News roundup--Mothercare, Game, Superdry, more

Mothercare has named Simon Calver as its new chief executive, replacing Ben Gordon who left the business in November. Calver joins the struggling maternity and nursery specialist in April from Amazon-owned DVD rental company Lovefilm, where he is currently chief executive. Prior to Lovefilm, Calver was president and chief operating officer of educational software development firm Riverdeep. He has also held senior roles at Dell and PepsiCo.

As part of its restructuring plans, some 46 jobs are on the line at Game Group’s Basingstoke headquarters. The retailer has also reshuffled some senior roles. Commercial strategy director Tricia Brennan becomes chief commercial officer while UK managing director Tom Devine becomes channel director. Chief marketing officer Dave Hughes will leave the retailer next month, reports MCV.

SuperGroup, the owner of the Superdry brand, delivered a 27.8 percent growth in retail sales in the 13 weeks to 29th January 2012. Retail sales grew to £78.5 million, compared to £61.4 million in the third quarter last year. The majority of the growth was experienced during the run-up to Christmas, with the last three weeks of January proving “challenging”. Due to the January slowdown, profits for the full year are now expected to come in at around £50 million—the lower end of market expectations.

Cornish fashion company Seasalt has struck a deal with John Lewis to design an exclusive range for six John Lewisstores and online.

According to figures from Kantar Worldpanel, quoted in the Independent, Amazon overtook HMV as the UK’s favourite place to buy CDs, DVDs and computer games. Amazon captured a 22.4 percent market share in the 12 weeks to 25th December, with HMV accounting for 17.5 percent. The piece noted that HMV's slip into second place came due to its declining dominance on the high street.

Former Pets at Home chief executive Matt Davies has joined the board of homewares retailer Dunelm as a nonexecutive director.