Cera promoted to president; Condit hired as CFO
HILLIARD, Ohio (Oct. 24, 2019) — VARGO®, a leading provider of material-handling systems integration, warehouse execution software and equipment solutions for major fulfillment and distribution centers, is announcing the opening of a sixth office, this time in Mason, Ohio, and changes to the company’s leadership team. The growing company has also recently hired 11 new associates.
VARGO® has promoted Bart Cera, who joined the company in 2006, to president. Cera will retain the title of chief operating officer, as well. Since he joined the company, Cera has provided strategic financial and operational direction for VARGO®’s business goals and has been responsible for developing corporate strategies and systems. Prior to joining the company, Cera was the senior vice president, COO and CFO at Emerald Bank, where he successfully charted a de novo bank and was responsible for all operations.
VARGO® has hired Gary Condit as the company’s chief financial officer, a title Cera held until his promotion. Condit, who has worked as a CPA for almost 40 years, has previously worked with VARGO® as a consultant. Condit, who owned his own firm — Condit & Associates — from 1986 to 2011, most recently worked as director of assurance services at GBQ Partners LLC from 2011 to 2019.
“The growth our company has achieved in the past decade can be attributed, in part, to Bart’s leadership, and I am looking forward to seeing him excel in his expanded role,” said Mike Vargo, CEO. “When I look back at how we have grown in the past 13 years, let alone since our founding in 1971, it is fulfilling on a personal and professional level. We have achieved so much by providing the best combination of engineering, technology and material handling expertise and customer service to help our clients achieve success.”
The company — with headquarters in Hilliard, Ohio; a Technology Center in Dublin, Ohio; and additional offices in Austin, Texas; Berkeley, Calif.; and the Grand Rapids, Mich., area — is opening an office at 4680 Parkway Drive, Mason, Ohio, in the Governor’s Pointe Office Park. The Mason office is tentatively set to open in early November.
In addition to the new office location and changes to its leadership team, VARGO® welcomed 11 other new employees. George Belivanakis and Steve Crawford, both senior project engineers, and Andre DeGiuseppe, project engineer, will work out of the Mason, Ohio, office. In addition, VARGO®’s other recent hires include: Michael Shannon, implementation and business analyst; Steven Speer, manager of implementation and QA; Christopher Beseda, implementation and business analyst; Keegan Doyle, software support, QA and implementations specialist; Dan Mattson, site manager; Jeffrey Johnson, software engineer; Arianna Bryant, software support, QA and implementations specialist; and Charles Steward, junior systems administrator.
“The addition of the Mason office space and the increase of our staff provides more project engineering bandwidth to support current company growth,” Cera said. “It also enables us to position ourselves to continue adding engineering talent and supporting new business activities.”
The suburban Cincinnati location will expand VARGO®’s opportunities to attract and retain the brightest talent in southwestern Ohio and capitalize on business development opportunities in the area.
“There is a wealth of talent in the Cincinnati area that is specific to the material handling industry,” Cera said. “In addition, the greater Cincinnati, northern Kentucky market is a hotbed for distribution, with numerous e-commerce facilities in the region.”
As logistics has changed and Amazon has raised consumer expectations for order processing time to the door, retailers have felt the pressure to maintain productivity and yet turn orders around within an hour or two of receipt, Cera explained. VARGO®’s fulfillment solutions, including its leading-edge Warehouse Execution System (WES) software called COFE® (Continuous Order Fulfillment Engine), have enabled retailers to be successful in a very competitive market.
VARGO® offers complete fulfillment solutions for e-commerce, retail, wholesale and manufacturing clients. COFE®, its intelligent software, drives the fulfillment of many global retailers’ distribution centers across the country, including American Eagle Outfitters, Forever 21, Gap, Inc., Thirty-One Gifts and several other well-known retail brands. VARGO® uses its proven, pull-based methodologies to create intelligent solutions for these fulfillment centers and continues to be a leader in its industry by integrating robotics and automated storage and retrieval systems (AS/RS) into its solutions.
Some of the company’s more well-known projects include:
- American Eagle Outfitters Inc.: VARGO® worked with American Eagle Outfitters Inc., to design the first fully waveless, omnichannel facility in Hazle Township, Pennsylvania. Built new from the ground up, the 1-million-square-foot facility is designed to handle e-commerce and store-replenishment orders. As the integrator, VARGO® managed every aspect of the design and installation of the fulfillment center, implementing the appropriate WES solutions to maximize speed, efficiency and expediency. Since the facility opened in 2014, AEO has continued to invest in its Hazle Township facility by integrating robotics and an automated storage and retrieval system into COFE® to handle increasing order volumes, maximize floor space and make the most efficient use of labor.
- Gap Inc.: At Gap Inc.’s Gallatin, Tennessee, location, VARGO® worked quickly to design the fulfillment center and outfit it with VARGO®’s waveless COFE® WES. In less than a year from beginning of design, the facility went live in 2017. In 2018, VARGO® worked with Gap Inc., to add new workflows, and VARGO® updated the facility with an automated storage and retrieval system. Gap Inc., has since hired VARGO® to work on facilities elsewhere in the United States and in the United Kingdom.
