After a very disappointing year in 2012, Body Central Corp. is putting the past behind it and starting fresh in 2013.
"2012 is over and we are not happy with the results," Chief Executive Officer Brian Woolf told shareholders at Wednesday's annual meeting at The River Club.
"The question is, why is 2013 going to be different than 2012?" said Woolf, who joined the Jacksonville-based fashion retailer in February.
One reason shareholders are hoping for better times is the appointment of Woolf, who was brought in after Body Central completely overhauled its management in the wake of 2012 results.
Body Central recorded its highest revenue ever at $311 million last year and its second-highest net income of $11.9 million.
However, shareholders focused on the sharp 8.1 percent drop in comparable-store sales. Comparable-store sales are sales at stores open for more than one year and are considered by analysts to be the key metric in evaluating retailers.
After same-store sales began dropping a year ago, Body Central's stock plunged from a high of $30.93 in the spring of 2012 to a low of $7.71 by last summer.
That prompted the board of directors to make sweeping changes.
"Body Central is a unique and very special company," said Donna Ecton, newly elected chairman of the board.
"In 2012 it became apparent that a new direction was needed," she said.
Ecton, chairman and CEO of management consulting firm EEI Inc., has been a Body Central director since 2011 but was elected chairman at a board meeting on Tuesday.
She succeeds John Haley, a retired partner of accounting firm Ernst & Young, although Haley remains on the board of directors.
Ecton said Woolf's passion for the business impressed the board.
"Brian is a proven pro who instills excitement for this business," she said.
Although he has been on the job for only three months, Woolf already is taking steps to turn the sales trends around.
He has brought in a number of new high-level executives in merchandising and other areas, searching for the best combination of "brainpower and horsepower" to run the business, he said.
Body Central, which operates 281 stores in 26 states, is working on a prototype to replace its "somewhat old and tired" store model, Woolf said.
"We need to be more modern," he said.
The company is hoping to roll out the prototype in 2014.
Woolf said Body Central is working to establish a brand identity and doing customer research around the country.
He said the company expects to remain with its current target market of women 18 to 29 years old, but it hasn't done any extensive customer research in more than a year.
Body Central also has opened an office in New York so it can keep tabs on the latest fashion trends.
"What we heard in the field is we are slow in fashion," Woolf said.
Before Woolf joined the company, Body Central revealed plans to moves its headquarters and distribution facility from Jacksonville's Southside to One Imeson Center in North Jacksonville.
City Council approved Jacksonville's share of $1.39 million in incentives for the move in January.
Woolf said after the meeting Wednesday that the company expects to start the build-out of its new offices in the next two to three weeks, and is hoping to move in sometime between October and January.
Despite the disappointing sales results in 2012, Body Central remains in a strong financial position. It ended the year with more than $40 million in cash on hand and no debt.
"Even during our tough times we were able to conserve our cash," Woolf said.
Body Central's sales slump continued in the first quarter this year. The company two weeks ago reported that total revenue fell 1.5 percent to $81.4 million and comparable-store sales dropped by 10.2 percent.
Woolf said after the first-quarter earnings were released that the company doesn't expect to see results of its new initiatives until the second half of this year, and he reiterated that Wednesday.
"We're a company in transition and we're not seeing the immediate results yet," he said.
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