Shopify has seen yet another departure from its senior leadership team, with Shopify Plus executive Loren Padelford announcing on Twitter today he is leaving the company.
Padelford was with Shopify for almost seven years, most recently serving as both general manager of revenue and vice president of Shopify Plus.
He helped create and launch Shopify Plus in 2014, which is the company’s enterprise e-commerce platform tailored for larger brands. Over the past seven years, Plus is said to have grown to more than 10,000 customers and garnered over $1 billion in revenue.
“Thank you to our amazing merchants, partners and to the best team in the world. Be proud of what we have built, it changed lives,” Padelford wrote on Twitter.
Padelford is the latest in a line of senior leadership departures at Shopify. Most recently Shopify’s managing director of United States West, Lynsey Thornton, left after an eight-year tenure at the company. In April, three major executives left, including chief talent officer Brittany Forsyth, chief legal officer Joe Frasca, and chief technology officer Jean-Michel Lemieux.
In the fall, Shopify had made a number of executive changes, with longtime chief operating officer Harley Finkelstein moving into the president role. CEO Tobi Lütke took over the role of chief product officer amid the departure of Craig Miller.
The shift in leadership at the 15-year-old company as Shopify has seen its growth skyrocket over the past year and a half. Amid the pandemic’s widespread impact on retail and e-commerce, Shopify managed to generate $307 billion in global economic activity in 2020 and become one of Canada’s most valuable companies.
Padelford led the Shopify Plus team out of Kitchener-Waterloo, where the company opened a second office in 2017 to house the hundreds of Shopify Plus employees. In 2016, Shopify acquired Waterloo-based product design and development consulting firm Boltmade to accelerate the development of Shopify Plus. The company also acquired New York-based B2B e-commerce wholesale startup Handshake in 2019 to integrate into Shopify Plus.
Regarding his departure, Padelford said, “I have no plan except to spend time with family and friends. But I think I have more chapters to write, so we will see what happens.”
