For interviews, product samples or other media related queries, please contact our PR Department at publicrelations@crocs.com.
Back to News
Shoe fits for new Crocs CEO
Denver Post, Jan 14, 2005
Demand soared last year for the waterproof clogs made by the Niwot company, and Ron Snyder has experience managing growth.
A former electronics executive is taking the helm of Crocs Footwear, the privately held Niwot-based company that has made a mark nationally with its brightly hued shoes.
Ron Snyder was named chief executive Thursday.
Snyder, formerly senior vice president of Flextronics International, an electronics manufacturing company in San Jose, Calif., has been president of Crocs since June. The fast-growing Crocs sold 500,000 of its trademarked waterproof clogs – worth $25 million – in its first two years.
Snyder, 48, said he plans no big changes for the shoe company other than keeping up with demand by growing the company’s distributing and manufacturing base.
“In 2004, demand increased 15 times over 2003, and we’re expecting two to three times that growth in 2005,” Snyder said. “We are in the process of setting up distribution in Japan, Australia, southeast Asia, Canada and Europe.”
Crocs has plants in Florida, Canada, Italy and China, and it is launching one in Mexico.
Snyder retired from Flextronics in late 2003 and began consulting for Crocs immediately afterward. Before Flextronics, he co-founded the Dii Group, an electronics manufacturing company in Niwot, and he headed global sales and marketing efforts as well as mergers and acquisitions. That company went public in May 1993 and merged with Flextronics in 2000.
Snyder said his experience running global distribution and manufacturing operations would prove useful at Crocs.
“My experience is in growing companies,” he said. “I was with Dii when they were a $20 million company, and it went to $17 billion.”
Also Thursday, Caryn Ellison was named Crocs’ chief financial officer.
Ellison previously served as president of Classic Sport, a Broomfield-based sporting-goods manufacturer.
Crocs founder and former chief executive George Boedecker will remain on the board and will become a marketing consultant for the company.
Download: Shoe_fits.pdf
read more…