Mitchell & Ness Naps Jordan Exec to Be Its New CEO – WWD

Mitchell & Ness has a brand new head honcho.

The sports activities attire model has named Eli Kumekpor as its subsequent chief government officer, efficient instantly. He succeeds Kevin Wulff, who can be retiring on Friday.

Mitchell & Ness is a part of the Fanatics Commerce enterprise and Kumekpor can be based mostly in Irvine, California, and report back to Joe Bozich, Fanatics’ CEO of vertical manufacturers. 

Fanatics acquired Mitchell & Ness in 2022 alongside a strategic possession group comprised of a few of the most distinguished names in sports activities, leisure and enterprise together with Jay-Z, Maverick Carter, the D’Amelio household and others. Since that point, the model has added new rights throughout a number of leagues, schools and gamers associations, together with a brand new league-wide licensing cope with the Nationwide Hockey League and an expanded headwear and reversion jersey catalog with Main League Baseball.

Kumekpor, a 20-plus 12 months veteran, was most lately at Nike, the place he served as international vice chairman and basic supervisor of the Jordan Model’s males’s enterprise and led the technique and execution for the model’s multibillion-dollar omnichannel enterprise. As well as, he served as co-chair of the Nike Black Worker Community and was a member of the Nike Black Neighborhood Dedication Taskforce.

“Eli has an unbelievable background that features a number of years main one of many world’s most progressive, beloved manufacturers,” stated Bozich, who believes Kumekpor can take the model “to the subsequent stage in addition to convey an elevated product mindset to all the pieces Fanatics designs and makes. Eli can be centered on combining Mitchell & Ness’ momentum as a number one supplier of high-quality classic and way of life sports activities attire with the facility of the bigger Fanatics platform and community, creating new avenues for important progress for the model.”

Previous to Nike, Kumekpor spent greater than a decade within the healthcare business at AstraZeneca, Alcon, Life Applied sciences and Cigna. He additionally spent a number of years at Deloitte Consulting specializing in M&A method.

“For generations, Mitchell & Ness has sat at an extremely distinctive crossroads weaving sports activities, tradition, way of life and trend, and I couldn’t be extra excited to be on this place to usher within the subsequent period of such an iconic model,” Kumekpor stated. “I’ve lengthy admired what Mitchell & Ness means to our tradition at giant, and I look ahead to working carefully with the workforce and the broader Fanatics group to develop our presence and uncover new alternatives to ship elevated worth to our followers and companions world wide.”

Mitchell & Ness was based in Philadelphia in 1904 as a sporting items firm.