Academy Sports + Outdoors Names McCabe Chief Merchant

Academy Sports + Outdoors has named Matt McCabe as its new executive vice president and chief marketing officer. The promotion, effective June 25, fills the position vacated by Steve Lawrence who was recently promoted to CEO. 

Since September 2017, McCabe has served as Academy's senior vice president, general merchandise manager, Footwear. He joined the company in December 2016 as vice president, divisional merchandise manager, Athletic and Licensed Apparel.

In his new role, McCabe will oversee merchandising, planning & allocation, visual merchandising, and private label product development & sourcing.

Prior to joining Academy, he served as vice president at Golfsmith International, where he led the apparel, footwear, and soft consumables buying and private brand businesses. He has also held various merchant leadership roles at The Bon Ton Department Stores, Bachrach, Sears & Roebuck Co., and Mark Shale.  

"(McCabe) has been instrumental in growing the footwear category during his tenure as GMM with the addition of several new brands such as Hey Dude and Birkenstock along with an improved shopping experience both in-store and online,” said Lawrence. “The combination of his broad industry experience coupled with his knowledge of Academy should make his transition to chief merchandising officer seamless.”

"I'm humbled and excited for the opportunity to lead our merchant organization into the future," said McCabe. "Under Steve's leadership, we established a clear market position with strong and localized assortments, value-based differentiation, and refined our merchandising strategies and processes, and I am confident that we can continue to accelerate our growth and take market share in key categories as we help customers have fun out there."