NEW YORK (Reuters) – Outdoor goods company Yeti Holdings, which makes cooler boxes and insulated cups, on Monday said it will add two new directors and expand the size of its board after months of discussions with activist investor Engaged Capital.
Magnus Welander, former chief executive of lifestyle and outdoor company Thule, and Arne Arens, former chief executive officer of footwear brand Boardriders, will join eight directors and increase the board’s size to 10.
Yeti, founded two decades ago by two brothers who wanted a better cooler to keep their drinks cold in the Texas heat, is currently valued at $2.7 billion. Its stock price has come under pressure recently amid the prospect of tariffs on goods from China, where many of the company’s products are manufactured.
Engaged, which owns roughly 2% of Yeti’s common shares, has held talks for months with management and has told people that the company’s stock price could triple over the next three years if management pursues growth strategies and returns cash to shareholders, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.
Yeti stock closed trading at $32.17 on Friday.
The fund has also urged Yeti to improve communication with investors by scheduling conferences, an investor day and being in touch more actively with shareholders, the sources said.
Engaged’s efforts have been behind the addition of more than a dozen directors to boards over the past five years, industry data showed.
Earlier this month it laid the groundwork for a board fight at Portillo’s when it nominated two director candidates to the restaurant chain’s eight-member board.
(Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss; Editing by Christopher Cushing)
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