Good morning! Canada’s finance minister resigns, Vera Wang agrees to be acquired, and Bath and Body Works is ready for the holiday season. Have a lovely Tuesday.
- Holiday shopping. Earlier this fall, as Bath and Body Works customers were preparing to fill their carts on Black Friday and during the retailer's even bigger annual shopping event—Candle Day—CEO Gina Boswell made a purchase of her own. The chief executive bought 6,000 shares of her own company's stock, totaling $177,852.
"I looked at it and I thought, wow, that is a value," Boswell told me recently in a conversation at the New York Stock Exchange after she rang the opening bell. "A value-seeking customer does the same thing."
Boswell took over the CEO job exactly two years ago, following a career at Unilever, Avon, and Ford. Bath and Body Works' share price is down about 6% this year. Boswell's strategy for the company revolves around "five Es:" elevating the brand, extending its reach into new categories and geographies, engaging the customer, enabling seamless experience, and enhancing operational excellence. By buying her own stock, she wanted to send a message. "That's a level of confidence that I do have," she says.
Under her leadership, Bath and Body Works has taken steps toward some of those goals. The Fortune 500 company (ranked No. 481 with $7.4 billion in revenue) known for its candles, lotions, and hand sanitizers has introduced new categories, like a men's line and laundry products that use some of its signature scents. It's collaborated with Netflix on lines of candles and personal care products that evoke both Bridgerton and Emily in Paris.
This season, its efforts are all coming together. The company whose products are in 40% of American households hires 30,000 seasonal retail workers for the holidays. The true holiday shopping season was five days shorter than usual this year thanks to a late Thanksgiving, but Boswell says customers started shopping earlier than Black Friday. "You have to bring it," she says of the shortened season.
While Black Friday was important for Bath and Body Works across its categories, its biggest sales day by far is Candle Day, when on the first weekend in December this year three-wick candles were discounted to $9.95 from sticker prices around $25. The company is trying to expand the Candle Day recipe for all its categories, introducing other discount events like "body care day."
Holiday planning for 2025 is already underway. When it comes to another hot topic for Fortune 500 CEOs—Donald Trump's expected tariffs—Boswell feels prepared; 85% of the company's manufacturing happens in North America, she says. Her seat, however, gives her great insight into the American consumer—for whom it all comes down to value. "They'll spend—but they're very choiceful around what they put in their basket."
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
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