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Steve Rennekamp (MBA '86) Named Business Person of the Year
Steve Rennekamp (MBA '86), president and founder of Energy Swing Windows, was honored October 14 by the Westmoreland County Chamber of Commerce as their 2010 Business Person of the Year. Rennekamp was nominated for the award in recognition of his commitment to employee education and development and for providing a quality product and exemplary customer service to his clients.
"We spend a lot of time trying to educate our customers," says Rennekamp. "We want to make sure they are making the right investment."
After a 33-year career with Alcoa Inc., where he served as technical director for building products and technical manager for wind turbines, Rennekamp was forced to decide between early retirement and entrepreneurship when Alcoa announced they would be closing the plant at which he worked. He did what many results-oriented MBAs would do-he partnered with his son to start Energy Swing, a Murrsyville-based manufacturer and installer of custom home replacement windows.
Rennekamp credits his business success to the education he received at the Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business and broad exposure to many different departments within Aloca. "I was always lucky to work in smaller business units and that meant I got exposed to everything: technical, production, marketing, sales, advertising, and finance," he says. "That was the genesis of my entrepreneurial spirit."
More than 10 years later, that entrepreneurial spirit has helped fuel impressive sales growth-25 percent over the past two years despite the economic downturn. "We've held our own and grown," Rennekamp says proudly.
