Fanatics, Inc. named Lauren Cooks Levitan as its chief financial officer. Levitan, who comes to Fanatics with more than 20 years of strong operational, financial and strategic experience across a variety of retail businesses, will be responsible for overseeing accounting, financial planning, strategic analysis and investor relations for the company.
Based in Silicon Valley and reporting directly to Doug Mack, CEO of Fanatics, Levitan will utilize her deep financial experience and multi-channel retail expertise to drive ongoing growth across all divisions of the company. Levitan was most recently the Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Moxie Capital LLC where she provided capital and advisory services to consumer-facing businesses that operated in wholesale, retail, eCommerce and direct sales.
“Lauren’s experience as a retailer and as an industry analyst, where she became known as an omnichannel thought leader, will enable her to provide outstanding financial leadership for us while also helping guide our rapid strategic expansion in the years ahead,” said Mack. “Lauren is another all-star addition to the world-class leadership team we’ve built at Fanatics.”
Prior to launching Moxie Capital, Levitan was a Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst at Cowen & Co. where she established the investment bank’s inaugural consumer retail franchise, while also leading a team of analysts covering many other consumer sectors. She joined Cowen from Robertson Stephens, where she was a Managing Director covering specialty and multi-channel retail and was the first analyst to apply retail industry experience to the emerging online retail channel. Prior to joining Robertson Stephens, she worked in various capacities in the retail industry at Crate & Barrel and the Gymboree Corporation gaining experience in merchandising, inventory management and store operations. Earlier in her career, Levitan worked in equity capital markets and investment banking at Goldman Sachs.
“It is a tremendous opportunity to join a company as innovative and forward-thinking as Fanatics and I could not be more excited to start working with the talented team already in place,” added Levitan. “Fanatics, which is at the epicenter of sports, consumer product and onmichannel retail trends, is a company that combines all my passions into one incredible opportunity.”
Lauren, who earned an MBA from Stanford University and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Duke University, currently serves on the board of Crew Knitwear LLC. In addition, she is active in initiatives to support women’s leadership development in business, including the Stanford GSB’s Women’s Initiative Network (WIN) where she serves on the Advisory Committee. Lauren is also Co-Chair of the Duke University Northern California Women’s Forum and is the former Chair of the Stanford Graduate School of Business Trust.
