HanesBrands Inc. sold off its Champion brand last year, and now the group is losing its leader.
The company turned in better-than-expected fourth-quarter profits and was positive in its outlook for 2025, but Steve Bratspies, who’s been chief executive officer of the company for nearly five years, said he would leave at the end of this year or when a successor is found.
Word of the departure caught analysts and investors by surprise, sending shares of HanesBrands down 17.8 percent to $6.31 in midday trading, leaving it with a market cap of $2.2 billion.
After years of restructuring and streamlining, the company positioned the departure as a natural evolution that comes at a good time for the business.
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Bill Simon, chairman, said in a statement that HanesBrands had “reached a positive and important inflection point in executing our strategy and looking ahead to the next leg of the company’s journey, the board, in concurrence with Steve, has decided that now is the right time to initiate a search for our next CEO.”
Simon thanked Bratspies for leading the company through “a turbulent period in our industry, overhauling the company’s operating model, completing the sale of the Champion business and positioning HanesBrands as a global powerhouse in basics and innerwear. Under Steve’s leadership, the company has narrowed its focus and is now on track to deliver even stronger performance and increased shareholder returns in the coming years.”
The board is working with Spencer Stuart to find a successor.
Bratspies, who was chief merchandising officer at Walmart Inc. before joining HanesBrands, told analysts on a conference call that he was in “lockstep” with the board on succession and saw “a great window of opportunity for a smooth transition.”
“We shifted from a global holding company to a global operating company, where we leverage and share our brands, innovation, marketing, talent and supply chain capabilities around the world,” the CEO said.
“We entered 2025 as a new company, a more simplified focused business with a powerful asset base, significant competitive advantages and multiple levers to create shareholder value over the next several years,” the CEO said. “We’re a global powerhouse in innerwear and basic apparel, operating in a brand-driven category that is core and essential to consumers. We own market-leading brands, including Hanes, Bonds, Maidenform and Bali.”
Now somebody else will step in to push the business forward, and should benefit from some momentum.
Net sales rose 4.5 percent to $888.5 million for the fourth quarter ended Dec. 28, but losses from discontinued operations — HanesBrands sold Champion to Authentic Brands Group in September — hit the bottom line hard.
Net losses tallied $12.9 million, including a $58.5 million loss from discontinued operations.
But adjusted earnings per share came in at 17 cents, 3 cents ahead of the 14 cents analysts projected, according to Yahoo Finance.
This year, HanesBrands is looking for its continuing operations to log sales of $3.47 billion to $3.52 billion, from $3.51 billion last year.
Adjusted earnings per share are projected to range from 51 cents to 55 cents, in-line with the 53 cents Wall Street had penciled in.
