Kim Roether is preparing to stand down by the middle of June as vice-chairman of the board at Intersport International Corporation (IIC) and chief executive of Intersport Deutschland, citing personal reasons.
An assembly of Intersport staff members was informed earlier this week about the resignation. Roether has been on the management board at Intersport Deutschland since October 2007, and he has been its chairman since 2014. Knud Hansen, chairman of the supervisory board at Intersport Deutschland, said in a statement that Roether had been instrumental in driving the performance of the group and its transformation.
Intersport said Roether would be replaced on the board of Intersport Deutschland on an interim basis by Harald Schedl. He is a consultant and a member of the organization's supervisory board, but this mandate will be suspended until a permanent chief executive is appointed. Intersport said this would occur promptly.
This comes as Intersport is adjusting its management structure with the appointment of Mathias Boenke as part of Intersport Deutschland's executive team, reporting directly to the supervisory board. He has been placed in charge of a new division that will deal with sales, marketing, merchandising and other aspects of the business relating to stores trading under the Intersport banner.
Boenke has been the managing director of Intersport Austria, which is owned by Intersport Deutschland, since April 2014. In this position, he has helped to drive robust expansion for Intersport in the country. Its sales jumped by 17 percent to €0.53 billion in Austria last year, with a comparable sales rise of 15 percent and a network of 295 stores at the end of the year.
His appointment from June 15 is meant to reinforce the Intersport brand and its omni-channel transformation in Germany. He will remain in charge of Intersport Austria, working from two offices in Heilbronn and Wels.
The Intersport brand is used by nearly half of the roughly 1,800 stores affiliated with Intersport Deutschland in the five countries that it covers: Germany, Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. Intersport wants to convince more of them to start using the brand, in order to fully take advantage of the impact of the group.
Intersport Germany has been supportive of the changes implemented by IIC in the last year, with the launch of a more engaging, multi-specialist and multi-channel retail concept, which was first implemented in Germany with Intersport's Future Stores in Berlin. Both pilots started last October, and Intersport Sauer in Bad Hersfeld was the first owner-managed store to take up the concept.
The management of Intersport Germany already changed earlier this year with the departure of Jochen Schnell, the former executive board member in charge of market development. The sole permanent member after Roether's departure will be Hannes Rumer, Intersport Deutschland's chief financial officer. The group said that the executive board would be permanently reduced to two members after the appointment of Roether's replacement.
The structural change with the launch of the Intersport division suggests that the organization could set up a second entity to support retailers trading under their own banners. Intersport Deutschland has formed a partnership with the Signa Sports group, which is again another type of arrangement.
