commonsku, a Toronto-based promotional products business and sales software, held its skucon virtual event on Thursday, Jan. 18, and recognized four skummunity award winners.
The skummunity awards honor the explorers, rule-breakers, dreamers and innovators in the branded merchandise industry. At the live skucon virtual event, four recipients were recognized for their radical leadership and generosity.
• The Supplier Community Champion Award recognized Alex Symms, national account manager at Chameleon Like, for inspiring the industry with optimism and ambition, overcoming adversity, and rising to encourage and support both distributors and fellow suppliers.
• The Supplier Connected Workflow Award recognized Jon Norris, chief operating officer at Starline Inc., for his cutting-edge business processes and connected workflow (from ideation to inventory to electronic PO to order status and ship notifications) creating a seamless experience, faster and more accurate orders, and a simpler life for his customers.
• The Distributor Entrepreneur of the Year Award represents grit, hustle, perseverance, resilience and creativity, and was given to Kelly Henderson and Elise Lindborg, founders of Brand Pride. “This pair has been through an unbelievable journey over the past couple of years, ups and downs in both their business and personal lives, including cancer, a move across three states, and a complete rebrand of their business,” said Catherine Graham, commonsku’s CEO. “They have successfully come out the other side to have their highest sales year ever in 2021.”
• The Distributor Community Champion Award recognizes the most outstanding distributor personality in the industry who continually invests in the wellness and growth of their peers. This year’s honoree was Brenda Speirs, CEO of Buzztag. Speirs started a grassroots mindshare group from within the commonsku community that soon multiplied from one group of all-female-led distributor owners, eventually soaring to 13 different mindshare groups featuring over 100 professionals.
The skummunity awards are conferred each year and are given to the industry’s most radical innovators. To learn more about the awards and each recipient, click here.
The preceding press release was provided by a company unaffiliated with Promo Marketing. The views expressed within do not directly reflect the thoughts or opinions of Promo Marketing.
