Dive Brief:

• Weis Markets announced Tuesday that Michael T. Lockard, an executive at regional grocer K-VA-T Food Stores, will become the new chief financial officer, senior vice president and treasurer. Lockard will succeed long-time CFO Scott Frost, who is retiring after 42 years at the company. 
• Lockard will join the food retailer on March 12 following nearly nine years at K-VA-T Food Stores, where he is currently senior vice president and chief financial officer. Before that, he held financial posts at Walmart and UPS. 
• Lockard joins Weis Markets at a time when the food retailer is seeing continued financial growth as it invests in its e-commerce offerings. 

Dive Insight:

As CFO, Lockard will be responsible for the food retailer’s accounting, auditing and financial operations, reporting to Chairman and CEO Jonathan Weis. 

Weis said in the announcement that Lockard brings “extensive experience in retail, particularly food retail,” to his upcoming role at Weis Markets. "During his retail career, he has helped drive efficiencies and managed large, multi-discipline financial teams that have been a strong business partner to his respective companies' merchant, supply chain and store teams,” he said.

During his more than 25 years of experience in senior executive roles, Lockard has directed strategic planning, finance and accounting, information technology and global shared services.

Lockard started as the senior director of finance at Walmart’s U.S. Financial Shared Services division in 2007 and a year later was promoted to vice president of finance for the department, according to his LinkedIn profile. In 2011, he became the retailer’s vice president of information systems for global shared services, where he helped the then-new CIO team cut costs and boost quality across the transactional and administrative support services on the business operations side. He joined K-VA-T in March 2012. 

Weis Markets runs 196 stores in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, West Virginia and Virginia. 

About a year before the novel coronavirus pandemic hit the U.S., Weis Markets started boosting its e-commerce business and investing in store remodels after seeing record sales and online shopping growth in 2018. In 2020, the food retailer continued to expand its e-commerce offerings, signing onto Mercatus’ AisleOne platform. 

The company's e-commerce sales have seen triple-digit growth in recent quarters. In Q3, which ended Sept. 26, Weis saw sales rise 14.4% and comparable store sales increase 14.8%, while e-commerce sales for the quarter rose 160%.