family-business
(15)
Melissa Haynes
Melissa Haynes is the Chief Marketing Officer of Glik's, one of the oldest family-owned fashion retailers in the United States, founded in 1897. A digital commerce and merchandising leader who cut her teeth as a shoe buyer at Zappos and later ran merchandising at eBags, Shane Co. and Scrubs & Beyond, she now steers marketing and customer experience for the roughly 70-store Midwest chain. Her calling card is hyper-local: she believes Glik's wins by tailoring each store's assortment to the community around it, backed by modern unified-commerce technology.
Jason Andringa
Jason Andringa is the third-generation president and CEO of Vermeer Corporation, the Pella, Iowa manufacturer of industrial and agricultural equipment founded by his grandfather Gary Vermeer in 1948. A mechanical engineer who once worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory before joining the family business in 2005, he took the top job in 2015 and led the roughly 4,400-employee company through a devastating 2018 tornado and the pandemic, growing it stronger while staying, in his words, oriented to the long term.
Brad Berman
Brad Berman is the co-owner and CEO of BodyBio, a family-owned cellular-health and nutritional-supplement company in Millville, New Jersey. He arrived not from a lab but from the beverage aisle, with stops at PepsiCo and FIJI Water, and married into the founding Kane family. Since taking the top job in 2019 he has rebranded the 25-plus-year-old practitioner brand, pushed it into direct-to-consumer and mainstream retail, and steered roughly 41% revenue growth that landed BodyBio on the Inc. 5000.
Brian Pallas
Brian Pallas is the Italian founder and CEO of Opportunity Network, a private business-matching platform where vetted CEOs and investors anonymously connect on commercial, fundraising, investing and M&A deals above $1M. What started as an anonymous newsletter he circulated at Columbia Business School to help his father's Milan family business grew into one of the world's largest communities of CEOs and investors, with tens of thousands of vetted members across 130+ countries and hundreds of billions in transaction flow. A former Boston Consulting Group consultant with private equity and investment banking experience, Pallas also co-founded Collective Equity Ownership and the Milan real estate firm Medhelan Capital.
Duncan MacLean
Duncan MacLean is the President and CEO of MacLean-Fogg, the Mundelein, Illinois manufacturing company his great-grandfather founded in 1925. A Dartmouth-trained engineer who started in quality control as a teenager, he is the fourth generation of his family to run the roughly $1 billion enterprise. He joined as a manufacturing engineer in 1996, spent 4.5 years in Germany, rebuilt the components business after the 2008 recession, and now leads global operations across fasteners, power systems, plastics, and 3D-printed tooling as the company crosses its 100-year mark.
Graham McConnell
Graham McConnell is the CEO and co-founder of Nth Round, a Philadelphia fintech that helps private companies, family enterprises and funds manage equity, run investor portals, distribute reports and create shareholder liquidity. A Dartmouth cognitive science graduate who oversaw software at the $25B quant firm AJO Partners before launching the company with his father in 2018, he is a self-described saver and Bogle-style passive investor on a mission to simplify and democratize private investing.
Miles Rosedale
Miles Rosedale is the second-generation steward of Monrovia, the wholesale nursery his father Harry founded in 1926. A Stanford-trained historian turned tax attorney, he traded oil-and-gas law for potting soil in 1981 and ran the company as CEO from 1986 to 2020. Under him Monrovia became one of America's largest nurseries - roughly 22 million plants, 2,000-plus varieties, 5,000-plus garden centers - and a pioneer of container growing, custom soil blends, plant patenting and consumer branding. He stepped down as CEO at the end of 2020 to become co-chairman of the board, and is an inductee of the Green Industry Hall of Fame.
Mort Fertel
Mort Fertel is the co-founder and CEO of Poplin (formerly SudShare), a nationwide peer-to-peer marketplace often called the 'Uber for laundry,' which connects customers with independent Laundry Pros across 500+ markets and 8,000 zip codes. Before laundry, he spent two decades as a globally known relationship expert and author of the Marriage Fitness system, used by millions in marital crisis and the subject of the documentary 'Back from the Brink.' He started Poplin in 2018 alongside his teenage triplet sons after his wife, drowning in laundry for their five kids, asked why she was still washing clothes like her grandmother.
Barry Friedman
Barry Friedman is the President and CEO of Friedman's Home Improvement, a third-generation family-owned hardware and home improvement retailer based in Petaluma, California. Named CEO in 2013 by his father Bill Friedman, Barry has led the company through digital transformation, e-commerce expansion, and a new 72,000-square-foot distribution center, all while steering the business toward its 80th anniversary in 2026. Under his leadership, Friedman's operates four locations across Sonoma County with approximately 600 employees, and remains deeply embedded in the North Bay community through philanthropy and civic engagement.
Bob Kearn
Bob Kearn is the President and CEO of COIT Cleaning and Restoration Services, a family-owned franchise business founded in 1950 by Lou Kearn near San Francisco's COIT Tower. Bob has led the company since 1982, growing it into one of the nation's largest specialty cleaning and restoration companies with operations across the United States, Canada, and Thailand. Under his leadership, COIT operates a multi-service franchise model covering carpet cleaning, drapery, upholstery, tile and grout, wood floors, air duct cleaning, water damage restoration, and mold remediation. He holds a BS in Marketing from the University of Colorado Boulder and has championed environmentally friendly cleaning practices including GreenEarth dry cleaning technology.
Dewey Pest
Dewey Pest is the Chief Executive Officer of Dewey Pest & Termite Control (Dewey Services, Inc.), California's largest family-owned pest control company, headquartered in Pasadena. Founded in 1929 by Ray M. Dewey, the company has grown through multiple generations of the Dewey family to operate 32-36 branches across California, employing roughly 750 people and serving both residential and commercial clients with integrated, eco-friendly pest management solutions.
Perry Patel
Perry Patel is President and CEO of Radiate Hospitality (formerly BPR Properties), the Palo Alto-based hotel management and development company his father founded with a single motel in 1973. Under Perry's leadership, the firm now operates a portfolio of branded and lifestyle hotels across the West Coast - from the Crowne Plaza Cabana in Palo Alto to the Hi-Lo Autograph Collection in Portland - with 500+ employees and a reputation for restoring historic properties.
Richard Westin
Richard Westin is the co-founder of Agemark Senior Living, an Omaha-based operator of 28 communities across six states. The first American to work full-time for Club Med, he imported a resort-style hospitality ethos into a category usually defined by clinical efficiency. He led Agemark as CEO from 1987 until 2022 and now sits as a principal as his son Forrest steps into co-CEO.
Mohamed Batterjee
Dr. Mohamed Mazen Batterjee is the Co-Founder, CCO, and investor behind Aumet, an AI-first procurement operating system reshaping pharmaceutical supply chains across the Middle East. A scion of one of Saudi Arabia's oldest pharma dynasties, he parlayed a DBA from IE Business School and 15+ years running Batterjee Pharmaceuticals into co-founding a platform that now connects 12,000+ pharmacies, 1,000+ suppliers, and has processed over $1 billion in GMV. Aumet closed a $12M Series A in May 2026, bringing total funding to $21.84M.
Sean Banks
Sean Banks is the founder and CEO of Krisp Drinks LLC, a Harrisburg, Pennsylvania beverage company that makes Krisp Flava, Krisp Fruitish, and Krispwtr - a line of zero-sugar flavored spring waters sourced from Pennsylvania's Locust Mountains. He built the company from a convenience-store insight into a brand now stocked at Giant Food Stores, Amazon, and bodegas across all five New York City boroughs, while running it as a family operation with his wife and daughters.