Chris Menefee joins Smart Furniture as Vice President of Small to Mid-Sized Business Sales.
Smart Furniture has hired two seasoned executives from the exhibit and retail markets for their sales division.
Chris Menefee joins Smart Furniture as Vice President of Small to Mid-Sized Business Sales. Mr. Menefee brings to Smart Furniture more than 20 years of experience in the wholesale, retail and tradeshow business.
Prior to Smart Furniture, Mr. Menefee was Vice President of Leasing for High Point , Merchandise Mart Properties Inc. (MMPI), the nation’s leading furniture market. In this role, Mr. Menefee was responsible for developing and managing Market Square in High Point, N.C., which included the new Market Suites facility housing hundreds of permanent showrooms and temporary exhibit halls. He was also Vice President of the AmericasMart, the number one gift market in United States, where he was responsible for leasing and running a 1.2 million-square-foot facility that housed the permanent Gift Showrooms.
Mr. Menefee was part of the team that took Atlanta’s Gift Industry from a regional Market to today’s position as the number one Gift Market in the nation. Other positions include working for Urban and George Little Management, the country’s largest tradeshow company, where he focused on new business development as well as management and sales of the Gift and General Merchandise segments.
Mr. Menefee played a lead role in the development of four national tradeshows in various regions of the United States and has maintained strong relationships with regional representatives throughout the country.
Mr. Menefee has served on the Board of Directors of the following industry and community organizations: AmericasMart Gift Advisory Board in Atlanta, Center for Family Resources in Marietta, Gift For Life a division of The American Foundation for Aids Research in New York, and The Galloway School in Atlanta.
Scot Cannell joins Smart Furniture as Vice President of National Business Sales. Before coming on board with Smart Furniture, Mr. Cannell was the CEO of Sarasota Shutters, a successful plantation shutter manufacturing company. During his tenure with the company, Mr. Cannell created and executed a business plan that rebuilt a 20-year-old organization making it profitable. Before Sarasota Shutters, Mr. Cannell worked for Bose Corporation for 11 years in a variety of leadership positions including store roll-out/merchandising manager responsible for new retail store development; regional sell-through manager; and regional sales manager of Bose USA and Bose Europe.
Significant achievements include the Bose Corporation Most Valuable Performer Award and the John Geheran Customer First Award, which is the highest award in the Bose Corporation, given only in exceptional circumstances.
“The addition of Chris and Scot to our team reinforces Smart Furniture’s commitment to long-term growth,” said Smart Furniture CEO Stephen Culp. “Chris and Scot’s breadth of knowledge in the retail and tradeshow industries will enable us to strengthen our foothold in existing markets and tap into new markets of interest, both large and small.”
Located in Chattanooga, Smart Furniture, Inc. provides patented organizational, workspace and display solutions for customers in all 50 states and Canada via an award-winning web model at www.smartfurniture.com.
Scot Cannell joins Smart Furniture as Vice President of National Business Sales.