Why? He did a good job at Apple, went into the "wild," learned a great deal, including some humility; so Apple would get someone who understands its culture but with the advantage of an outsider's perspective, brings more experience and is now more determined than ever to prove himself. Sounds exactly like the type of guy Apple needs, if you ask me.
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Former Apple Retail Head Ron Johnson Fired as CEO of JC Penney
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Why? He did a good job at Apple, went into the "wild," learned a great deal, including some humility; so Apple would get someone who understands its culture but with the advantage of an outsider's perspective, brings more experience and is now more determined than ever to prove himself. Sounds exactly like the type of guy Apple needs, if you ask me.
He was crap at Apple - why is everyone talking like he wasn't? He put profits ahead of employees and customers alike.
Edit: never mind. I mixed him up with John Browett.
Edit: never mind. I mixed him up with John Browett.
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He left Apple on his own to take over the challenge of reinvigorating JC Penny. He was fired from JC Penny as his ideas have not panned out.
Now we know why Tim Cook never replaced Bowett. He was waiting on Johnson to get the axe.
He did an incredible Job changing Target, hence Apple's interest in him. It's too bad for JC Penny, he's done some great work in the past.
He also oversaw the Michael Graves line and stuff like that too, bringing a more upscale feel to Target.The guy knows his stuff.
+1
It would be great, but I think we'll never see this.
Avie and Tevanian back at OS X team, a wet dream for Mac enthusiasts ...
I bet it was a struggle for Johnson from day one. I mean, for the last decade, he had been a part of something that's literally changed our world. He was dealing with customers and teams within Apple that were excited about the product and happy to be on the cutting edge of technology.
Contrast that to JCPenney. You're dealing with an old, tired business model that's trying to compete with online retailers. Most of the people at JCPenney from the executive management on down to most of the store managers are probably largely tired and lifeless when it comes to their jobs.
Those managers probably see the writing on the wall in terms of where the company is headed if they don't reinvigorate the brand; but they're probably so set in their ways that they're terrified to change much of anything.
Trying to get JCPenney's people to see themselves as -- and then to think and act like -- the Apple Retail teams was likely a doomed proposition from the start.
Contrast that to JCPenney. You're dealing with an old, tired business model that's trying to compete with online retailers. Most of the people at JCPenney from the executive management on down to most of the store managers are probably largely tired and lifeless when it comes to their jobs.
Those managers probably see the writing on the wall in terms of where the company is headed if they don't reinvigorate the brand; but they're probably so set in their ways that they're terrified to change much of anything.
Trying to get JCPenney's people to see themselves as -- and then to think and act like -- the Apple Retail teams was likely a doomed proposition from the start.
The stock spiked up 11% after hours on the news that Johnson was out. It then came crashing back down once traders realized that JC Penney is bringing their old CEO back. Steve Jobs, apparently, Mike Ulman is not.
Ron Johnson no Steve Jobs
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Originally Posted by anthony11
Yeah look at all the fallout from that Jobs guy doing just that.
The company didn't almost go bankrupt because of the departure of Ron Johnson. ie. Steve Jobs
Quote:
Originally Posted by anthony11
Yeah look at all the fallout from that Jobs guy doing just that.
The company didn't almost go bankrupt because of the departure of Ron Johnson. ie. Steve Jobs
All I can say to this is: You must have confused Ron with someone else, right?
There's literally no other response to this I can think of.
Exactly. The quality of the old Marshall Field's stores in particular took a hit when they changed to Macy's a few years ago. Field's stores were actually higher quality when Target owned them (I'm not sure if Johnson had any role back then).
Was pulling for Johnson at jcp. Went and bought $1000 in clothes there after he took over. The first time ive shopped there in ove a decade. The quality was very good, and I regularly received compliments. People were surprised they came from jcp. But the service was crap so i haven't felt like going back. Now that he's gone, I have no need to go back. They can keep thir coupons.
Yep. But you can't blame him for trying, especially considering he dropped a lot of his own coin to do so. He had a lot of success doing what he did at Apple, but he wanted to give being a CEO a chance. He tried and he quite obviously failed. It is what it is, but I agree that he was being more than a bit naive in trying to push the model he did for JC Penny. It's not to say it's a bad idea in concept, even for a clothing retailer, but it's just not going to work in a setting like that with the customer base they attracts. To build that model and make it work, I think you have to be starting at ground zero seeing as so much of it's success is tied to brand identity. JC Penny did not have the brand identity to pull off that kind of transition; it had the opposite of what was needed really.
I'm just surprised that Stephen Elop still has a job at Nokia, whose collapse over the same period makes JC Penney's seem small by comparison. When Elop took over, Nokia was the largest manufacturer of smartphones by revenue and volume. Now they aren't even in the top 5. True, Symbian had no future, but had Nokia decided to go with Android instead of Windows Phone, Samsung might have half the market share it does now, if that. They basically picked up all the market share that Nokia lost. Heck, even if they stuck with Symbian and Meego they'd probably be in better shape.
He did his best to refloat that old boat. Just too creaky and rotten, the crews deserting long ago and the passengers off in the steerage class of the scow WalMart.
Take him back. One has to admire his courage and undoubted hard work, and likely he learned a lot from that. Needs to be paid a bit less than he was though, just because.
Take him back. One has to admire his courage and undoubted hard work, and likely he learned a lot from that. Needs to be paid a bit less than he was though, just because.
The problem Ron had was he needed a few years to turn the stores around. He essentially was trying to turn JCPennies into a more trendy cool place to shop, but it couldn't be done over night on the money JC Pennies had in the bank. I hated Pennies before, but started liking them.
He started creating stores within stores and was updating the store interiors. I thought the stores were coming along nicely. I was in one yesterday. However, the problem was he had two sets of customers, none of whom were super happy. The people shopping there for years (older folks), and the people he was trying to bring in (but without the stores completely finished).
Probably John Browett. In both cases, it's a case of being a fish out of water. Browett came from the "Best Buy" of the UK and tried to turn the Apple Stores into Best Buy. Johnson tried to apply an Apple/Nordstrom business model to a middle-market retailer.
I think he could have pulled it off with more money and time, but obviously he had neither.
The problem was in the execution. It takes a long time to change an existing retailer. He lost the old customers before the new customers arrived. He should have test marketed first. If he saw that dropping coupons drove away so many customers in one market, he could have kept the coupons in the rest of the stores while gradually improving the quality of the merchandise. Hindsight is 20/20 of course, but I wouldn't be surprised if the next permanent CEO decides to implement a version of Johnson's strategy, but in slow motion.
Minor technicality but Dixons was the shop that closed around 10 years ago. Dixons Group PLC is the company he was the CEO of. They run PC World and Currys. You only ever see Dixons shops in airport terminals, and are a very minor part of the DGP business.
So technically the article should read "the CEO of British electronics retailer, Dixons Group PLC".
Saying he came from the "Best Buy" of the UK is a bit too kind. More like Circuit City. Interestingly Best Buy UK were actually pretty decently run, just had horrible prices. The shops were decent, and the staff seemed a hell of a lot more knowledgeable than those you find in any Dixons owned shop.
Agreed. You can't blame a guy a guy for wanting to try something different. He did good while at Apple, and he left on good terms.
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Mansfield never officially left thought, and was going to leave because of a personality conflict with Forstall who was fired.
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Seemed to work with Steve Jobs coming back. And he was fired.
Yeah. I only shop at macy's and drink fine wine from Walmart. Also, I couldn't stand to be seen driving anything less than a Honda civic. I appreciate fine quality products. Nothing less suits my exquisite tastes.
