Binghamton, N.Y. –
McIntosh will follow through on its current initiatives and directions following
the departure of global sales and marketing VP Linda Passaro, who served 17
months in that position, McIntosh president Charlie Randall told TWICE.
McIntosh expects
to fill the same position with someone who, like Passaro, has experience in
marketing luxury brands, he said.
Under Passaro,
McIntosh expanded its efforts to pursue luxury-market consumers via
advertising, event marketing and distribution, and it began rolling out
McIntosh-dedicated Experience Center rooms in dealer stores. Also under Passaro,
McIntosh earlier this year eliminated 10 of 18 independent rep companies and
expanded its in-house sales team in a sales and marketing approach typical of
luxury brands outside the CE market. That initiative is supported by Randall.
The company will
continue in a direction that introduces the brand to consumers unfamiliar with
the brand or unfamiliar with quality audio systems, Randall added.
Passaro is the
a D&M Holdings company this year following the
August 2010 hiring of Jim Caudill, a Stanley Black & Decker executive who
came on board as CEO and is now also chairman.
Under Caudill,
its global operations to move marketing and
product-development decisions closer to local markets, bring retailers more
aggressively into the product-planning process, and stimulate technology
collaboration among its consumer and professional audio brands and OEM speaker
business. He also reorganized the company’s eight business units into three
divisions — consumer, professional and OEM speakers, mainly automotive OEM
speakers.
In his letter,
Randall said Passaro made “several important contributions, including upgrading
the sales and marketing team, improving our advertising quality, dealer and
customer communications effectiveness, and reinforcing our brand positioning as
the leading audio brand in the luxury lifestyle marketing space.”
