Potter makes power play

ST. LOUIS, Mo.—A reorganized sales force and a new product launch has Dave Kosciuk, Potter Electric Signal's VP of sales, predicting a breakout year for Potter's fire alarm division in 2010.

“It's going to be a big year, absolutely,” he said.

Kosciuk said Potter's many months of focus on R&D has resulted in its first launch of the year, which, along with the sales reorganization will boost his team of regional sales managers' ability to focus on the wholesale distribution channel.

Potter in January announced that it added two new regional sales managers, Len Vitale and Wayne Mills, to its fire/security division. This brings the total number of regional sales managers to seven. Kosciuk also rearranged territories. “We were trying to do too many things and please too many customers. This regrouping will allow us to focus on the core product and the best fit for that, which is the wholesale distribution market,” he said.

Managers, who previously had multiple responsibilities, will now spend “85 percent of their time on our core business in the wholesale distribution market and I will drive the OEM, national accounts and GSA business,” Kosciuk explained.

In January, Potter launched its first fire alarm power booster called PSN Series Power Supply with Quadrasync. “It's a patented quadrasync technology developed by Jeff Hendrickson and his team. Potter's very excited about this: it's a fire alarm power booster game changer,” said Kosciuk. The best thing about it, Kosciuk said, is that it has all the major brand sync protocols in the power supply and it allows those brands to sync with each other off of one power supply…it's a nice package for the AV side of the fire alarm system and it's great for the new and retrofit market.”