Dive Brief:

• E-grocer Imperfect Foods announced on Tuesday that it has tapped Dan Park, who has nearly three decades of experience at retail and technology companies, as its new chief executive officer.
• Park most recently served as the CEO of BuildDirect Technologies, a Canada-based online marketplace for building materials, and previously worked at Amazon, Target and Payless. He joined Imperfect Foods on Jan. 3. 
• The change in top leadership follows a string of c-suite departures last year, including the previous CEO, and rounds of layoffs among employees for the company. 

Dive Insight:

Imperfect Foods is looking to regain its footing with a chief executive who has extensive experience in retail and digital technology. 

Park worked at BuildDirect for four years and took the company public last summer. He remains a member of the company's board. Prior to BuildDirect, Park worked at Amazon for nearly seven years in senior management roles within the company's B2B and consumer electronics segments, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Before that, he was a division senior vice president of product development at Collective Brands for two years, vice president of merchandise distribution at Payless for nearly three years and a senior group manager at Target for three years, where he was responsible for strategy and operations support for the retailer's sourcing services. 

Park's predecessor, Philip Behn, left a few months ago after the company’s board reportedly pushed him out following several rounds of layoffs and financial challenges as the initial shopping surge it had experienced early in the pandemic reversed, Business Insider reported last fall.

Behn, who joined Imperfect Foods in late 2019 after nearly 10 years at Walmart, is currently an independent investor and advisor, according to his LinkedIn profile. Along with Behn’s exit, Imperfect Foods' chief financial officer, chief product and growth officer, and chief merchandising officer also departed the company last year.

Imperfect Foods announced early last year that it had raised $95 million in a Series D funding round that pushed its valuation past $700 million, per Bloomberg. The company said it planned to use the funds to double capacity and product assortment in its existing facilities and also grow its private label offerings. The financing came after the company saw triple-digit growth in 2020, ending that year with a revenue run rate above $500 million. 

But the company overestimated its revenue following the early pandemic surge in online shopping and hired too many employees, Business Insider reported. As shoppers returned to in-store shopping last year, Imperfect Foods struggled to meet its sales goals.

In announcing Park’s appointment, the company reiterated its previously stated goal of becoming a net-zero organization by 2030. 

Founded in 2015, Imperfect Foods has made sustainability and reducing food waste core to its mission and has recently expanded into packaged grocery products and home goods, including private label selections. In the fall, the company became certified as a B Corporation for its sustainability efforts.