Five Star’s Pros to Know 2023
Automatic Merchandiser announced their 10th annual Pros to Know award winners, and among the winners were Five Star’s Katie Pilcher, Director of Sales, Laura Price, Director of Retail Operations, and our Category Management Team, David Amberger, VP of Purchasing & Category Management, Kimberly Boorse, Senior Category Manager, Jessie Brown, Category Manager, Jay Harold, Purchasing Manager, and Austen Bowles, Associate Category Analyst. This award highlights the outstanding individuals and teams whose work is helping move the industry forward. Award winners are nominated by readers who see individuals, or teams persevering through today’s challenging business environment to elevate workplace refreshments and embrace new technology to promote future growth of the industry.
Katie Pilcher
Director of Sales
Pilcher has over 20 years of experience in customer relations and retail business development experience. During the pandemic, she joined Five Star’s team in late 2020, in a new role as director of sales for a startup in Dothan, Alabama. This was a new territory for Five Star. A year later her territory expanded to supporting five branches stretching over 300 miles in the Southeast. During this time, Pilcher focused on prospecting, fostering new relationships, and growing the customer base and sales to over $5 million in new business.
Laura Price
Director of Retail Operations and Support
Price Joined Five Star nearly a decade ago serving as a reporting analyst, concentrating on the newly developed micro market line of business, helping develop and launch the company’s business and helping develop and launch the company’s business intelligence reporting software. With the rapid growth of micro markets and the company, she took on the additional role of managing a support team for both micro markets and vending at the corporate level. Price works closely with the VMS and market technology providers to keep Five Star’s retail operational data accurate and up to date, as well as testing new features before release.
Nicholas Himburg
Director of New Business Development
Since entering the industry in early 2019, Nick Himburg has held roles within Five Star as a retail team manager, and customer service manager and currently serves as director of new business development in the Atlanta metro market. Himburg attributed his success to his operational and account management background as well as having many great mentors along the way. This experience has allowed him to bridge the gap between sales and operations to deliver new customers a service program that meets their needs and is operationally achievable. He prides himself on building new relationships and providing outside-the-box ideas to solve the pain points his clients face.
Category management Team
The Category Management Team is made up of David Amberger, VP of Purchasing and Category Management, Kimberly Boorse, Senior Category Manager, Jessie Brown, Category Manager, Jay Harrold, Purchasing Manager, and Austen Bowles, Associate Category Analyst. They work with their supplier partners to maximize the company’s sales and profits by satisfying customer needs. The team takes a strategic approach to managing product category and product selection to achieve sales and profit targets. Kimberly Boorse handles the beverage and food categories, Jessie Brown handles the snack category, Jay Harrold focuses on pricing and margin improvement, and Austen Bowles focuses on space management software placement.