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Remembering Your Mentors

Dedicated to Gerald B. Speen

7/11/2019 | Rick Greene, MAS, Be Bold, Be Different, Be Memorable

Whether you’ve been in the Promotional Products Industry for three months, for three years, or for thirty years, most of us have had the good fortune to learn from industry mentors – those successful people who came before us, who trained us, who guided and advised us and who showed us what was possible in this twisty-turney complex career choice. I’ve been in our industry for nearly forty years and have been immensely fortunate to have a series of stellar mentors beginning with the legendary Carl Rosenfeld and followed by Preshia Humecke, Gene Geiger, Jeff Gordon, Bill Barker, Tad Webster, Terry McGuire, Jim Stutz, and Marc Simon.

Earlier this week, I attended the funeral of one of my mentors so I thought I’d dedicate this column to the story of Gerald B. Speen, President of Creative Promotional Services during the 1980s and 1990s before selling his distributorship to Goldman Promotions. I had the pleasure of first working for… then working with Jerry and Gloria Speen for about 12 years… first doing research (on ASI U.N.C.L.E . Microfiche, remember that?) and finally as their National Sales Manager.

Like many who came into this industry via an unusual route, Jerry began as a certified GENIUS.  No, really… he was a freakin’ GENIUS with more than ONE HUNDRED patents with his name on them. Jerry was an engineer for a few decades before making a massive career shift.  He saw how much fun his wife Gloria was having with her little startup Creative Gift Services, supplying gift baskets for Jerry’s company to use to say thank you to their clients… which led to promotional products. Jerry decided to leave corporate America behind and asked Gloria for a job, helping to grow her company. They were a successful combo and when I joined them in 1984, Creative Gift Services was about to become Creative Promotional Services and our two million dollar distributorship grew into a six million dollar entity with twenty salespeople in four offices.

Jerry Speen soon applied his genius to our industry, noticing an avenue of potential sales that didn’t even have a name but consisted of selling not ad specialty products but putting together a series of sales to support and promote the client’s brand in an ongoing… what would you call that???  Oh, yes… PROGRAM SELLING. Indeed, Jerry Speen in the early ’80s became the Father of Program Selling, one of the very cornerstones of our industry. He even named it Program Selling and defined it… writing first a series of articles for The Counselor Magazine, then a series of instructional Program Selling books for PPAI with his partner Dan Bagley. Those books are still referenced today, offering up Jerry and Dan’s guidance and wisdom in crafting and running successful promotional products programs.

I learned a lot from Jerry over the years… patience, approaching adversity with a calm fortitude and the confidence to find a solution, creating a warm and nurturing environment for salespeople to flourish and for staff to support them and so much more. But the first lesson I learned from him was one of the most impactful.

It was 1984. I was two years in on my advertising specialties career (the industry was not yet branded ‘Promotional Products’) and after a few years at the W. W. Cribbins Company doing research, filing catalogs and selling, I had landed a job with Sweda as their National Sales Manager. That job (Sweda was much smaller then and called CMI) only lasted one week (that’s another story for another column!) after which I was scooped up by Jerry to work as the Creative Gift Services research person, also filing catalogs.

After my first day at CGS, I went into Jerry’s office, sat down and quit. “Jerry,” I told him, “after spending today doing product research and filing catalogs, I realize this position is a step backward for me. I started two years ago doing this, then stepped up into sales, then stepped up as a National Sales Manager – then circled back to research and catalog filing. I’m not happy going backward, I think I need to find something else.”

I’ll never forget how Jerry handled this situation. He asked me if I had something else lined up and I admitted I did not. That’s when Jerry said, “Then I’ll tell you what. I hear you. I hear how you are frustrated and feeling like you’ve gone backward. I will accept your resignation – but only after you give us a chance. Since you don’t have another job to go to, how about giving us two weeks. If at the end of those two weeks you still feel the same, we will shake hands and part company as friends. But don’t leave one job without having another job lined up, and don’t make those decisions based on emotion.” I agreed that this made sense and I’d give it two weeks.

Well, that two weeks became two years. Over those ten work days, I got to know the people, I got to bond with Jerry and Gloria, Steve Tashman, Jeff Gordon, Vanna Sharp, and many others, all of whom became my friends and co-workers for decades. I left the company in 1985 for Singleton and Geiger, only to return in 1990 and spend another decade there. Jerry, Gloria and I built a world-class sales team, pursued and won dozens of Pyramid Awards, helped to define what Program Selling was and how it could increase sales and cement relationships, came up with new ways to source product, to partner with suppliers and to become ESSENTIAL to our clients. Jerry taught me about when to stand firm and when to fold, how to add value and what diplomacy means and, most important of all, how to create a warm and nurturing environment to support the efforts of our sales staff.  In other words… how to make our office a home.

I learned lessons working with Jerry that serve me well here in the 21st Century with HALO Branded Solutions and the biggest sales team I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. And, not surprisingly, I’m STILL finding mentors to guide me, to learn from and to admire. We are NEVER too old or too smart to learn from others, to embrace partnerships and cherish life and sales lessons. Think about the mentors in YOUR life and, if they are still around… reach out and say ‘thank you. You helped to shape me into what I am today.’ One day, you won’t be able to do so and you’ll wish you had.

Rick Greene, MAS, is the Western Regional Vice President for Halo Branded Solutions, a Past President of SAAC, on the PPB Editorial Advisory Board and the author of two comic fantasy novels entitled “Boofalo!” and “Shroom!” available at www.amazon.com.  His third book is a non-fiction biography of movie character actor Henry Brandon called “Henry Brandon King Of The Bogeymen” published by BearManor Media and available everywhere fine books are sold.  He was also the National Sales Manager for Creative Promotional Services during the 1990s.


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