Many in the industry know Doug Albregts, whether from his time at Sharp, Samsung, Marco, or another one of his business technology leadership roles. With his recent move from President of Marco to CEO (replacing Jeff Gau), Albregts brings with him an interesting and accomplished background to lead the St. Cloud, Minnesota-based megadealer.
| Doug Albregts, CEO of Marco Technologies |
While CEO of Sharp Electronics America, Albregts and his colleagues worked with hundreds of US office equipment dealer and reseller partners—observing which had what it took to grow their business and make their employees and clients happy. “Marco always stood out,” Albregts said.
“It had a great vision, great mission statement—which made up a great culture, and I always admired it from afar,” Albregts said, noting he got to know quite a few of the company’s top executives while at Sharp. “And I thought it had the best potential moving forward in the industry.”
In addition to taking care of its employees, he saw the company wasn’t afraid to diversify into areas like security, IT services, and managed services. As such, Marco is now probably the largest in the country with its integrated solution set of IT, voice, and document management offerings.
The IT business, including voice, now represents about half of the company’s approximately $400 million in annual revenue—something quite unusual among document technology dealers. And the company has impressive credentials like Cisco Gold Certification and serving as the largest Mitel dealer in the United States, which are increasingly relevant to its main base of SMB customers.
When Albregts was hired as President of Marco a couple of years ago, he knew it was part of Gau’s succession plan that involved Gau retiring and Albregts taking the CEO reins. He feels grateful to be leading a company that is financially strong (last year the company saw the greatest percent increase in profitability, driven by lower costs and pre-pandemic business process optimization efforts) and supported by owner Northwest Equity Partners to continue its expansion into new geographies (in part through acquisitions) and product and service categories.
“I love the company,” Albregts said. “I love the people. I love the growth trajectory—not just the historical one, but the plans we have for the future.”
I was fortunate enough to speak with Albregts just days after the start of his new position, asking him about a wide range of topics including his top goals as Marco CEO, the top areas of opportunity for Marco going forward (from both a document technology and IT perspective), updates to the company’s marketing and selling strategies, and the importance of employee satisfaction.
This excerpt from our conversation touches on that last point. Enjoy!
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