BS People: Philip Auld

Experienced pair of hands

When Philip Auld joins Tata’s retailing arm, Trent, as its chief executive officer (CEO) by the end of this month, working with department chain Westside, modelled on the lines of UK’s iconic retail chain Marks & Spencer (M&S), it may give Auld a sense of deja vu.

The reason: Auld has worked with both M&S (as head of selling womenswear) and M&S Mode, a Netherlands-based female fashion retailer that was part of the Maxeda Retail Group BV. At M&S Mode, he oversaw the operations of 400 stores in seven European countries in which it operated.

Auld played a key role in making M&S Mode a leading fashion brand in Europe. In December 2010, the group sold the chain to Excellent Retail Brands Group, which runs formats like Cool Cat, America Today and Wonder Woman.

Before joining M&S Mode, Auld was the head of clothing at Walmart-owned supermarket, Asda.

All of Auld’s fashion retail experience in Europe will come handy in steering the 13-yeard-old Trent, which is reinventing itself by adding a gourmet section and designer brands and chalking out aggressive expansion plans for Westside. The department store chain plans to touch the 100-store mark in four years.

However, some say filling into the shoes of Noel Tata, former managing director of Trent, is going to be challenging, given that Tata oversaw the growth of the company from a single store in 1998 to over 90, and maintained the profitability of the company even during the tough times.