Swati S Kelkar

With a reputation for delivering speed, margin, and sustainable growth in global retail, I joined the company as chief sourcing officer, in charge of turning around the product department, during which time I cut headcount, while prioritizing team building and professional growth roadmaps. Reporting to the CEO and board, we began by balancing funding requirements with retail constraints, driving consolidation, and addressing major shifts in the supply chain.

At Kit and Ace, which was founded by Chip Wilson and Shannon Wilson, the former lead designer of Lululemon, I was brought on board by private investors to deliver profitability, stabilize operations, amplify the company brand, and set the financial foundation to offset prior-year losses. I reported directly to the president (Shannon Wilson), CEO, and board. Adept at transforming complex challenges into growth, resilience and measurable impact, positive revenue and sales were achieved with a rock-solid product vision and strategic and cross-functional partnerships, which proved instrumental in introducing a profitable product architecture (right price, value, and quality). Delivering positive EBITDA within 18 months, I prioritized a cost discipline, reengineered sourcing, and eliminated factors that eroded profit margin. Additionally, I scaled EBIT contribution from sub -5% margin to 15% by overhauling digital operations, optimizing CAC, and improving conversion via UX redesign and CRM integration. To increase AUR by 14%+ and gross margin by 300bps, I implemented new pricing and product architecture. By diversifying country of origin, negotiating vendor terms, and consolidating manufacturing, we saved $10M+ in landed costs and strengthened supply chain resilience. To increase inventory turns from 2.4x to 3.6x, I cut $8M+ from working capital requirements and 30% of end-of-season liability. To minimize business risk, I built internal and external inventory strategies. At the same time, I optimized inventory and introduced a strategic fulfillment strategy to balance growth and margins. Driving transformation that delivers financial results while investing in people, innovation, and resilience, I overhauled our physical retail footprint to ramp up store productivity, decrease fixed overhead, and enhance the omnichannel customer experience.

Able to build organizations that are not only operationally strong, but also agile, values-driven, and future-ready, I was brought on board to head up and streamline the men’s and accessories growth roadmap as well as build a new women’s and accessories business from the ground up; this included a new team structure, budget, and processes. Reporting directly to Kenneth Cole, I mapped out private equity operations and implemented a long-term global sourcing roadmap. As someone who can navigate disruption with clarity, drive results without chaos, and build trust across functions, cultures, and partners, I proceeded to diversify our sourcing mix in Asia, LATAM, and nearshore regions, which improved our gross margin by ~8%, saved $11M YoY, and mitigated COO exposure. Add to this optimizing our fabric strategy and vendor performance, negotiating longer payment terms, and building a competitive margin goal structure. To improve our margin by 200+ basis points, it necessitated strategic fabric platforming, duty engineering, and long-term vendor partnerships based on shared cost-down initiatives. Capitalizing on speed-tiered sourcing, pre-booking raw material, as well as aligning design, merchandising, and vendor partners, we reduced our lead times by 35%. On the people side, I established an organizational culture around global sourcing and supply chain, ensuring a high sense of urgency, accountability, and commitment to value-added services as the organization supported retail, wholesale and DTC, and international divisions. Raising the bar in product development, I rolled out agile methodologies and aligned calendar milestones for cross-functional teams across all divisions in order to shave 25% from our development cycle.

After the company relocated, my first order of business was removing a growth bottleneck within the resource allocation function in support of company expansion. Reporting directly to the Chief Product Officer, I focused on ensuring timely product delivery and initializing a sourcing strategy that would deliver a positive bottom-line impact. Critical success factors were establishing a seasonal chase model, vendor score carding and risk assessment tools, and strategic partnerships. No easy feat to direct a multiyear sourcing transformation, but I led my team to consolidate the vendor base by 40%, shift 15% of production to nearshore/low-duty regions, minimize tariff exposure, and cut average lead times by 3 weeks. By cost engineering core product categories, we improved our gross margin by 250 bps. Raising our full-price sell-through by 12% was the result of a seasonal chase model. In addition, we decreased material costs by 18% and enhanced delivery reliability during volatile supply chain periods through fabric platforming.

Progressing my career with American Eagle Outfitters, I launched the very first formalized product development and profitable margin structures for two key divisions ($1B+ Aerie Division and $25M M+O Division). A prolific five years, I delivered 15% in SG&A savings by restructuring product, supply chain, and corporate overhead costs, saved $30M+ from landed costs, and consistently improved margins by ~7% to 8% YOY.

Having started out as Senior Director of Product/Technical Design & Quality Assurance (1995 – 2003) at Club Monaco (CM) in Toronto, Canada, I oversaw technical design and a 42-person team responsible for sourcing, QA, and human rights/compliance. Following the company’s acquisition by Ralph Lauren, I was retained as 1 of 2 CM executives and relocated to NYC and went on to launch 3 new product categories in less than 12 months. During this time, I increased sales 20% YoY, cut single-country reliance from 70% to 45%, slashed 22% of defect-related product returns, delivered $8M savings, and trimmed 3 weeks from seasonal development timelines. One of the most rewarding parts of my leadership journey was mentoring my executive assistant at CM, who later became VP of Product for LVMH in Paris. I saw her potential early on as analytical, reliable, and highly coachable due to her willingness to learn and grow.