David Perry — Furniture Today,
TAMPA, Fla. — Consolidated Bedding Inc., Spring Air’s largest licensee, has hired Kevin Damewood, formerly a top executive


at Simmons, as executive vice president of sales as part of a round of organizational changes.

Damewood succeeds Kevin Martin, formerly executive vice president of sales and marketing at CBI, who has been promoted to chief operating officer.

Also promoted was Richard Fleck, now vice president of marketing and product development. He has been instrumental in driving the company’s national expansion of products and managing the Eastern Sales Division, CBI officials said.

Fleck and Damewood report to Martin, who joined CBI in August 2012 and led the company’s introduction of national product lines while managing the sales and marketing departments.

Consolidated Bedding CEO Steve Antinori said Damewood will help lead a growth push.

“With Kevin managing our sales organization, we will aggressively focus on opening new customers throughout the United States, and building distribution within our existing customer base,” Antinori said.

Damewood is a 23-year veteran bedding industry veteran who worked at Sealy and the Premier Bedding Group before joining Simmons, where he led the national sales organization. He left Simmons late last year.

Consolidated Bedding, based here, has plants in California, Texas, Florida, New Jersey, Ohio and Illinois, and in Toronto and Montreal in Canada. In addition to selling all Spring Air brands, such as Back Supporter and Four Seasons, CBI’s product lines also include Chattam & Wells and Nature’s Rest.

Jim Nation, CEO of Spring Air, hailed the hiring of Damewood.

“Kevin’s reputation in the industry of obtaining proven sales results speaks for itself. We are enthusiastic that CBI appointed Kevin to further build out its management team and grow the business,” he said.

Damewood said he was “impressed with the company’s product portfolio and service provided to retailers. I see rapid growth for CBI in the short term given the competitiveness of their products.”