M&S bolsters clothing business with senior hires

Marks and Spencer has announced it is strengthening its Clothing and Home leadership team through two new hires, who are both set to “play an important role” in the development of its Never the Same Again programme.

The programme, launched last year, is focused on the group becoming “more relevant, more often to customers both now and post-Covid”, with a particular focus on developing its clothing offering.

Anna Braithwaite will be joining as director of Clothing and Home Marketing to lead M&S’s conversation with millions of UK customers. She will join this summer from Tesco, where she is currently global brand director for non-food and leads on sustainability.

She has a “breadth” of marketing experience from over 15 years in the retail fashion industry, including over ten years at John Lewis, and will now lead the streamlined marketing team made up of creative and channels experts. The team will focus on quality, style and trusted value with emphasis on M&S’s hero categories and opportunities for growth. 

Fiona Lambert will also join M&S later this month as the managing director of Jaeger, which was bought out of administration by M&S last month. Whilst Jaeger will be part of the M&S group, it will operate as a separate independent business reporting directly into Richard Price, who leads the Clothing and Home team. 

Lambert is experienced at “defining and transforming” brands and will lead the brand repositioning of Jaeger, supporting the team to “revive the heritage in a relevant, contemporary, and commercial way”. 

She has vast experience in defining and transforming brands, including the launch of George at ASDA, and oversaw the creation of its Home brand from scratch. Other notable industry experience includes time at Next, Dunelm and River Island. 

Commenting on the appointments, Richard Price, M&S Clothing and Home MD said: “Our Never the Same Again programme is about being more relevant, more often to our customers. 

“Showing up as a brand with energy, confidence & style is crucial to this and so I’m delighted Anna Braithwaite is joining as our new Clothing & Home Marketing Director to lead how we talk to our millions of customers across the UK, however they chose to shop with us.”

He added: “Alongside this, as we turbocharge our online proposition with new brands, we’re committed to reinvigorating Jaeger whilst retaining its much-loved brand heritage – and we’ll do through a dedicated team led by Fiona Lambert who is experienced in transforming clothing brands. 

“As a wider team we remain committed to offering our customers relevant products & services for how they’re living and working both today and in the future, and we’re looking forward to Anna & Fiona playing a role in our accelerated transformation.”