Dear Valued Customer:
We are very excited to announce that The Gerson Companies has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Sterling Supply Company, Inc. The acquisition is scheduled to close on April 1, 2013.
For those of you not familiar with Sterling, it is a privately owned designer and importer of a broad range of Christmas seasonal products with an extensive line of Christmas trees as well as LED lighted everyday blossom trees, located in Kansas City, MO. Sterling has been in business for 40 years and has its office and product showroom in downtown Kansas City, and its distribution center in a south suburb of Kansas City.
Most importantly, Larry and Stan Weiner, the owners of Sterling, have been retained by Gerson as consultants to Gerson and Sterling going forward. After a transition period, both Larry and Stan will continue to consult with Gerson/Sterling primarily in their current capacity with Sterling. Additionally, Samantha Hammontree, the current President of Sterling, will work for Gerson as the President of the Sterling division of The Gerson Companies.
Our collective goal is to expand on the already fantastic Sterling product line and combined with Gerson’s wonderful seasonal product line offer you the customer the most complete, exciting, new product line in the industry. Beginning in December Sterling and Gerson will be jointly marketing and selling their combined fall, harvest, Halloween and Christmas 2013 seasonal line to all of their combined customers. You will literally have a one stop shopping experience working with Sterling/Gerson for your fourth quarter 2013 product needs.
Speaking of shopping, Sterling and Gerson both open their Kansas City showrooms on December 10, 2012 and welcome all customers to see the new product lines. Please plan on spending time in both the Sterling and Gerson showrooms in Kansas City. The same is true for the Atlanta show in January 2013. Please book appointments now to visit both Sterling’s Atlanta showroom located in Building #1, 16th floor, showroom #16-B7, and Gerson’s showroom located in Building #2, 11th floor, showroom #1112A/B.
Hopefully, the transition period will be seamless to you. Our goal is to ship you the same great Sterling products combined with Gerson products. After a short transition period, the entire office and warehouse operations of Sterling will be moved into The Gerson Companies facility. The expected move completion date is June 1, 2013. Beginning in June, Sterling will be up and running and shipping product out of The Gerson Companies’ distribution center.
For Sterling customers, if you are currently working with a sales rep and/or sales rep company please continue to work with your sales rep and write any new orders or reorders with your sales rep or rep company as you have done previously. For Gerson customers, you will be hearing from Gerson and/or your Gerson sales rep about the new and expanded product lines being offered by Sterling for holiday 2013 as well as Sterling’s LED blossom tree line.
We look forward to working with you and thank you for your continued support of the Sterling and Gerson product lines. For more information regarding The Gerson Companies please go to www.gersoncompany.com.
Please feel free to call us at Gerson at 913-262-7400 with any questions you may have.
Best regards,
John Hjalmarson Jim Gerson
Chairman and CEO President