Caleres (NYSE: CAL)

Diane Sullivan, Chairman of the Board and CEO, Caleres

Diane Sullivan is the Chairman and CEO of Caleres, a more than $2 billion portfolio of global footwear brands that includes Sam Edelman, Famous Footwear, Allen Edmonds, Naturalizer, Vionic, and Dr. Scholl’s Shoes. Sullivan joined the company as president in 2004 and was named chief operating officer in 2006. In 2007, she was elected to the board of directors, became chief executive officer in 2011, and was named chairman of the board in 2014. Under her leadership, Caleres transformed from a company that sells shoes to a company that builds brands by using deep consumer insights to create powerful consumer connections.Sullivan was named the Footwear News Person of the Year in 2018 and 2013, and has been consistently named in the top 10 of the annual Footwear News Power 100 Most Influential Designers, Influencers and Leaders in the Shoe Industry over the last decade. In 2021, she was named to the inaugural Fairchild Media Women in Power list. Sullivan’s philanthropic passion for the shoe industry, gender parity, education, and healthcare was celebrated in 2017 when she received the Footwear News Icon Award for Social Impact. She has been recognized by the Women’s Forum of New York for her commitment to gender parity, with more than 50 percent women on the Caleres Board of Directors. Sullivan serves on the board of the Two Ten Footwear Foundation and was one of the founders of Two Ten's Women in the Footwear Industry community (WIFI). She serves on the board of Enterprise Holdings and the Gateway Arch Park Foundation. She is also an active member of Greater St. Louis, Inc., an organization of business and civic leaders working to create jobs, expand inclusive economic growth and improve the St. Louis region’s global competitiveness and CEO’s Against Cancer of Missouri. She has presented as a guest lecturer at Washington University, Saint Louis University, and Webster University, and has served as Executive in Residence at the University of Missouri as well as on the boards of Washington University and BJC Healthcare.Prior to Caleres she had more than two decades of experience in consumer products, brand building and the footwear industry include serving as vice chairman of Phillips-Van Heusen’s Footwear Group, president and COO of the Stride Rite Corporation, and vice president of product and marketing at Rockport. Prior to that she held key brand management, marketing, and sales positions at The Mennen Company and M&M/Mars.Sullivan received her MBA from Babson College and her bachelor’s degree in business administration from Boston College. Diane has two married children and enjoys yoga, travel and gardening.

Moderator: Dana Telsey, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Research Officer, TAG

Dana Telsey is the CEO and Chief Research Officer of Telsey Advisory Group (TAG). TAG’s research team covers U.S. and international companies across all market caps in the following sectors: apparel manufacturers, children’s and teen retailers, consumer electronics retailers, cosmetics, department stores, discounters, footwear, home furnishings retailers, home improvement retailers, internet, luxury goods, office supply retailers, off-price retailers, restaurants, specialty apparel retailers, sporting goods retailers, and supermarkets. Founded in 2006, TAG has grown to be a leading equity research, trade execution, investment banking and consulting firm, focusing on the consumer space. TAG is also certified as a Woman-Owned Business Enterprise by several states, cities, the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council and numerous plan sponsors across the country. In 2015, Ms. Telsey also formed Telsey Consumer Fund Management LP, an asset management firm that manages a long/short hedge fund investing in consumer-based companies.Ms. Telsey has followed over 100 companies during her 31-year career and is the only U.S. based analyst to provide complete analysis of the European luxury goods sector. From 1994 to 2006, she was at Bear, Stearns & Co. Inc. covering the retail sector as a Senior Managing Director. Prior to working at Bear Stearns, Ms. Telsey was the Retail Analyst at C.J. Lawrence and Vice President of the Baron Asset Fund at Baron Capital, Inc.In 2020, Dana was recognized for her leadership in Finance by Barron’s, on their inaugural 2020 list of 100 Most Influential Women in U.S. Finance. In 2018, Ms. Telsey was elected to the International Council of Shopping Center’s (ICSC) Board of Trustees for an initial three year term. In 2016, Ms. Telsey won the Thomson Reuters award for “Number 1 Stock Picker for Multiline Retail”. In 2015, Ms. Telsey was selected, “from hundreds of nominees by the National Retail Federation (NRF) executive judging panel of top industry CEOs”, as one of the 24 winners of The List of People Shaping Retail’s Future. In 2014, Ms. Telsey was honored with the designation of Woman- Owned Brokerage of the Year by Traders Magazine for successfully growing her firm by developing and delivering top-notch research and trading tools. In 2011, Traders Magazine awarded her as Entrepreneur of the Year. Ms. Telsey is a thirteen-year member of Institutional Investor magazine’s “All-America Research Team” where she was ranked the Number One Specialty Stores analyst for seven consecutive years through 2005.Ms. Telsey is a regular guest analyst on both CNN and CNBC and has appeared as a special guest on such programs as Bloomberg Radio, World News Tonight - ABC News, Good Morning America, The NBC Evening News, The Today Show, BNN, and BBC amongst many others.Ms. Telsey graduated from Hobart-William Smith Colleges with a B.A. degree in History and Spanish and received her M.B.A from Fordham University.