Kindel Furniture Co. Hires Sales Rep Joseph Poltorak

Furniture World Magazine

Kindel Furniture Co. announced that it has hired Joseph Poltorak as account executive to drive sales and service in the company's southeastern U.S. territory of Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi and Louisiana. A veteran of the paper industry and a woodworking hobbyist, Poltorak said he is excited for the opportunity to apply his 30 years of experience in sales and customer service to his lifelong passion for high-end furniture. "I spent a lot of time in West Michigan when I was involved in the paper industry, so I had the opportunity to see some of the fine furniture coming out of that area over the years," Poltorak said. "Making furniture and woodworking has been a hobby my whole life, so I was always very interested in the type of craftsmanship coming out of Kindel." Poltorak closed more than $150 million in sales of paper machinery as a sales manager for Scandinavian manufacturer Valmet Inc., now known as Metso Corp., leaving the company in 1997 for another paper machinery manufacturer, IP/Champion International Corp. He later served as the general manager of North/South America for Solaronics IRT Inc., the world's largest supplier of infrared drying equipment for paper and other products. Most recently, Poltorak worked as a sales associate for L. & J.G. Stickley Inc., a New York-based furniture manufacturer. He earned a bachelor's degree in industrial engineering and a master's in business administration from the University of Rhode Island. "It's great to be working for a company that is just as passionate about furniture as I am, and I look forward to serving our customers to the best of my ability," Poltorak said. Kindel President and CEO Jonathan Smith said he was pleased to have Poltorak join the company to support Kindel's push to open new and existing markets. Kindel is now launching introductions of its products at the showrooms of Robert Allen|Beacon Hill in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, Houston, Washington D.C. , Philadelphia, Dallas, Dania Beach, Fla., Westbury, N.Y. and Troy, Mich. It has also expanded into other international markets such as Kuwait, Ukraine, Egypt and Spain. Established in 1901, Kindel employs more than 130 people including hand carvers, decorators and other skilled craftsmen at its 170,000-square-foot factory and headquarters in Grand Rapids. The company has exclusive rights to reproduce the furniture for The Winterthur Museum, which is the estate of Henry Francis du Pont in Winterthur, Del., and the premier museum of decorative arts in the nation. Known for its authentic reproductions and historically based designs of the 18th and 19th centuries, Kindel also produces original designs from the legendary interior designer, Dorothy Draper, and furniture based on designs from a licensed program with Mount Vernon, the ancestral home of George Washington. Under a program called ReNew, the company also offers to refurbish any of the estimated 250,000 pieces of Kindel furniture made over the past century by using many of the same time-honored techniques at the same Grand Rapids location as when they were first manufactured. For more information about Kindel, refer to the company's website at www.kindelfurniture.com. For more information on Poltorak or Kindel, please contact Matthew Gryczan at mgryczan@alexandermarketing.com or phone (616) 957-2000.