Creston Industrial Sales makes executive leadership changes

Paul Hendricks Courtesy Creston Industrial Sales

A Grand Rapids tooling services provider named its next president and appointed its owner as CEO.

Grand Rapids-based Creston Industrial Sales said last week that it named David Darling as president and Owner Paul Hendricks as CEO of the 60-year-old company.

Hendricks took ownership in 2015 when he purchased the company from his father, Russ Hendricks. Adding Darling as president will allow Hendricks to focus more time on relationship building and new ventures.

David Darling Courtesy Creston Industrial Sales

Darling started with Creston as a contracted COO in June 2019. He now runs all of Creston’s daily operations.

“(Darling) brings a tremendous amount of success with creating operational efficiencies, including several years running AutoDie on behalf of Chrysler Fiat,” the company said.

Prior to coming on board at Creston, Darling was senior director at DWH in Grand Rapids, and before that, he founded and was managing member for U.S. Forming Technologies, also in Grand Rapids.

Darling holds a Master of Business Administration in finance and industrial operations from Oakland University, as well as a Juris Doctor in labor law from Wayne State University Law School.

Creston Industrial Sales, which has more than 700 customers throughout West Michigan, has plans to expand its geographic reach through a mix of organic growth and acquisitions in the near future.

In the past few months, Creston hired more than 10 new sales representatives, and the company has plans to add more in the near term.

More information about Creston is available at crestonindustrial.com.