SCHIPHOL, The Netherlands—GrandVision N.V. (EURONEXT: GVNV) has named Jorge Gervasi as the new managing director of For Eyes, the company’s U.S. business division. The move was effective May 1, a GrandVision spokeswoman told VMAIL. Gervasi, an experienced retailer who has held senior level posts with GrandVision for several years, will take over the responsibilities previously handled by former For Eyes chief executive officer Jose Costa. Costa left the company on March 1, as VMAIL reported.

For Eyes, based in Miramar, Fla., operated 125 optical stores in the U.S. as of the end of 2018. It accounts for about 2 percent of GrandVision Group’s overall €3.7 billion in revenue.

Gervasi previously had overseen GrandVision’s MasVision business in Spain for many years, and then moved to Mexico as managing director of MasVision Mexico in 2012. He started the MasVision business “from scratch and grew it to 350 stores by the end of 2016,” including overseeing the acquisition of Walmart’s optical stores in the country, according to the company.

Since 2017, Gervasi has been the company’s regional operations director for Latin America.

For Eyes experienced some difficulty in the U.S. in 2018 related to the implementation of a new POS system, the company noted in an earnings release earlier this year, which resulted in lower sales during the roll out phase in the fourth quarter.

In a breakdown of its 2018 results, GrandVision earlier this year reported that sales growth in its Americas & Asia business segment “slowed down to 1.8 percent at constant exchange rates with a comparable growth rate of 5.5 percent, mainly due to lower growth levels across Latin America and the United States.” The company noted that the U.S. market “remains a core priority” and that the U.S. unit reduced its EBITDA loss “despite the cost of store openings and a new POS system in the fourth quarter of 2018.”