• by Sarah Mahoney  @mahoney_sarah, January 4, 2023

Amy Hauk, chief executive officer of the Victoria’s Secret and Pink brand, is leaving the company after seven months.

In a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission dated Jan. 3, the company says Hauk notified the company last week and that she will stay in the role of brand CEO through the end of March.

At that point, Martin Waters, chief executive officer of Victoria’s Secret & Co., will assume her responsibilities.

Hauk had been promoted into the new role in July. She had been CEO of Pink, the company’s collection aimed at younger women, since 2018. Before that, she spent a decade in merchandising at Bath and Body Works. At that time, the company said her role would be to “ integrate merchandising, planning, marketing and creative teams to quickly apply best practices and consumer insights, speed the company’s test and learn agenda and better engage customers.”

The news comes as the New Albany, Ohio-based company completed its $400 million acquisition of AdoreMe, a popular D2C brand, and continues its transformation efforts.

AdoreMe will help Victoria’s Secret’s financials. The company says the deal “creates meaningful sales and profit upside opportunities… including the opportunity to leverage Adore Me’s expertise and technology to continue to improve the Victoria’s Secret and Pink customer shopping experience.”

It says AdoreMe generated an estimated $250 million in profitable sales in its latest fiscal year.

But Victoria’s Secret still has plenty of work to do, shaking off years of scandal and bad publicity. The larger story is while it continues to hang on as market leader, digital brands like ThirdLove, Aerie and AdoreMe constantly outperform it. Competing against other brands' inclusive sizing, appeal to diverse audiences and better fashion sense, the once-relevant Victoria’s Secret has become something of an afterthought for Gen Z.

In its latest quarterly results, Victoria’s Secret announced that sales fell 9% to $1.32 billion for the third quarter, down from $1.44 billion in the prior year. Comparable sales fell 11%. For the coming quarter, it anticipates a decline in the high-single digits.

Net income dropped to $24 million from $75 million in the prior period.