People On the Move

RAB Lighting (Northvale, NJ): Richard Barna, the company’s chairman, announced his retirement (In photo), and RAB’s board of directors has appointed the current CEO, Ross Barna to succeed him in a dual role as CEO and chairman.

Richard will continue as a member of the RAB Board with the title of director and chairman emeritus. He served as CEO of RAB Lighting from 1977 until 2010 and successfully passed leadership responsibility on to Ross — the fourth generation of RAB’s family ownership. He led RAB’s introduction of the first motion-activated lighting control sensor, early advances in LED lighting and a new lighting packaging and merchandising. He was the recipient of the NEMRA “Manufacturer of the Year” award and during his tenure, RAB earned more than 50 “Supplier of the Year” and marketing excellence awards.

LSI Industries (Cincinnati, OH): Jeff Davis joined the company as president and will be responsible for LSI’s sales functions and leading LSI’s commercial planning efforts. Prior to joining LSI, Davis was VP of sales, Wholesale for Reliance Worldwide. He has held executive sales leadership positions at Overhead Door Corp., Uponor, and Kohler Co. Davis has a degree in marketing from Miami University.

BlueVolt (Portland, OR): Benjamin Ertischek is the company’s new president. Ertischek comes to BlueVolt with more than 25 years of strategic, financial management and executive experience, including roles at Deloitte, Xerox Corp. and Viewpoint Construction Software. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Princeton University and earned a master’s in business administration from New York University.

“Research shows that training employees, partners and channel associates can be the difference between growing sales and increasing brand loyalty and getting lost among the noise,” said Ertischek, in the press release. “I’m excited to lead BlueVolt into the future and look for ways to help our customers build on the elearning data they’re collecting, so they can better understand how value is being driven in their organizations.”

NSI Industries (Huntersville, NC): Tim Vanderaa is the company’s director of national accounts. He brings more than 20 years of sales experience and will lead the team of national accounts managers and be responsible for developing sales strategies. Prior to joining NSI, Vanderaa spent most of his career as the director of sales for Greenlee in Kannapolis, NC. He also worked for Spectrum Brands Holdings and most recently was the director of sales for Emerson for its commercial and residential solutions business. Vanderaa received a BA in history from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He will be based at NSI’s corporate headquarters.

Nora Lighting (Commerce, CA): Jilla Farzan, vice president and founder, was presented with the American Lighting Association’s (ALA) Women in Lighting Leadership Award at an industry reception during Lightovation 2020 in Dallas.

“The Leadership Award recognized a woman in the lighting industry for her overall career accomplishments,” said Laura van Zeyl, co-chair of the Women in Lighting Committee and vice president of the Dallas Market Center Lighting Technology Development and Marketing, in the press release. “Jilla Farzan was able to grow a business as a female leader at a time when that was not seen as an asset. The milestone of Nora’s recent 30th anniversary seemed like the right time to recognize the progress made by Nora with Jilla at the helm.”

Saylite (Carrollton, TX): This manufacturer of LED lighting fixtures and solutions has added Tim Connolly to its team as regional sales manager and new business developer for its Southeast region. Connolly brings 25 years of lighting expertise, 23 of which were spent with GE Lighting in positions such as pricing manager and southeast region manager. He has a proven history of identifying high-value opportunities for customer partners and negotiating mutually beneficial sales relationships that last.

Industry Data Exchange Association (IDEA) (Arlington, VA): David Oldfather is IDEA’s president and CEO, effective Feb. 18. Oldfather is a well-known electrical market veteran, having served in leadership roles at Affiliated Distributors, Hagemeyer North America, and most recently Jigsaw Systems.

“The board is delighted to see someone with significant industry experience take the helm. David will ensure a successful new platform launch and drive execution of user enhancements without a steep learning curve,” said Rick Gigliotti, IDEA board chair, in the press release.

“A good deal of progress has been made since NEMA and NAED announced their partnership to develop a data warehouse to promote the exchange of product information electronically through a common interface point more than 20 years ago,” said Oldfather in the release.

“With the demand of product content accelerating, I believe a focus on the fundamental purpose of IDEA is as appropriate now as it was then: IDEA should continue to offer an efficient, robust digital exchange between electrical trading partners, with complete product information synchronization coming directly from manufacturers through IDEA to their authorized distributors.”

OBITUARY

Ken Rogers, the executive vice president and co-owner of Ideal Electric Supply Corp., Washington, DC, passed away on Feb. 7. He was the husband of Cora William, Ideal Electric Supply’s president and CEO.