Border States Electric, Fargo, N.D., this week announced a new regional structure to better serve customers and support manufacturers. This change takes effect January 1, 2021. Each region will consist of five service areas, delivering a more unified experience.

“By moving to two large regions, we lean on the 10 service areas, led by outstanding individuals and teams, to further enable agility and responsiveness,” said David White, CEO. “Area leadership was an investment made as we expanded our footprint the last several years and has us well-positioned for growth. Our objective is to make decisions closer to our customers, vendors and our teams and ensure a unified experience for the customer.”

The two regions will be led by two executive vice presidents with a long industry history of working directly with customers. Don Masters becomes executive vice president East Region, and Matt Eddleman, executive vice president West Region. Both leaders will join BSE’s executive committee to provide invaluable insight and perspective to the committee.

“The changes support some of our most important values — a relentless focus on the customer and decision-making that is close to and responsive to customer needs. The changes put our existing leadership team in a better position to create differentiating value and leverage our broad geographic and market reach with a more consistent and meaningful experience,” said Jason Seger, president.

Additionally, the restructure allows for two proven leaders with great field experience to focus on customers in our core markets. Brad Kvalheim will join BSE’s utility segment and become vice president of public power and Shane Kerska will join and lead BSE’s industrial segment as vice president of sales and marketing. In their new assignments, they’ll ensure we are continuously delivering new value as trends develop and customer requirements evolve.

Patrick Novak will become vice president of customer experience. His background and experience as vice president marketing and as an area vice president in the field will create immediate value and provide a heightened focus to enhance every point of interaction we have with customers.

Effective November 1, 2020, James Sipe is promoted to senior vice president of supply chain, with responsibility over operations and procurement. Also, effective November 1, 2020, Tony Serati is promoted to vice president of procurement. Both will help BSE create tighter integration with our partners, a more seamless and consistent experience and a stronger supply chain.