Over 30 years of experience in manufacturing and retail material management / supply chain operations. Following several years working in industrial engineering and operations within the Philip Morris manufacturing organization, Ranny has served in director and VP assignments for retail distribution, logistics, supply and operations, including Foley’s Department Stores, Cracker Barrel Old Country Stores and Brookstone Company. For the past several years, Ranny focused on multi-channel operations where he led distribution and logistics efforts for Brookstone, with store, internet and catalog operations.

Ranny Welton is an operations executive with extensive experience in developing and implementing operational initiatives. With over 35 years experience, these efforts have resulted in significant savings and process improvements in the areas of:

* Distribution center layout & design
* Freight management
* Productivity improvement
* Import operations
* Operational cost control
* Manufacturing processes
* Direct-to-customer distribution & logistics, supporting catalog & internet
* Retail store distribution & logistics, department stores & specialty chains

Mr. Welton has served in director and VP assignments for distribution, logistics, supply chain and operations. He has also served in internal consulting assignments and has established an industrial engineering operation for a major retailer.

Selected accomplishments include:
* In first three months of distribution operations assignment, implemented stringent cost reporting and controls, resulting in improvement of overtime by 61% and improvement in overall percent to sales by 38%.
* Developed and implemented design to double the size of a 180,000 square foot distribution center, resulting in project completed on time and within budget without missing one day of shipping to customers.
* Developed and implemented layout improvements and productivity processes which resulted in an increase of 23% over previous year.
* Led small package negotiations resulting in contract savings of $3 million.
* For company with $500 million sales, developed and implemented import processes resulting in annual savings of $600,000.
* Leveraged third party operations for big-ticket deliveries with annual savings of $350,000 and improvement in customer delivery times of 2-3 days.

Mr. Welton earned his bachelor’s degree in industrial engineering and operations research from Virginia Tech and his MBA, with concentration in labor relations, from Virginia Commonwealth University. He is a member of Warehousing Education and Research Council (WERC), Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals and has served on the advisory board for the National Conference on Operations and Fulfillment.