Thrive Market Hires 4 Key Merchandising Execs
Thrive Market has made four key senior hires across its merchandising organization, with the goal of investing in its hyper-curated catalog and owned-brand innovation engine. The new team members are Kelly Nigh, VP of strategic merchandising initiatives; Natalie Wieder, VP, category management; Bri Waldoch, senior director, owned brands; and Yvette Lemieux, director, category management.
“Each brings deep industry expertise and a proven track record of scaling high-impact, member-first merchandising strategies,” noted Los Angeles-based Thrive, a mission-driven, membership-based e-tailer.
Nigh, who excels at harnessing data to drive growth and has a proven track record of leading cross-functional teams through complex, large-scale initiatives, was previously chief merchandising officer at Delanco, N.J.-based Misfits Market/Imperfect Foods, where she headed the category management, planning, and private label teams. While there, she grew product selection by 60% and played a key role in the post-merger integration of the two companies. She also boosted delivered margin per order by more than 55% through cost negotiation, shrink and freight optimization, and CX enhancements, and her innovative sourcing practices helped divert 55 million-plus pounds of food from waste.
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Before that, Nigh held multiple leadership roles at Seattle-based Amazon, including senior manager of special projects and head of global sourcing for softlines private brands. She was also BizTech leader for worldwide driver performance and rewards in Amazon Last Mile, supporting more than 1 million delivery partners worldwide, and WW product leader for international expansion, rolling out Amazon Flex in India, Canada and Japan. Additionally, Nigh led the Amazon Family program, a Prime acquisition and engagement initiative for new and expecting parents, and managed vendor management teams for the baby and computers categories.
Wieder brings a unique blend of category and product and engineering management experience to her new role of guiding the e-tailer’s category management teams across the entire portfolio of hyper-curated, high-quality selections. She recently spent eight years at Amazon in a range of businesses, among them Amazon Fresh, health and personal care, Amazon Pharmacy, private brands, and Amazon’s Baby Registry and Parent Experience. Most notably, she led the initiative to build Amazon’s FSA/HSA capabilities, enabling customers to use their benefits across Amazon health businesses.
Waldoch who now leads the strategy, development, and expansion of Thrive’s owned brand assortment, which is part of its hyper-curated catalog, has deep expertise in sourcing, product development and brand management. She joined Thrive Market from Philadelphia-based Gopuff, where her most recent role was head of private label. In this role, she oversaw the growth of Gopuff’s private brands and rolled out hundreds of food, beverage, and household products. Earlier in her career, she spent eight years at Minneapolis-based Target in sourcing, product development and merchandising, which included leading the owned brand snacks team.
Lemieux came to Thrive from Bellevue, Wash.-based MiLa, a frozen food startup where she was the head of digital product and customer lifecycle. Prior to MiLa, she spent nine years at Amazon leading category and product teams in apparel and kids’ devices. Before Amazon, she was a buyer at Target, with experience in home and perishables.
