Couche-Tard appoints Erica Fortune as chief digital officer
Couche-Tard has appointed Erica Fortune as its new chief digital officer.
According to the executive bio published on its corporate website, Fortune worked as senior vice-president, ecommerce and chief product management officer with Advance Auto Parts and as senior vice-president, e-commerce at Big Lots for eight years.
At Big Lots, a home discount retailer operating more than 1,300 stores in 48 states, she oversaw the company’s development and deployment of its e-commerce platform.
Fortune’s appointment comes as Couche-Tard looks to open an virtual convenience store as part of its work with McGill University which the company entered into a partnership with the university’s Bensadoun School of Retail Management to develop and test technologies that address the retail sector’s challenges of the future.
READ: Alimentation Couche-Tard earnings fall as consumers watch spending
“By combining artificial intelligence and retail management, this retail innovation lab at the Bensadoun School of Retail Management will allow our researchers to develop new initiatives and technologies to improve the customer experience for the retail sector with the help of industry partners,” said Professor Morty Yalovsky, dean of McGill’s Desautels Faculty of Management upon the announcement of the partnership. “We are excited to welcome one of Canada’s largest retailers, Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., as the first industry partner of our lab to help shape the future of retail during this pivotal moment in history.”
In July, Couche-Tard announced that appointment of Mark Ostoits to senior vice-president of operations last month. Earlier, he had been a vice-president overseeing Couche-Tard’s Southeast region.
