News: A Woman, Marigay Mckee Becomes The President Of Saks Fifth Avenue

When Marigay Mckee needed to recharge between top gigs at Harrods and Saks Fifth Avenue, where she recently took over as president, she did something unusual: She climbed more than 17,000 feet, to Mount Everest's base camp. Yet even on her Himalayan sabbatical, McKee couldn't resist conducting an on-site focus group.

In Kathmandu, among the bustling chowks, cashmere goats and Buddhist temples were eight American women also adventuring. When McKee noticed one of them carried a Saks handbag, she saw an opportunity and pounced. "I didn't tell them what position I was going to go into at Saks, but I was like, 'Oh, you've got a Saks bag, tell me about Saks,' "McKee says, settling in to an evening cup of tea at her four-story town house in London's Ealing district.

To another ear, the ladies' conversation may have sounded as thin as the high-altitude air, but for McKee, it was rich research. The women, from all over the U.S., talked for hours, and they helped McKee realize a key piece of strategy: Each Saks storefront must appeal to a distinct customer. "The woman from Seattle has a completely different set of wants from the woman in Palm Beach," explains McKee, who came on board after Hudson's Bay Co., a Canadian retail conglomerate, bought Saks last July for $2.4 billion. Geographical sensitivity is just one part of the overall goal to change the course of Saks and resurrect its prestige.
In her almost 15 years at Harrods, McKee helped expand the London landmark into a billion-dollar-plus sales machine, while working her way up from a beauty director to the store's chief merchant, overseeing most retail offerings. McKee is a saleswoman at heart, and she's bringing that approach to Saks: : Know your customer, know your merchandise and know your market results.