Lululemon Athletica Inc, the yoga-wear maker that last month recalled shipments of women’s pants for being too sheer, said chief product officer Sheree Waterson was stepping down.
Waterson, who had been with the company since 2008, will leave on April 15, the Vancouver-based company said on Wednesday in a statement. The company said in a separate release that it was restructuring its internal product organization.
Lululemon has been probing how the shipments of pants that did not meet its standards — they became too sheer when wearers bent over — passed through its testing procedures.
With the recall of the black Luon yoga pants, which accounted for about 17 percent of all the women’s pants it sells, the company said that profits this year would fall below analysts’ estimates, causing the shares to drop to a two-month low.
The company said that while the fabric, a combination of nylon and Lycra spandex fibers, met the low end of its standards, the company’s testing protocols were incomplete.
Lululemon said that it was also assessing all of its Luon garments that are in production and stationing company employees in factories to monitor manufacturing.
Lululemon is offering full refunds or exchanges to customers who bought the defective pants after last month. Luon is manufactured in Vietnam and Taiwan, according to the company’s Web site.
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