For Andy Ruben business is the “canvas of creative expression.” “You can invent business models that really do change the way we live, they change society, and business is a fun place to work on those things,” he said.
For Ruben, that meant pioneering sustainability at Walmart and inventing the branded resale space, where brands take back their pre-owned products, refurbish them and re-sell them under their own brand.
Ruben joined Walmart in 2002 as vice president, corporate and U.S. strategy. In 2004 CEO Lee Scott asked him three times to be the company’s first chief sustainability officer.
“I realized he was going to fire me if I didn’t say yes,” Ruben said. “It wasn’t a job I ran to, and yet it changed everything about my career.” He integrated sustainability into Walmart’s strategy and operations.
“That was a moment,” he said. “I didn’t realize how rare and how special those 10 years were in getting that program off the ground. So here we are 21 years later, and it’s changed many companies beyond Walmart. It’s changed industries. It’s continued to evolve how Walmart sees its role in society and vice versa. In many ways it coined the term ‘sustainability.’”
In 2007 the Northwest Arkansas Business Journal named Ruben to the Forty Under 40 class. The same year he became vice president private brands and repositioned Walmart’s $20 billion private brand portfolio. In 2010 he moved to California as Walmart’s vice president of global e-commerce and omnichannel.
Ruben credits the time at Walmart for defining his career “in terms of culture, values and operational excellence.”
“I spent so much time in Lee Scott’s office — between strategy, corporate strategy and sustainability, there’s not a day that goes by since I left Walmart that something I observed, or heard or he said to me, pops into my head — it’s a part of me. It’s the same with so many leaders at Walmart.”
Throughout his career, Ruben has continually questioned why things are the way they are and how he could make them better. “Once you are exposed to a set of things that you think could be done in a better, smarter way for society, you don’t unsee that,” he said.
With an “incredible curiosity and excitement on pushing something,” and asking “how we get more use out of what we’ve already made,” he left to start his own company, Trove, in 2012. The branded fashion resale platform pioneered the brand resale category with the launch of Patagonia’s Worn Wear. He also helped envision and launch resale categories at Levi’s, REI, lululemon, Canada Goose, Carhartt and On.
“Resale has since become the fastest growing segment of retail globally,” he said.
Ruben believes the role of the retailer and the brand will be dramatically different in three to five years. “We’re asking the same questions as in 2010, but the questions are more relevant now. There are moments when you want to stick to your knitting, and there are moments where you want to have people pushing and pioneering and thinking differently. Sustainability at Walmart was a moment of really pushing and pioneering and thinking differently. I think we’re at a moment like that right now, but the context is different. Now it’s about how a retailer evolves, how a brand evolves, where the value is going to be and how they’re successful.”
Ruben recently started a company in the retail return space and likens starting a new company to “chewing glass and staring into the abyss, completely unknown and painful,” he said.
Senior adviser to the Boston Consulting Group and adviser for Earthshot Ventures, Ruben is on the boards of Goodwill Industries International and Zevia. He was a member of Cerberus Capital Management’s Competitiveness Council from 2017 to 2024.
“The board work is incredibly rewarding because I get to be with a company over a long period of time and develop people but also work from a different seat — not being on the field, not being an operator — but still supporting operators. Now I’m focused on leveraging the experiences I’ve had while still getting to be involved in the things that I love.”
Empty nesters, Ruben and his wife live in San Francisco.