There are a few roles we’ve noticed growing with distributors, one is a dedicated marketing person, and the other role is that of a supply chain manager or production manager. Through the pandemic, we experienced a painful supply chain crisis and suddenly, monitoring and troubleshooting projects in production became a vital part of a distributor’s workflow.

But the role didn’t arise as a short-term fix, in fact, post-pandemic, many suppliers changed their buying and inventory strategies, for example, offering fewer products and implementing shorter inventory cycles, thus one of the reasons for the need for heavier ops focus on production. 

Because this role has become more important, we wanted to talk with an insider, someone doing the work — and explore their best practices and advice. But this isn’t just any insider; our guest actually has a military logistics background. Mike Vandervoet has been a Production Manager for over four years with Paperclip Promotions. He brought seven years of Air Force logistics experience along with decades of customer-facing involvement to his first job in the industry with Paperclip. 

Growing up in Southern California, Mike’s first job was at In-N-Out Burger. It was an experience where he learned the value of treating everyone with equal kindness. Mike then joined the Air Force, where he was assigned as an Inventory Management Specialist. It was a successful match for Mike as he was named one of the 12 Outstanding Airmen during his seven years of serving. 

Upon leaving the Air Force, Mike completed his bachelor’s degree in communication studies at California State University, Sacramento, and moved to Austin, Texas, where he has lived since 2000.

Mike is moving out of his role as Production Manager and into a new role as Program and Fulfillment Manager for Paperclip, so during our chat, we wanted to know not only what his experience was like in the production role but how he’s training his replacement, plus, his advice on how to do this production job well and what it involves.

Even if you don’t have any plans to hire a production manager, Mike’s advice on how to masterfully handle production, work with salespeople, and strengthen your supplier relationships is vital for any distributor today!

Here are some additional blog resources to help you manage your team: