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What do you love about
your company?
I love the way that we dive
headfirst into challenges. At its
core, a company is nothing more
than a collection of individuals
going after a common goal—at
BAMKO, that goal is growth.
We are very intentional about
who we hire, making sure we’re
bringing on team players with a
strong worth ethic and an
indomitable spirit. The end result
is just an incredibly invigorating
group to be a part of. Whenever
I see our people excitedly rush
head-on to tackle a major chal-
lenge, it fires me up in a way
that’s hard to even articulate.
Describe your office
atmosphere.
Fun, focused and driven. We
tend to attract intensely compet-
itive folks who hate to lose and
take pride in their work. That
creates a very high-energy, col-
laborative, and intense office
environment with teams of indi-
viduals coming together to tackle
unique challenges. We also do
lots of fun events like office
yoga/Pilates, chili cook-offs and,
of course, our highly competitive
ugly holiday sweater competi-
tion. We believe that individuals
reach their highest level of per-
formance when they are actually
enjoying themselves, so we’re
constantly challenging folks to
create fun within the workplace.
This helps balance out the stress
of difficult or high-pressure
situations.
What kinds of projects or
tasks might you tackle on a
given day?
I have my hands in all
aspects of the business. On any
given day, I’m likely spending a
fair amount of time involved in
sales, operations and recruiting.
With offices on four continents,
the real challenge lies in being
disciplined in the ways I spend
my time so that I can create the
greatest impact on our business.
Oftentimes that involves
keying in on significant sales
opportunities or major opera-
tional issues. It also means
investing time in specific indi-
viduals who have the ability to
have an impact, which reverber-
ates through our business. To
that end, I’ll spend a great deal
of one-on-one time managing
certain individuals who are force
multipliers. I also spend more
time than you’d expect on hir-
ing, because the best way to
grow our business is to bring
talented and driven individuals
who share our vision for the
business.
How do you collaborate with
co-workers?
Our entire company is built
on a foundation of cross-discipli-
nary collaboration. It is incum-
bent upon our leadership group
to set the example and drive
those collaborative efforts across
all elements of our company.
With the Superior acquisition,
we have a tremendous opportu-
nity to collaborate with an
entirely new group of extraordi-
narily talented individuals. There
is true synergy between both
Superior and BAMKO that will
be unlocked in the months to
come, which will allow us to
offer significantly more to our
customers.
What gets me so excited
about the Superior acquisition is
the people, process and capabili-
ties they bring to the table.
Superior does so many things at
a world-class level. We have
joined forces to combine our core
competencies of creative, sourc-
ing and technology with their
sophisticated warehousing and
distribution capabilities and
incredible leadership group. This
will allow us to deliver a signifi-
cantly enhanced value proposi-
tion to our customers. There
isn’t a single other company in
the promotional products space
that can offer the combination of
unparalleled capabilities that is
now possible as a result of our
union with Superior.
How does this job
challenge you?
Fortunately for me, being
BAMKO’s president presents
PHILIP KOOSED, BAMKO PROMOTIONAL ITEMS
MAY 2016 •
PPB
• 79
The BAMKO
team
“We are very intentional about who we hire,
making sure we’re bringing on team players
with a strong worth ethic and an indomitable
spirit.
The end result is just an incredibly
invigorating group to be a part of.”