Kansas City Business Journal - by Suzanna Stagemeyer Staff Writer

The head of YRC Worldwide Inc.’s logistics subsidiary will leave the company at the end of the month.

YRC Logistics CEO and President Jim Ritchie will transfer his responsibilities to John Carr, who had been COO of the division and President of YRC Logistics in the Americas and Europe, the Overland Park-based trucking giant (Nasdaq: YRCW) said in a Wednesday statement to the Kansas City Business Journal. Carr will handle the unit’s overall leadership as president and will report to company Chairman and CEO Bill Zollars.

“YRC Worldwide continuously reviews its organizational structures to consider customer requirements, business volumes and efficiencies,” the statement said. “Since its inception (in) 2002, the YRC Logistics business has matured as an organization, marking impressive growth and improvements. In light of this, as well as the current economy, we have decided that it is unnecessary to have both a CEO and a president at YRC Logistics, and we should combine the two roles into a single leadership position.”

Last year, the logistics unit posted revenue of $621.7 million, down less than 1 percent from $623.2 million the prior year. The unit accounted for about 7 percent of YRC’s $8.94 billion in annual revenue.

Ritchie, who was with the logistics unit for nine years, will start June 1 as president of CHEP USA, a division of Australia-based Brambles Ltd., according to a May 6 release. He’ll be based in Florida.

Brambles is a global provider of support services and had total assets of $5.6 billion on June 30, according to its Web site. CHEP offers pallet and container pooling services.

“Jim is a very accomplished executive and with extensive customer and operational experience in logistics and the USA supply chain,” Brambles CEO Mike Ihlein said in the release. “In particular, Jim’s strong relationships with customers in the fast-moving consumer goods sector will be of great benefit to CHEP USA.”

Before heading up YRC Logistics, Ritchie was CEO of both Yellow Global and Transportation.com. He also held executive positions at Ryder Integrated Logistics. Zollars was a senior vice president at Ryder Integrated Logistics before joining Yellow Transportation Inc., which later became YRC Worldwide.

YRC recruited Carr in 2007 “for his considerable supply chain experience and to grow our leadership bench,” the statement said. He joined as president of YRC Logistics in the Americas and Europe.

He previously was president of Global Supply Chain Management for BAX Global Logistics, an executive vice president of sales and marketing at Fritz Cos. and in leadership positions at Profit/LEP International (GEO Logistics), Pandair Freight and Behring International, according to a biography on the company’s Web site.

YRC’s stock closed on Wednesday at $2.94, down 61 cents, or 17 percent, on volume of 5.65 million shares, according to Yahoo Finance. The stock's average daily volume the past three months is 2.7 million shares.

In August, YRC Worldwide CFO Stephen Bruffett resigned for a position with YRC competitor Con-way Inc. (NYSE: CNW).

YRC, which has been struggling with a freight recession for a couple years, lost $257.4 million in the first quarter, compared with a loss of $46.37 million the prior year.

The company ranks No. 2 on the Kansas City Business Journal’s list of area public companies.