People: May 10, 2013

May 12, 2013

Dominion Electric Supply Company, Inc. (Washington, D.C.): Stephen Krooth is now president. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin and the George Washington University School of Law., Krooth practiced law and previously spent over 10 years working on Wall Street as a managing director in the field of commercial real estate finance before coming to Dominion. A company press release said he will continue to ensure that the company remains privately owned and independent.

K/E Electric Supply (Mt. Clemens, MI): John Heitchue will be the company’s sales manager effective June 1. He has been with the company for more than 20 years in outside sales, and a company press release said his deep integration with the existing Team-K/E staff provides him advanced insight to manage a current inside/outside team of sixteen sales professionals. His initial marching orders are reportedly to “question everything” when evaluating K/E Supply’s customer service structure and the real potential of its customers, vendors and employees.

WinWholesale (Dayton, Ohio):Rich Nowak, a sales and marketing professional with 21 years of experience, is now electrical product marketing manager. Nowak will maintain relationships with electrical vendors and develop efforts to assist locations in the Win Group of companies carrying electrical products to increase sales.

Leviton Manufacturing Co. (Melville, N.Y.): Ron Newton and Mike Wilson have joined the expanding Leviton eastern region C&I sales team as Commercial & Industrial (C&I) sales specialists. Newton will be responsible for Minnesota, North Dakota and parts of Wisconsin. Wilson will be responsible for eastern Pennsylvania, central/southern New Jersey and northern Delaware.

Prior to joining Leviton, Newton was a regional sales manager and category manager with Cooper’s Lighting Division. In addition, he has forecasting and purchasing knowledge through experience as a category analyst for a big box retailer, handling a variety of electrical manufacturers. He received his BA and MBA from Thomas College in Waterville, Maine.

Wilson comes to Leviton with strong, diverse set of sales skills developed in the distribution side of the business. He was a successful outside salesperson for The Hite Company in Altoona, Pa., for the last seven years. He has also worked for a manufacturer’s rep firm promoting a wide variety of electrical product families, and as an applications analyst at Siemens Energy and Automation in Philadelphia.

Border States Electric (BSE) ( Fargo, N.D.):The company made several executive appointments, naming  Brent Leith as utility market manager; Bruce Penas as industrial market manager; Kevin Donnalley as area manager for BSE’s West region; and Todd Kadry as business intelligence manager. Before joining BSE, Leith consulted for the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) and managed transmission and distribution relationships for First Choice Power, a Texas retail electric provider and Midwest Independent System Operator (ISO). Most recently, he worked for Oracle for five years in product management, industry strategy and worldwide alliances.

Penas joined BSE in 2008 as the Northwest region business development manager. Most recently he was the Northwest region industrial sales manager. Before joining BSE, he was the senior account manager for Rockwell Automation in Fargo, N.D. While at Rockwell, he achieved many sales black belt awards, and was twice a finalist for the Ted Schaller Award for sales excellence. Prior to that, he worked for WESCO and Westinghouse Electric Corporation. Kadry joined BSE in July 1999 as an inventory planner. In 2001, he was named marketing services supervisor. He then held the positions of marketing manager, marketing solutions manager and most recently industrial market manager.

Donnalley joined BSE in April 1997 as a management trainee. He has held a variety of positions including Southwest region manager, branch operations manager for BSE’s Phoenix, Ariz., location, corporate operations manager, South Central and Southwest region corporate operations manager and branch manager for the company’s Wentzville, Mo., location. Most recently, he was the alliance manager for the Denver location.

Before joining BSE, Donnalley spent 15 years as a professional football player and college football coach. He was drafted in the seventh round by the St. Louis Cardinals in 1981. From 1976 to 1980, he played football for North Dakota State University, Fargo, N.D., where he received his master’s degree in education in 1987.

In other news at the company, Brad Kvalheim has been named Northwest region utility sales manager for and Vernon Kuntz has been named Northwest region construction and industrial sales manager. Kvalheim joined BSE in 1989 as an electronic service technician in the company’s Fargo, N.D., location and has served as a utility customer service rep, account manager and branch manager. During his 32 years at BSE, Kuntz has worked in a variety of roles in multiple locations including customer service representative, industrial control specialist, industrial account manager, branch manager and most recently, product manager covering western North Dakota.

Lutron Electronics (Coopersburg, Pa.): Joel Spira, the company’s founder,was named as recently the 2013 recipient of the Da Vinci Science Center (DSC) Corporate Grand Maestro Hall of Fame Award.  The DSC award recognizes Lutron’s contributions to the scientific community of eastern Pennsylvania and western New Jersey. As part of its ongoing energy-saving awareness campaign, in 2011, Lutron Electronics presented the Da Vinci Science Center with an interactive exhibit that teaches children how much energy can be saved by dimming the lights.

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