Michael Jordan
Jay R Kent
Sr. Consultant
Jay brings more than 30 years of experience to FitForCommerce with deep expertise in retail operations, supply chain, omnichannel and 3rd party logistics for major retailers and brand manufacturers.
Prior to joining FitForCommerce, Jay was the Chief Supply Chain Officer for General Nutrition Centers (GNC), a $2.7B operation, where he was responsible for end-to-end supply chain for 9,100 stores worldwide in over 50 countries. In this role, he successfully oversaw and optimized omnichannel fulfillment, manufacturing, wholesale, and contract sales business. Among other efforts, he developed and implemented strategic initiatives to improve working capital by $90M in 2017 and developed strategic direction for Domestic, Omni Channel and International Supply Chain for retail, wholesale and direct businesses. He was responsible for network study, site selection, real estate negotiations, state/local incentives and material handling design/installation for Greenfield operations, resulting in 35% improvement in productivity and 40% improvement in store service
Before GNC, Jay was Executive Vice President of Supply Chain at Tiger Direct/Systemax Corporation, responsible for end-to-end supply chain, distribution, transportation, fulfillment, inventory productivity, and planning/allocation. He improved company profitability by reducing total logistics costs as a percent to sales by 17% in 18 months through expense reduction and efficiency improvements and developed Open to Buy/Forecasting tools to reduce inventory levels by 20% or $80M from previous year while improving sales, in-stock percentages and turn.
Jay has also held senior executive leadership positions for Kohl’s Department Stores, Linens N Things, Macy’s, and Toys R Us.
Jay received a BA in Economics from Wisconsin’s Ripon College.