Takeaway: KSS CEO replaced by the person that said "customer engagement will be driven by 'Love'". Guess what...Love dosen't drive cash flow. #short

Here's my lead-in point (of six in total) in my Hedgeye RetailDirect (HRD) client productthis morning. If you don't get it, ping me or your Hedgeye sales person.

1. Kevin Mansel finally out as CEO of KSS. Looks like this was voluntary – he’s out in May ’18. Two weeks after his first NYC NDR in two years. Weird.  Michelle Gass is new CEO. This is the person that actually said [love will drive our business] at the 2014 analyst day. Here’s a winner of a statement…

Michelle Gass : Love is actually, it's good business, right? I know this to be true and this is what you need to walk away with and care about. And why, because love will drive engagement, it will. It's emotion, right? Customers don't go around and say, "Oh, I'm so engaged with Kohl's." Maybe he would say, "I love Kohl's." Right? Nearly never a day goes by where I'm not hearing customers say they love Kohl's. So I'll get back to that. But that's how we're going to shape the minds, the hearts of our customers.”

Mansell dosen't understand the sub-prime late fee increases w COF, or lease accounting math when pushed in one-on-ones (there's $4.00 in EPS for a company the STreet thinks will earn $3.50 in perpituity). Let’s see of Gass get's this. I’ll take the under on that one.  In the words of Buffett…"put a good person in a flawed job, and the flawed job will win every time."