People - Dec 21, 2012

Plenty of executive appointments over the past two weeks. Here’s Electrical Marketing’s expanded coverage of personnel changes in the electrical market.

Graybar Electric Co., (St. Louis): Randall Harwood has been elected senior V.P. and CFO, effective Jan. 1. He has worked for Graybar since 1978 and has served on Graybar’s board of directors since 2009. Harwood is currently district V.P. in the company’s Dallas district. His appointment follows the announcement that Beatty D’Alessandro will be resigning from Graybar as senior V.P. and CFO and as a member of Graybar’s board of directors at the end of this year.

Arlington Industries (Scranton, Pa.): Nick Montalbano has been appointed Eastern regional sales manager effective Jan. 2. He will be based in Warwick, R.I. Montalbano began his career in the electrical industry with Dual-Lite in 1980. He joins Arlington following a 26-year career with AFC Cabling Systems (now part of Atkore), where he held increasing positions of responsibility in purchasing, manufacturing and sales management. Montalbano most recently served as the national sales manager for Kaf-Tech. In his new role he will work with rep agencies in promoting and selling Arlington’s products to distributors, end users and installers from Maine to Virginia.

This position became available because Ray Kennedy, Arlington’s national sales manager, who also functioned as regional sales manager for the Eastern Seaboard, wants to reduce his 2013 travel schedule. Kennedy, a well-known industry veteran and the leader of Arlington’s sales efforts for more than 24 years, will remain with the company focusing on special projects, product positioning and strategic actions for Arlington President Tom Stark. Don Ambrose, formerly Southern regional sales manager, will assume Kennedy’s position as national sales manager effective Jan. 2.

Mayer Electric Supply (Birmingham, Ala.): The company recently added three associates to help build sales and market share in the industrial, commercial and institutional customer market segments. Joining the Mayer team are Bill Stone, V.P., industrial and commercial business development; Paul Giler, Mid-Atlantic region industrial sales manager; and Brian Balmes, Southeast region industrial sales manager.

Stone will be located in Mayer’s Birmingham corporate offices. With 25 years of experience, Stone is the former president/COO of Electric Motors Sales, Chattanooga, Tenn. His previous experience includes industrial market and sales leadership roles at Border States, Schneider Electric and Siemens.Giler will be located in Mayer’s Charlotte, N.C., regional office. A graduate of Carnegie-Mellon University with a degree in mechanical engineering, Giler began his 28-year career in the electrical industry with Rockwell Automation and has also worked for WESCO and GexPro. Balmes will work out of Mayer’s Norcross, Ga., regional office. He has 22 years of sales and management experience with Eaton, Sprecher+Schuh, GE and Siemens. He has an electrical engineering degree from Marquette University.

Barron Lighting Group (Phoenix): Phil Henry has joined the Barron team as the new Trace Lite brand director. He comes to Barron Lighting Group with 30-plus years of lighting experience and an extensive background in LED manufacturing. He started in the industry in 1979 with Stonco Lighting as an inside sales manager and stayed on with the company after Philips purchased it in 2008.

Daintree Networks Inc. (Mountain View, Calif.): This provider of networked wireless control solutions for smart buildings recently hired George Stringer as V.P., channel development and marketing. During his 16-plus years at Acuity Brands, Stringer held a variety of senior positions in channel development, marketing and sales, including V.P. renovation and V.P. distributor channel, where he created innovative channel models that dramatically grew new lines of business. Stringer also led corporate accounts, government and regional sales at Acuity.

MaxLite (West Caldwell, N.J.): Chris Primous has been appointed V.P. of OEM sales and is working with residential and commercial lighting manufacturers on the global level. He will be in charge of developing LED and CFL programs for a broad range of top-tier luminaire manufacturers and marketers. He has more than 15 years of lighting industry experience and when he was a product manager for Progress Lighting/Hubbell Lighting, he helped launch the company’s first LED residential luminaire package, including one of the first LED downlights. He also was product development specialist and applications engineer for Lithonia Lighting/Acuity Brands. He has a B.S. in electrical engineering from the University of Tennessee.

Halco Lighting Technologies (Norcross, Ga.): Alex Chaet has joined the company as a product analyst, where he will be working as part of the product development team, researching industry trends and new technologies, and testing and analyzing Halco products. Prior to joining Halco, Chaet worked for CNN Headline News, editing sports footage and highlights. He holds a BA degree in communications from the University of Georgia.

Electric Supply Center (ESC) (Boston): Wentworth Institute of Technology has elected Lawrence LaFreniere, ESC’s president and CEO, to the corporation of the Institute. He will serve as part of a key advisory board for guiding, advising and advancing the Institute.