Heath E. Combs — Furniture Today
Smola retains broader sourcing, warehousing duties

SEATTLE — Crystal Nguyen has been promoted to director of product development for solid wood bedroom, dining and office resource A-America.

Nguyen will have responsibility for managing the design process from concept to store floor. She has worked with the company for more than 10 years, starting as a part-time employee while she was a teenager.


Nguyen was formerly product development and marketing manager. Most recently she managed merchandising activities for the A-America’s four store retail division, Home Furniture.

In her new post, she reports to A-America President Fred Rohrbach.

In addition to her background at the company, Nguyen has worked for Nordstrom and several high-end stores. Her duties have included visual merchandising and display, buying, advertising and promotion and sales.

“Crystal has a keen eye for trends and understands the dynamics of how furniture needs to work in the home and on the retailer’s sales floor,” Rohrbach said.

Nguyen’s new duties had been handled by Jeff Smola, senior vice president and manager of factory and production and overseas warehousing operations. Smola’s responsibilities have increased as the company has begun sourcing from Vietnam, the company said.

“We’ve added a new dimension of complexity to sourcing with requirements by customers for shorter lead times and more mixability, and that, with the challenges of a new country, places much higher demands on Jeff’s time. Crystal’s total emphasis on the design aspects frees Jeff to assume that larger role for the company,” Rohrbach said.