Calhoun, Ga.—Paul De Cock, Mohawk Flooring North America’s newly named president, is taking steps to operate the Flooring North America segment with five distinct business units—residential carpet, wood and laminate, resilient, commercial and Mohawk Home—in order to drive growth within each business.
“As we focus on areas of our business that will drive growth in 2019, such as product innovation, best in class customer service and operational excellence, an optimized organizational structure puts us in the best possible position to maximize these opportunities,” De Cock said. “In this new business model, we are reaching the residential customer through a single sales force that is responsible for residential soft surface, wood and laminate, and resilient.”
With the realignment of the residential sales organization as a separate function from residential carpet business unit, Tom Lape will assume the new role of president, residential flooring. In this role, Lape will lead sales for all residential channels across all categories and brands. He will use his expansive experience and leadership to successfully deliver on this more focused approach to energize the team and drive sales growth for these business units by capitalizing on Mohawk’s brands, innovative products and sales force.
Lape joined Mohawk in 1998 with the acquisition of World Carpets, where he served as president of the contract division. For more than 20 years, he has held a series of senior executive roles within Mohawk’s Flooring North America operating organization, most recently as president of residential business. He has also led as the president of the company’s commercial business.
Michel Vermette has been appointed president, residential carpet. Foundational to his new role, he will manage the P&L by driving operational excellence across the business unit, including manufacturing, product management, R&D and planning.
Vermette previously served as president of Mohawk Commercial, where he led global commercial and hospitality business, Flooring North America logistics and customer experience. Additional executive roles within Mohawk held by Vermette include senior vice president of international and business development, chief accounting officer and corporate controller for Mohawk Industries and chief financial officer for Mohawk Flooring.
Succeeding Michel Vermette, Mike Gallman has been named president, commercial. Through his extensive experience within the industry and at Mohawk, Gallman is well prepared to lead Mohawk’s aggressive growth objectives for commercial for 2019 and beyond. He will also oversee commercial sales, operations, product management and planning.
Gallman previously served as senior vice president commercial product, a role he entered in 2012. Gallman began his career in the flooring industry with Shaw Industries where he served in a variety of executive positions for over 20 years. After spearheading the team that developed the Shaw Contract division, Gallman went on to serve as president/CEO of Blueridge Commercial Mills before retiring in 2011.
In late November, Roger Farabee accepted the role of president, wood and laminate. He is managing the business unit P&L across manufacturing, supply chain, product management, R&D and planning.
Farabee previously served as Mohawk’s senior vice president, laminate and hardwood. He began his career with Mannington Mills in the early 1990s before making the move to Dal-Tile where he served as vice president of marketing for the ceramic tile division.
Lape, Vermette, Gallman and Farabee will report directly to De Cock as members of the Mohawk executive leadership team.
“I congratulate these leaders on their new roles,” De Cock said. “They will each build on their respective business unit strengths to enhance our current strategies, key initiatives and financial results. With our strong organization and talented team, I am confident Mohawk will exceed our goals and bring greater value to our customers in 2019 and beyond.”