Steve Noren

Responsible for studying trends and industry research to pursue adding new products and categories for all the departments at True Value. Worked with existing startegic vendors to focus on new item launches at trade shows and with True Value's Marketing & Social Media Teams.

Responsible for Hardware & Building Materials Departments. Including financials,product assortments, line reviews & merchant team.

• Selected to design and implement training programs to assist China-based company in effectively capturing U.S. markets while overseeing global sales and marketing efforts. Trained 150+ sales and design teams and implemented two-week orientation for new sales professionals. Created product design groups for North America and Europe; managed P&L with responsibility for a $500million USD budget. Captured new business and managed sales to companies that included Delta / Peerless, Price Pfister, Lowes, Home Depot, True Value, and Homewerks Worldwide.
  Selected Contributions:
  Increased annual global sales by 35%.
  Brought in several new customers, including B&Q ( Kingfisher PLC.) the largest home improvement in Europe, who developed a private-label program incorporating Lota products.
  Implemented factory testing and design elements into sales training to give sales teams a comprehensive understanding of the products, which translated into improved sales and 40% decrease in staff turnover.
  Successfully conducted business functions within a foreign culture while living in China for 2 years.Selected to design and implement training programs to assist China-based company in effectively capturing U.S. markets while overseeing global sales and marketing efforts. Trained 150+ sales and design teams and implemented two-week orientation for new sales professionals. Created product design groups for North America and Europe; managed P&L with responsibility for a $500million USD budget. Captured new business and managed sales to companies that included Delta / Peerless, Price Pfister, Lowes, Home Depot, True Value, and Homewerks Worldwide. Selected Contributions: Increased annual global sales by 35%. Brought in several new customers, including B&Q ( Kingfisher PLC.) the largest home improvement in Europe, who developed a private-label program incorporating Lota products. Implemented factory testing and design elements into sales training to give sales teams a comprehensive understanding of the products, which translated into improved sales and 40% decrease in staff turnover. Successfully conducted business functions within a foreign culture while living in China for 2 years.
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Divisional Merchandise Manager Southern Division
Prior experience with Home Depot includes serving as Regional Manager of Northern California, Product Merchant for West Coast Stores (at special request of Merchandising Vice President), Product Merchant for the Southern Division; and Divisional Merchandising Manager for the Southern Division overseeing 6 product merchants including sales and P&L budgeting, performance evaluations, margins while additionally held decorative and rough plumbing responsibility for underground sprinklers & the development & implementation of the General Electric Brand Water Heater program.