Barbie Can’t Save Her Boss as Mattel CEO Fired

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Jan 12, 12:44AM EST · Published Apr 20, 6:20AM EDT

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Barbie Can’t Save Her Boss as Mattel CEO Fired — © Thinkstock

Mattel Inc. (NYSE: MAT) lost another chief executive officer. Even strong sales of Barbie dolls could not salvage the company’s most recent quarter, and CEO Margo Georgiadis was sacked.

Georgiadis did not last very long. Mattel tried to spin the decision, but the troubles it has had are transparent.

The announcement read:

Mattel, Inc. today announced that the Board of Directors has named Ynon Kreiz, a Mattel director since June 2017, as Chief Executive Officer effective April 26, 2018. Margo Georgiadis, who became Mattel’s CEO in February 2017, has informed the Board of her decision to step down from her executive and Board roles to pursue a new opportunity in the technology sector. Ms. Georgiadis will serve in an advisory role at Mattel through May 10, 2018 to ensure a smooth transition.

That is only 14 months, which even for a company in dire need of a turnaround is not a very long time.

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In the most recently reported quarter, Mattel’s sales fell 16% to $1.6 billion. It lost $281 million, after a $173 million profit in the same period of last year. Much of the blame for the poor results was put on the Toys “R” Us bankruptcy, as the failed retailer was a major outlet for Mattel toys.

In the period, sales of Barbie, Mattel’s most famous product, rose 9%. The ancient toy, now in its 59th year on the market, could not counterbalance poor results at other units. In particular, the American Girl brand sputtered:

Fourth quarter worldwide gross sales for American Girl Brands were $217.3 million, down 23% as reported and in constant currency, versus the prior year’s fourth quarter, primarily driven by lower sales across channels.

Mattel’s shares have had a rough ride, down 46% in the past year to $13.45. Over the same period, the S&P 500 is up 22%.

Mattel’s rough attempt at recovery has been blamed on the lack of enough new age, electronic toys. It does market mobile apps for its toys, but that apparently is not enough.

After a period when sales dropped, Barbie is back in business, but not enough to save one more fired CEO’s job.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.