E-commerce experts, once relegated to the back room, have become C-level executives as the online retail market continues to grow; companies of all sizes in fierce competition for people with web experience

Allison Oesterle

LOS ANGELES , November 15, 2011 (Industry Intelligence) – As sales for traditional brick-and-mortar stores continue to wane, the online retail market continues to grow, leading a fierce competition among businesses and recruiters for web-savy executives, The Wall Street Journal reported on Nov. 15.

According to the article, e-commerce executives, who used to be members of either tech support or a retailer’s catalog businesses, have become highly paid C-level executives.

Les Berglass, founder of executive-recruitment firm Berglass & Associates LLC, reports that approximately 20% of his projects are searches for companies who are looking for an executive to run their various websites, in contrast to five years ago, when he rarely received requests for these kinds of searches.

Companies of all sizes are looking for people to head their Internet operations, particularly as many traditional brick-and-mortar based stores have realized that they are falling behind their Internet-savvy competitors when it comes to the lucrative Internet market.

According to comScore, Inc., the U. S. online retail market this year is projected to increase to $162 billion.

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. has announced that it will name its global e-commerce CEO in January. The new CEO will replace Eduardo Castro-Wright, who is planning to retire in July.

Target Corp. is still looking for a new president for its website, Target.com, after a serious of disastrous website crashes led the previous Target.com’s previous president to resign.

The primary source of this article is The Wall Street Journal, New York, Nov. 15, 2011.

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