Charles Hansen Jr. has resigned as chief executive officer and chairman of troubled Pillowtex Corp., in a restructuring of top management the company announced this morning.

The announcement comes less than 24 hours after the Dallas, Texas-based owner of Fieldcrest Cannon revealed that Pillowtex lost $18.3 million in the third quarter, bringing losses for the first nine months of this year to $38.1 million, $6 million more than the company lost in all of last year.

Today’s statement said that the company board of directors has selected a new chairman, Ralph La Rovere, 65, a long-time director and former J.C. Penney Co. executive.

Anthony T. Williams, 54, who joined the company in May as executive vice president and chief financial officer, has been named chief operating officer.

La Rovere and Williams, along with Scott Shimuzu, 47, executive vice president for sales and marketing and two directors, form a management committee to guide the company.

Hansen’s resignation after 35 years with Pillowtex confirms rumors swirling around the textile and financial communities recently — rumors Hansen denied — that his time with the company was short.

Since taking over Fieldcrest Cannon, Pillowtex has struggled and Hansen has taken much of the blame for it. Once valued at more than $50 per share, Pillowtex stock closed at $1.56 on Thursday.

The third-quarter losses amount to about $1.29 per share, far more than the 9 cents per share the company and analysts predicted.

The board of directors has formed a committee to find a new chief executive officer, and hopes to hire someone early next year, the statement said.

“The entire management team is committed to meeting the challenges faced by Pillowtex,” Williams said in the press release.

The challenges include reducing bloated inventory in a sluggish sales environment, bringing the company current with its suppliers and paying off a mountain of debt, most of it associated with corporate acquisitions.

The Dallas-based company bought the much larger Fieldcrest Cannon in December 1997 for $700 million in cash and stock. In June 1998, it bought a smaller towel maker, The Leshner Corp. of Hamilton, Ohio, for an undisclosed amount.

A billion dollars in debt, the company had to again ask its creditors for temporary waivers on some of its agreements or face violating its covenants with them after its most recent losses.

Pillowtex reduced its inventory by about $34 million during the third quarter by idling manufacturing plants. Williams said the company “will continue to take such actions as are necessary.”

A company official said Thursday that Fieldcrest Cannon plants 16 in China Grove and 4 in Kannapolis, both sheet-making plants, will stand idle for a week starting Monday.

While they help reduce inventory, the idlings are costly and contributed to the company’s losses, Williams said.

Williams also pointed to the permanent closing of a plant in Salisbury this summer, and the consolidation of operations in Canada, as steps the company is taking to streamline costs.

Officials with the union representing some 10,000 Pillowtex employees in the Carolinas, Georgia, Alabama and Virginia expressed concern on Thursday over the company’s direction and doubts about Hansen’s ability to lead it.

Mark Pitt, southern regional director for the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees, said the company’s financial problems threaten jobs and communities.

“I guess it would be fair to say that we take no particular pleasure in seeing anyone lose their job,” he said today. “But I think the board made the correct decision in seeking some changes, and we hope it will be the first of other steps necessary to straighten out the financial problems within the company.”

The union has called upon Pillowtex, and whoever leads it, to announce a plan for returning the company to profitability by the end of the year, and to cooperate with the union in implementing it.

Without such a plan, Pitt said, the company is in danger of being taken over by the “Wall Street investment-type organizations” that already own Pillowtex stock. Those companies are interested only recouping their money, even at the cost of jobs, he said.

Pillowtex began reporting losses last year, saying that its customers were decreasing their own inventory and reducing orders. The company also blamed problems with new computer systems that track sales and collections.

Williams said the company’s collection process improved during the last quarter.

Pillowtex reported an overall loss of $31.8 million in 1999. In 1998, the company reported a net profit of $40.8 million.

This year, Pillowtex severed ties with Ralph Lauren, for whom it produces sheets. Kmart announced in August that it would no longer buy towels from Pillowtex for its 2,100 stores.