N Brown beefs up board with trio of appointments

Catalogue and online shopping group N Brown has appointed three new non-executive directors, including Glaswegian lawyer Fiona Laird.

The owner of the Jacamo and Simply Be brands said Laird, who is a senior vice president of human resources at consumer goods giant Unilever, will also chair its remuneration committee.

She joins the board on 1 April along with Ron McMillan, deputy chairman of PwC’s Middle East business, and Simon Patterson of investment firm Silver Lake.

The appointments were overseen by former newsreader Anna Ford, who has been an independent non-executive at N Brown for four years.

Chairman Andrew Higginson said: “Together with Anna Ford, I believe we will have a strong group of independent non-executive directors who will complement the executive team at N Brown and form a great leadership team to take the business forward.”

The Manchester-based retailer, which is due to publish its full-year results on 24 April, recently reported a 7.9 per cent rise in like-for-like sales for the 19 weeks to 12 January.