David Thoas

David Thomas began as school Chairman at FDSA in July 2023. His career in Australian Retail spans almost 30 years; for the last 16 years has been in senior leadership roles as CFO, COO and CEO of large listed and unlisted businesses.

Starting his career at Sportsgirl, Sportscraft Group, David then joined Country Road in late 2001, where he held multiple roles, including CFO and COO.  When Woolworths purchased David Jones in 2014, he was sent to Sydney to head the transformation of the new Group, where he continued to spearhead the changes within the Group, progressing to the role of CEO in 2017.  In 2019, after nearly 18 years with the Group, David decided to make a career change and resigned as CEO of David Jones.

He was immediately approached by one of Australia’s great retail families to work with Peter Lew to grow his retail Group, Brandbank. Through a combination of acquisition and brand start-ups, David successfully built Brandbank into a strong retail group comprising six retail brands; Seed, French Connection, Commonry, Allkinds, Kikki.K and Fine Day.

Today David is CEO of Brand Collective that is owned by the Larry Kestelmen group. David brings a world of business experience and knowledge to FDSA ensuring its growth, stability and care for troubled youth.

David is a father of three young boys that love being active and fit. He himself enjoys weight training, basketball and boxing