Kevin Queenin Awarded NFDA’s 2019 Fastener Professional of the Year Award
The National Fastener Distributors Association is pleased to announce the 2019 recipient of its Fastener Professional of the Year award is Kevin Queenin of Specialty Bolt & Screw (Agawam, Massachusetts).
The Fastener Professional of the Year award was created by NFDA to honor individuals and companies that make a substantial positive impact on people’s lives. The inaugural award in 2017 was presented to Robbie Gilchrist of Capital Marketing (High Point, North Carolina). In 2018 Jim Ruetz of AIS (Franksville, Wisconsin) was honored.
The award recognizes:
- Individuals from a fastener distributor or supplier company who make exceptional contributions to their companies and to the industry
- Partners or consultants who demonstrate exemplary support of the fastener industry
In his nomination of Kevin to receive this award, Jim Ruetz said, “Kevin has been both a mentor and friend to me for the last 25 years. His selfless desire to help anyone in the industry is reason enough alone for Kevin to be selected. Adding the fact that he has taken a small $1 million company to an international firm with sales in excess of $50 million.”
In 1982, Kevin began his fastener career at Specialty Bolt & Screw (SBS), now located in Agawam, Massachusetts, as vice president and general manager. Kevin and his sons, Jay and Jon, eventually purchased SBS and began an aggressive national and international expansion program to meet the requirements of their customer base. Today SBS has three distribution centers in the US and three in Mexico, along with facilities in Canada, Finland, and Taiwan.
Through the effective use of technology, superior customer service and product quality as well as dedicated customer engineering support, SBS has become one of the premier inventory management solution providers of C commodities.
In 1991, Kevin was a founding member of the iPower Distribution Group. The mission of iPower is to design, implement and manage supply chain solutions for C commodities and high value components for large OEMs.
Kevin also is a founding member of the Global Supply Alliance (GSA).
Kevin earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Westfield State University, has served on the university’s Board of Trustees, and today serves as chair of the Westfield State University Foundation. He also has served on the Noble Hospital Board of Trustees and its Advisory Board and is an active volunteer in many western Massachusetts civic organizations.
Kevin served on the Board of Directors for the New England Fastener Distributions Association from 1994-1996 and on the Board of Directors of the National Fastener Distributors Association from 1996-1999. For NFDA he also served on the Membership Committee, chaired the Information and Technology Committee, and represented NFDA on the Fastener Quality Act coalition.
Kevin has been married 48 years to his wife, Barbara. He enjoys golf, skiing, travel, and spending time spoiling their four grandchildren.
Kevin will be presented his award at the NFDA Executive Summit, November 3-5, 2019, at the Ritz-Carlton Beach Resort in Naples, Florida.
Nominations for the next Fastener Professional of the Year award will be open in January 2020.