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Featured Customer
By William Carothers
UEI is proud to introduce to you one of our newer distributors, Production Products, located in Shawnee Mission, Kansas. The owner, Tom Oakes, was raised in Oklahoma and graduated from Oklahoma State University in 1959. He and his wife, Barbara, have two children, Scott and Malinda. Scott is a salesman for Production Products and Malinda is a nurse in Austin, Texas. Tom was a salesman for Ingersol Rand for 15 years before buying Production Products in Kansas City. Along the way, Tom and his family lived in Houston, Texas; Atlanta, Georgia; and Athens, Pennsylvania.
Tom's sales background with Ingersol Rand was predominately in air tools. In 1980, Tom bought out Warren Nichols, the owner of Production Products after growing tired of the travel and persistent relocation that was required of him during his time at Ingersol Rand. This decision enabled him to be home more with his family. Since purchasing the company, Tom has grown Production Products' sales considerably by focusing on coated abrasives and air tools. He currently has two outside salespeople that cover a 200 mile radius of Kansas City. Tom's philosophy is "stick to what you are best at, and don't extend yourself into other areas." Tom's choice to sell technical products, such as air tools and coated abrasives, proved to be profitable. In spite of competitive pressure from large integrators, Tom's business has done very well. Tom has no plans of retiring, and he continues to travel more and more.
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