Meet Our President

I am honored to have been elected President of the QCA Board of Directors. I have served on the QCA Board since 2013, during that time; I served as Committee Chair of the Advocacy Committee, and I currently serve on the Marketing Committee. I am Chief Marketing Officer at alphabroder, a QCA Founding Company, since 2013. Prior to alphabroder, I spent most of my career in marketing leadership roles at Dell in Austin, Texas. That said, I did spend a few years as CEO of Hotlink Inc. – a promotional products distributorship in Austin, Texas. So, I have had the opportunity to see the world from both the Supplier and Distributor side and appreciate the importance of product safety from both perspectives.

I have been fortunate to serve on the QCA Board with outstanding members of our industry and work side-by-side with them to continue to help navigate the changes and opportunities in our industry – which makes the work QCA is doing more important than ever. As we see every day the speed and reach of information continue to accelerate – our industry is as susceptible as any (maybe more so) to the impact of bad news – product incidents, recalls, brand risk and more. At the end of the day, our industry provides a ‘platform’ for to grow brands – QCA’s focus is to ensure that ‘platform’ is solid, sustainable and responsible. The work QCA does if focused on making our entire industry safer.

Our industry has been impacted by many changes over the past 4-5 years – QCA’s focus remains consistent. That being said, we have taken a hard look at our approach to the market and listened to Distributors who said ‘you need to communicate the value/impact of QCA to the end-buyers of promotional products.’ We listened, and it led QCA to flip our marketing strategy to a ‘pull’ (from the end-buyer) vs. ‘push’ (from the distributor).’ So, we have increased QCA’s participation in end-buyer product/brand safety events/forums where marketing, procurement, and compliance professionals gather in mass. We have developed QCA marketing materials that focus on “Brand Safety” and ask the question – What is your promotional products vendor doing to protect your brand? This is resonating with end-buyers of branded merchandise, and we see this through increased engagement with our distributor partners. As I take over the reins at QCA, you have my commitment that we will continue to expand our efforts on end-buyer awareness to make QCA a household name in the business community.

Again, I am very appreciative of this opportunity and excited to take the reins which is now an immensely easier task thanks to the groundwork laid by Larry Whitney and the rest of the QCA Board, Accredited Companies, volunteers and representatives on the Distributor Advocacy Council. Larry’s focus on the fundamental strengths of QCA and how the organization could better position itself for the future has dramatically improved QCA’s acceptance in the end-buyer market. Leveraging my background in marketing, we will continue on the path of creating end-buyer awareness, and will work tirelessly to ensure Brand Safety for all end-buyers of promotional products.

Click to hear David’s vision for QCA and where accreditation fits in with brand safety.