Three Join Hooker Furniture in Operations, Merchandising, Administration

Furniture World Magazine

Hooker Furniture announced that veteran sourcing, supply chain and logistics executive Sekar Sundararajan is joining Hooker Furniture in the new senior management position of Executive Vice President - Operations. In addition, two other managers have joined Hooker in the areas of merchandising and human resources. James Millner, a 20 year veteran in youth bedroom merchandising and co founder of Opus Designs, a youth specialist acquired by Hooker in December, has joined the company as Vice President - Merchandising. Anne Jacobsen, who has 20 years of experience in human resources management, has joined the company as Director - Human Resources. In the new position of Executive Vice President - Operations, Sundararajan will oversee warehousing and distribution, sourcing, vendor management, product quality, parts delivery, forecasting and supply chain management. "With our new business model, we need a very strong executive focused every day on improving and managing all these operational areas," said Paul Toms, chairman and chief executive officer. "Sekar comes to us with a tremendous amount of relevant experience. He has strong relationships with many of our Asian vendors, a supply chain background and excellent engineering and project management experience that uniquely qualify him to help us in all these areas." Sundararajan has consulted with Hooker since last April. Previously, he was General Manager - Import Division for Pulaski Furniture. As President of Libra Consulting, Sundararajan consulted with major consumer goods companies including Whirlpool, Subzero, Kraft Foods and Ford. He reports to Toms. In the position of Vice President - Merchandising, Millner brings 20 years of experience in furniture design with companies including Stanley, Lea and Magnuson Home before helping to launch youthspecialist Opus Designs in 2004. "James will be a tremendous asset as we seek to grow our business in the youth furniture arena, and also strengthens our merchandising team, bringing a fresh, young vision and perspective that will help us reach an expanded demographic of younger, slightly less affluent consumers than Hooker's current core demographic," Toms said. Millner reports to Mike Spece, executive vice president - merchandising and design. In the position of Director - Human Resources, Jacobsen will oversee personnel policies, establish and administer benefit programs, develop a robust wellness program and develop continuing education programs to "mentor, train and grow employees to make sure we have bench strength," said Larry Ryder, executive vice president - finance and administration. Jacobsen comes with 20 years of experience in human resources management, including experience in leadership and coaching training. She reports to Ryder. Ranked among the nation's top 10 largest publicly traded furniture sources based on 2006 shipments to U.S. retailers, Hooker Furniture Corporation is an 84-year old residential wood, metal and upholstered furniture resource. Major wood furniture product categories include home entertainment, home office, accent, dining, bedroom, bath and youth furniture sold under the Opus Designs brand. Hooker's residential upholstered seating companies include Cherryville, N.C.-based Bradington-Young LLC, a specialist in upscale motion and stationary leather furniture, and Bedford, Va.-based Sam Moore Furniture LLC, a specialist in upscale occasional chairs with an emphasis on fabric-to-frame customization. Visit www.hookerfurniture.com, www.bradington-young.com, www.sammoore.com and www.opusdesigns.net for more information.