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Company: Blinds.com
Company Description: Blinds.com is the largest online window covering store in the world. At our heart, we are a passionate customer service and marketing company that connects our community to home decor trends and high quality window coverings. Blinds.com has been featured in numerous magazine, newspaper, and radio publications.
Nomination Category: Sales Awards Individual Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Senior Sales Executive of the Year

Nomination Title: Stephen M. Riddell, Chief Sales Officer

Tell the story about what this nominee achieved since the beginning of July 2012 (up to 525 words). Focus on specific accomplishments, and relate these accomplishments to past performance or industry norms. Be sure to mention obstacles overcome, innovations or discoveries made, and outcomes:

Stephen M. Riddell is the Chief Sales Officer at Blinds.com. During the last five years, he has consistently delivered 25% growth annually and has helped establish the company not only as the ‘World's Largest Online Custom Window Covering Store”, but also as a nationally recognized contact center with an award winning company culture.

In five years, Riddell has grown annual revenue from $32MM to $112MM and projects revenue to grow to $150MM in 2014.

In early 2013, Riddell designed and orchestrated the construction of a new 28,000 square foot state-of-the-art contact center featuring collaborative work spaces, company culturally themed coaching rooms and interactive screens to stay connected to the work-from-home force using Adobe Connect.(1)

This office move required a 2-week telecommuting period for all 160 employees as construction was completed on the new space. Not only did the remote working experiment succeed from a customer perspective but the company enjoyed a record-breaking month for revenue with no service interruptions. The innovative approach to remote working earned Riddell national media attention and training opportunities for other organizations to implement a similar strategy to lower their overhead and increase employee satisfaction.(2)

From the United States to China, Riddell is regularly sought after as a keynote speaker and seminar leader at trade shows and conferences internationally. In 2013 he once again taught one of two ‘Masters Classes’ at the IQPC Contact Center Conference(3), and Call Center Exchange Mind Xchange(4), along with various events including Marco Island eBroadcast, HBJ/Oracle breakfast keynote (5), HR Houston, IQPC Call Center Performance, Productivity & Metrics Conference and hosting an IQPC Call Center Tour at the Blinds.complex. (6)

Employee health and wellness remained on top of Riddell’s mind in 2013 as he led the charge in creating a wellness-oriented culture through workshops, employee weight loss and exercise initiatives and re-structured the company’s break room vending machines and weekly fruit deliveries. Because of these efforts, Blinds.com was nationally recognized as a '2013 Best and Brightest in Wellness' by the National Association of Business Resources.(7)

On the national front, Internet Retailer ranked Blinds.com as #219 on the 2013 Top 500 Guide for its fast-paced sales growth and service innovation.(8) Later in the year, Internet Retailer once again recognized Blinds.com as maintaining one of the Top 100 world’s best e-tail websites, citing the company’s sales innovation with the face2face video design consultation service as best in class.(9)

Inc. Magazine also honored Blinds.com with a spot on the Inc. 5000 list nationally at #3350 and at #64 for the Houston business region.(10)

In October 2013, under Riddell's leadership, Blinds.com was honored as ‘Best and Brightest Company to Work For Overall Medium Business’ in Houston. This annual award recognizes Houston-area top businesses that provide employees with a positive, exciting and growth-oriented workplace.(11)

One of the only four-time honorees, in 2013 Blinds.com was once again honored as a Houston’s Top Workplaces award winner by the Houston Chronicle.(12)

Riddell has substantially improved the inside sales organization with conversion rates growing from 17% to 48% with fourteen inside salespeople selling over $1MM in 2013.

Provide a brief (up to 125 words) biography about the nominee:

Mr. Riddell is a dynamic and inspirational speaker, trainer, coach, manager and author with a reputation for excellence. As an entrepreneur and motivational speaker he is considered an expert in management, sales and customer service, teaching his methods to large groups of people internationally. He is also the 2006 Recipient of the Peppers and Rogers National Innovator Award of Excellence. In 2010 he was named Call Center Leaders of the Year from IQPC and received the 2010 and 2011 Call Center of the Year Award. In 2012 Riddell won the Gold Stevie for Senior Sales Executive of the Year and led his sales and service teams to win two Silver Stevie's for Best in Class Customer Service and Sales Innovation of the Year.(13)