Gregg Smith, Sr. Director of Loss Prevention for The Children's Place, completes his first year in this senior LP position

By Gus Downing
Publisher & Editor

The Children’s Place is the largest pure-play children’s specialty apparel retailer in North America. The Company designs, contracts to manufacture and sells fashionable, high-quality merchandise at value prices, primarily under the proprietary "The Children’s Place" brand name. As of April 28, 2012, the Company operated 1,062 stores and an online store at www.childrensplace.com and operates throughout North America.

With his first year behind him, Gregg took the time with us at the Daily to reflect on some of the LP department’s accomplishments. When Gregg joined The Children's Place he was challenged to improve performance and elevate the program to best in class.

Gregg initially focused on assessing the team and the structure of the department and quickly made the necessary changes to elevate the talent and better align the department with the store organization. He initiated and chairs a cross-functional task force to gather input and ideas regarding existing and new LP programs, as well as to solidify corporate support and expedite the change process.

Gregg's four primary initiatives were field engagement, technology deployment, training, and creating a metric management process to measure performance and improve LP results. The LP assessment process now is automated with the goal of improving awareness and operational compliance.

Over the last year Gregg and his team have begun making significant strides by reorganizing the department, creating the corporate task force, focusing on four key initiatives to improve LP results, and automating the assessment process. With a solid start behind him, Gregg looks forward to accelerating the LP department’s progress over the coming year.

We at the Daily would like to congratulate Gregg and his team on a job well done.