Petco Animal Supplies Inc. has eliminated a position on its e-commerce marketing team, meaning industry veteran Gordon Magee will leave the company within a few months.
Magee was the Internet marketing and media manager at catalog and web retailer of pet supplies, Drs. Foster & Smith, for 13 years. In early 2015, Petco acquired that merchant for an undisclosed sum, and the two have been operating as standalone brands online since.
The layoff is a result of organizational changes at the company, though there are no plans for more layoffs, according to a Petco spokeswoman. The e-retailer would not say whether the Drs. Foster & Smith e-commerce site will be folded in with Petco.com in the future.
The move comes on the heels of two new e-commerce hires at Petco. Jodi Watson, formerly of footwear and apparel maker Wolverine Worldwide Inc., was hired in March as its first senior vice president of Petco Direct. Spencer Insolia, who has worked at IBM Corp. and Target Corp., was hired at the same time, as vice president of Petco and president of the Drs. Foster & Smith business.
Wolverine Worldwide is No. 257 in the Internet Retailer 2016 Top 500 Guide; Target is No. 22.
Magee will remain with Drs. Foster & Smith for the next few months to help oversee some organizational changes. After that, he will seek a new position in consulting or Internet marketing.
Petco’s acquisition of Drs. Foster & Smith was a major boost to the size of the retailer’s e-commerce operation, as Petco—primarily a bricks-and-mortar player—brought in an Internet Retailer-estimated $83.1 million in online sales in 2014. Drs. Foster & Smith was more than double that size when Petco bought it, with an estimated $221.4 million in e-commerce sales that same year.
Combining the two companies gave Petco a 283.7% increase in online sales in 2015, which makes Petco the third-fastest growing retailer in the 2016 Top 500 Guide.
In a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission document Petco filed in August 2015, the merchant disclosed that when combining sales through its four e-commerce sites—Petco.com, DrsFosterSmith.com, LiveAquaria.com and Unleashed.com–it generated more than $185 million in online sales during the first two quarters of fiscal 2015, making it the “largest integrated e-commerce offering in pet specialty retail.”
Petco is No. 114 in the Top 500.
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