Pacific-West Fastener Association Officially Formed
8/26/2009
FEATURE
Board members of the new Pacific-West Fastener Association sign the document creating the association. Front row: Dee Silver, Kelly Cole, WCL Co.; and Beth VanZandt, Duncan Bolt. Back row: Suzanne Dukes, Hayes Bolt; John Wachman, Desert Distribution; and Terry O’Barski, Hayes Bolt (photo courtesy Pac-West).
The new board members officially signed documents creating the new Pacific-West Fastener Association. Pac-West was formed this year unifying the Los Angeles Fastener Association and Western Association of Fastener Distributors.
Kelly Cole of WCL Co. is the first Pac-West president. Cole was the last LAFA president.
Suzanne Dukes of San Diego-based Hayes Bolt is vice president and Dee Silver of Barnhill Bolt of Albuquerque is secretary/treasurer.
Dukes was the 2007-2009 WAFD president and Silver became president this year.
Vickie Lester is executive director and Jeannine Christensen handles member services.
Upcoming Pac-West meetings include a September 1, 2009, workshop at Holiday Inn Select in La Mirada, CA, followed by dinner meeting and October 15-17 conference at the Miramonte Resort in Indian Wells, CA.
Alex Freytag, vice president of Ownership Thinking, will present the September 1 afternoon workshop entitled: “Ownership Thinking: The Business Model for the 21st Century” and the dinner meeting program, “Eradicating Entitlement: How to Create a Culture of Accountability.”
At the autumn conference, Kelly Flint, regional development director for Constant Contact, will speak on “The Power of E-Mail Marketing” and Randy MacLean, who has built several companies and designed software for Fortune 100 customers, will speak on “How to Find and Manage Hidden Profits.”
The schedule also includes the Business Owners and Business Executives forums and supplier/distributor meetings.
For information contact: P.O. Box 15862, Long Beach, CA 90815 or 3401 Katella Ave. #202, Los Alamitos, CA 90720. Tel: 714 484-4747 or 877 606-5232 E-mail: info@pac-west.org Web: ****************************************************************
8/27/2009
NEWS BRIEFS
TriMas On Track for Profitable 2009
Despite a tough year in 2008 and an ongoing recession, TriMas Corp. has bounced back in 2009, reports the Detroit Free Press.
“The manufacturer was in free fall as 2009 began, its stock skidding below $1 a share in early March from a peak of $16 in October 2007, a few months after it went public for a second time,” writes Tom Walsh of the Free Press.
Stung by public criticism, the company’s board of directors recruited David Wathen to replace Grant Beard as CEO.
Wathen, a former executive at Eaton Corp. and Emerson Electric, has focused on streamlining operations, generating cash and cutting debt.
Eight months after taking the helm, Wathen has helped TriMas stock rise above $5 a share, boosted by a second quarter performance that produced a $9 million profit on revenue of $209 million.
“In the first half of 2009, we generated more cash than in all of 2008,” Wathen told the Free Press. “The single change that affected that was a move to run with less inventory and more turns of inventory.”
Results were mixed. Sales at its Aerospace and Defense segment, including Monogram Fasteners, decreased 15.6% to $18.3 million during the second quarter, “due primarily to lower blind-bolt fastener sales resulting from program delays at commercial airframe manufacturers and inventory reductions at distribution customers.” Operating profit slipped 9% to $6.4 million.
During the first half of 2009, Aerospace and Defense segment sales declined 1.8% to $40.5 million, while operating profit dropped 2.7% to $13.2 million.
TriMas has reduced its workforce by nearly 1,000 in the past eighteen months, but Wathen instituted four-day workweeks and unpaid furloughs to cut costs without losing the company’s trained workforce.
He said shorter workweeks have enabled the company to “keep more people around, rather than cutting deeper with layoffs. Because things will get better and come back, and then people are still around and you’re not out having to retrain so many.”
Other changes include new leadership at two of the company’s 10 divisions, as well as having division presidents report directly to him.
While the cuts haven’t been easy Wathen said TriMas has communicated the necessity of investment “to let people know, hey, we are here for the long haul, not just cut, cut, cutting.” ©2009 GlobalFastenerNews.com
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