Athayde resigns as Regis CEO as hair salon firm's value plunges

Felipe Athayde, chief executive of Regis Corp., resigned Thursday after about 15 months leading the Minneapolis-based franchisor of hair salons.

The company's board of directors named Matthew Doctor as interim CEO while it conducts a search for a successor.

The news shook up the value of a company that has been under pressure all year from investors. Regis shares fell 15.5% to $1.69 a share, which appeared to be an all-time low. The company has lost about 80% of its value this year.

Athayde, who received a $2.5 million signing bonus when he took the helm, continued to change the ownership mix of the company's salons started by his predecessor.

"The Board is grateful for Felipe's leadership and the franchise expertise he brought to our transformed business model," David Grissen, chairman of Regis' board of directors, said in a statement.

"Felipe assembled and developed a stellar team, Matt [Doctor] included, with complementary skill sets across operations, development, technology, recruiting and finance," Grissen added.

Doctor, who has experience in franchise operations with several restaurant operations, was a consultant to Regis before being named as executive vice president and chief strategy officer in February.

In a related move, the board announced that Jim Lain, president of Regis' franchise operation, was appointed its chief operating officer.

Prior to joining Regis, Athayde was the Americas president of Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen Inc. In September 2020, Athayde succeeded Hugh Sawyer as CEO.

Sawyer began the process of converting Regis' mix of company- and franchise-owned salons to an asset-light model of all franchise-owned salons. Athayde announced in August that that process was complete.

However, Regis is still being affected by the pandemic. When the coronavirus outbreak happened in early 2020, salons were closed by mandate. Throughout this year, Regis franchisees continued to deal with labor and staffing issues.

In announcing its latest quarterly results, Regis last month said revenue decreased 30% to $78 million, primarily from exiting some corporate-owned locations, from the year-ago period.

Compared to the previous sequential quarter, however, revenue was up 8%, executives told analysts on a call. While that signaled some recovery, Regis missed profit expectations for the eighth-straight quarter.

According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Athayde will remain an employee and board member of Regis through March 19.