A changing of the guards is underway for Minnesota United. At the end of the 2026 season, CEO Shari Ballard will retire from her role, and Christina Hennington will join the Loons as the club’s new CEO. Minnesota United made the announcement last month.

Hennington comes to Minnesota United after more than two decades at Target, where she most recently served as the company’s chief strategy and growth officer. “Combined with her deep relationships across Minnesota’s corporate and civic communities, her experience positions her to strengthen strategic partnerships, deepen engagement with supporters, and help lead Minnesota United through its next chapter of growth,” Minnesota United stated in its press release.

Ballard, who has been with the Loons since 2021, will pass the torch after an impressive five-season tenure. She guided the team through a 2025 season that was a club record in overall revenues, with a notable new jersey-sleeve partnership. In December, Ballard was recognized as the Major League Soccer (MLS) Executive of the Year. Twin Cities Business named Ballard an Outstanding Board Director last year.

Before joining the team, Ballard spent more than 25 years at Best Buy, where she started in 1993 and worked her way up to president of multichannel retail, overseeing all U.S. Best Buy stores, Best Buy Mexico, e-commerce, and real estate strategy.

Hennington started at Target in 2003 and worked in various merchandising roles before becoming Target’s first chief growth officer in early 2021, where she led strategy, merchandising, and sourcing efforts. During her tenure, she helped found the company’s racial equity action and change committee and spearheaded its program to spend more than $2 billion with Black-owned businesses by the end of 2025. She was named to Twin Cities Business’s TCB 100 in 2023.

Ballard’s exit was planned, and she says that in the search for a successor, Hennington stood out as someone who “cares deeply about this community and is fully aligned with the values, mission, and ambitions of Minnesota United.” She says Hennington is the right fit for the team as it enters its second decade in Major League Soccer.

“We approached [Ballard’s] retirement with a commitment to leadership that will continue and expand the positive achievements of our club while staying true to what makes Minnesota United special,” says Bill McGuire on behalf of the Minnesota United ownership group.

For Hennington, the timing comes as she has watched the club strengthen connections with fans and the greater Minnesota community under Ballard’s leadership. Those efforts have included a year-long 10th-anniversary campaign with fan-voted awards, a commemorative jersey, and a permanent display inside the Allianz Field concourse that honors all players who have represented the team since 2017. Hennington says she wants to capitalize on that passion.

“What stood out to me is the club’s ambition to keep evolving without ever losing sight of what makes it meaningful to its fans,” Hennington says. “There’s a real commitment here to winning on the pitch, to creating fan experiences worth showing up for, and to making this a place where everyone feels they belong.”

Ballard will work alongside Hennington through the rest of the 2026 season, as the MLS transitions into a new, flipped summer-to-spring calendar for the 2027-28 season.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

How do you think your retail background prepares you for this new role in professional soccer?

I was really focused on guest experiences and how we make sure that, when you walk into a store, it feels unique and enticing and like you want to be there. You discover something new and alluring, and that’s not too different from a fan experience. I had a chance to work with thousands and thousands of brands and partners when I ran merchandising at Target, and … a lot of what we do at Allianz is with partners. They all have goals that they want to accomplish for their investment in the sport, and working to maximize the opportunities that they’re looking for against what we’re trying to do—that’s the nature of a lot of the work I am used to doing.

You worked at Target for more than two decades. How has playing the long game shaped your leadership approach and philosophy?

People are in your stores or experiencing the game and the play on a very regular basis, so it is hard to not always get pulled into the day-to-day. But any good leader knows that it is important to balance the now and the next, because if you don’t make investments in capabilities, in talent, in infrastructure, in development—whether it’s people, technology, process, whatever—at some point, your day-to-day operations aren’t going to be ready for the next set of challenges. As I’ve grown in my career, I’ve come to appreciate that more.

How do you see Minnesota United as a fixture in Minnesota’s sports scene? What role does it occupy now, and where do you see it heading?

The world sport that has more fans than any other sport in the world—we have a professional team right here in the Twin Cities. When you look at it in the context of the Twin Cities, obviously we’re a smaller professional team than the Vikings and the Timberwolves, but there’s room for all of us. … I think there’s a lot of opportunity for sports enthusiasts in broader Minnesota and our neighboring states to really opt into a plethora of sports options, and I hope more will choose soccer as they become more aware of its potency in creating fandom. Fan experience really is our secret sauce.

Can you recall your first Loons game and what that experience was like?

I had an opportunity to go about six years ago [on Target company tickets]. I’m not a person that grew up playing soccer, but I’ve always loved sports, and I try to go to games for every professional sport in the Twin Cities, both men’s and women’s, every year. I didn’t know anything about soccer, which is a little embarrassing knowing that I grew up in Europe, but it pulled me in because it was so accessible. … You can really enjoy the product, and then there’s uniqueness in how the supporter section creates community through their drumming and chanting. It makes you feel like you are a member … and that’s what got me started going to more games.