International Market Centers has realigned responsibilities for its sales and marketing teams.
IMC said the moves will focus management on the industry segments it serves, whether members attend the Las Vegas Market, the High Point Market or both. IMC is creating more vertical category responsibilities to better serve cross-market customers, and announced internal promotions for several senior staff members.
The company is creating a new unified home furnishings business unit, which will include all furniture, accessory, casual and bedding accounts across its campuses in High Point and Las Vegas. As part of a customer analysis, IMC identified more than 100 accounts that were within the home décor business unit in Las Vegas but within the furniture business unit in High Point. With the management change, customers will have one primary point of contact for both markets. Gift leasing, which is specific to Las Vegas Market, will remain a separate business unit.
Julie Messner and Ryan Mahoney will lead the new home furnishings business unit. They will continue reporting to Scott Eckman, who will assume the title of president as supervisor of the home décor leasing unit. He will assume the additional title of chief strategy officer. Messner, as svp/furniture and home décor leasing, will continue to manage traditional furniture accounts with additional new responsibility for all home accent and accessory accounts, high-end and designer channel home furnishings and the Las Vegas Design Center and Showtime, as well as all temporary trade show leasing in High Point. Mahoney, as svp/furniture leasing, will assume cross-campus responsibility for furniture and bedding accounts, in addition to his current responsibility for temporary furniture leasing in Las Vegas.
Lee Hershberg assumes the new role of vp/home décor leasing and Las Vegas Design Center. In this role, he becomes responsible for key account performance within this business unit. He also assumes responsibility for daily management of the design center. Hershberg will report to Messner.
In addition, Rhonda Jackson, director of leasing, will assume responsibility for management of trade show leasing in High Point.
Dorothy Belshaw will continue to act as IMC president of gift leasing. Terence Morris, promoted to svp/gift and trade show leasing, will oversee all Las Vegas Market gift-specific permanent showroom and gift and home décor temporary exhibit leasing in the temporary Pavilions space, reporting to Belshaw.
At the same time, Belshaw will assume the role of chief marketing officer, formerly held by Eckman, with oversight of the marketing department and associated digital initiatives. Karen Olson, svp/marketing will report to Belshaw, with continued responsibility for marketing strategy and implementation for High Point and Las Vegas Market. In addition, she will work with Belshaw to drive the development and implementation of new digital strategies.
“These customer-facing changes are the result of a year-long IMC examination of our leasing organizational structure, the goal of which was to identify opportunities to improve collaboration, cross-selling, value creation and customer experience,” said Robert Maricich, IMC CEO. “This new account-based leasing organization, under which agents manage vertical categories across both campuses, not only achieves these goals, but also allows us to recognize and reward several key members of our team. I am confident that these changes will result in a more cohesive and collaborative leasing organization and will enable our already highly successful team to take our business to the next level.”
