Meet Your Uneeda Staff

In this month’s newsletter, we wanted to introduce you to Mr. Curtis Hicks, National Sales Manager for Uneeda Enterprizes, Inc.

We came up with some light-hearted and more serious questions. We hope you enjoy reading this Q&A as much as we enjoyed asking them.

sandpaper.com: So Curtis, let’s get the personal light-hearted questions out of the way. What are some of your hobbies?
CH:  Snow skiing has become my favorite pastime since picking it up a few years ago.  I also enjoy running and try to get a few miles in at least every other day.

sandpaper.com: What is your favorite music?
CH:  That’s a tough question.  With the exception of modern country music, which I detest, I enjoy a lot of different types of music; everything from Rap to Blues.  If I had to pick just one artist, however, it would be Kid Rock.  I think he is extremely talented as he can sing Rap one minute, a slow ballad the next minute, and he also demonstrated a country sound on many of his tracks on the Rock and Roll Jesus album.  Coming from him, I can tolerate a little country sound.

sandpaper.com: And finally what are your favorite foods?
CH:  That’s easy. Sushi, Sushi, and Sushi. I love all kinds of fish and rarely eat anything else.

sandpaper.com: Great… so now the more serious questions… Why Uneeda for their abrasive needs? 
CH:  Uneeda truly offers a unique product for sanding wood. There really isn’t a comparison and if given an opportunity to test we can prove it each and every time. In addition to that, Uneeda offers a large selection of material for all other applications to include metal and automotive as well.   Uneeda is also a “human” company.  We’re not some large corporation.  We truly build personal relationships with our customers like no other competitor does.  To further illustrate the UEI “human” touch, it is common and frequent that our president, Bruce Fuchs and our V.P. of Sales, Phyllis Crystal, personally visit many of our key customers.  It is rare for a customer to ever meet the President or Vice President of any of our competitors regardless of the size of the account.

sandpaper.com: What product does Uneeda offer that readers might not be familiar with or know about that you would want people to know about?
CH:   I don’t think a lot of people realize we sell both Brushes and Brush Strips that can be fitted on most all Brush Machines.   We have a high quality product that is very competitively priced.

sandpaper.com: What brought you into the abrasive industry? How long have you been in it?
CH:  My first job when I graduated from Georgia Southern was selling wine for Gallo.  I had to wear a coat and tie every day calling on hotel and restaurant managers and owners.  My boss at the time made a statement to me that “if he ever went to bed at night dreading what he had to do for a living the next day, he would quit.”  I thought a lot about that and it really did seem like a good motto to follow.  I turned in my notice two weeks later and soon after took a job with Klingspor Abrasives.  I went to bed every night since looking forward to getting up and making sales calls. I have been in the abrasives industry since 1990, so I have been in the abrasives industry now for 23 years.

sandpaper.com: What do you find fulfilling about working for Uneeda?
CH:   The absolute, unbridled freedom to do whatever I feel it takes to help grow our sales.  I could never work somewhere that doesn’t foster that atmosphere.  It doesn’t take 20 meetings to get a decision or approval on something; it’s usually a quick conversation or email to the owners.  I feel, for the most part, we give all our sales force that same freedom to grow their sales.

sandpaper.com: What does the future hold for Uneeda?
CH:  Uneeda has seen a big shift in our business model, especially since the 2008 recession hit.  Although we will always have some very large direct customers and we appreciate that business, the majority of our future growth will come more from distribution channels.  We are expanding distribution in double digits every year throughout North America and we expect to continue that pace for many years to come.   The future for Uneeda is a very bright one.  We are lean and have a young and aggressive management staff.  Our founder, Herman Fuchs, was a salesperson above everything else so he created a sales driven company.  We still garner that sales driven philosophy today.  Proof of that is the fact that we, unarguably, have the most experienced and talented sales team in the abrasives industry.  All our salespeople have at least 10 years of experience selling and working with coated abrasives.   That makes for a winning combination and a bright future for the company.

sandpaper.com: Thank you Curtis for this opportunity to get to know you a little better. We think our readers will enjoy reading this and learning a little more about you.