CORONADO, CALIF. — Jack Criffield and Jeffrey Gage received Distinguished Service Awards from SPI's Western Region.
Based in Ontario, Calif., Criffield is senior adviser to Toshiba Machine Co. America and, through June 1997, was the firm's senior vice president with nationwide responsibilities for sales and service. Now at 78, he represents Toshiba as a voting member of SPI's Machinery Division and is coordinating Toshiba's exhibit for the June NPE 2000 conference in Chicago.
Criffield was the Toshiba operation's first employee in 1973. Eleven machines were sold for $350,000 in the first year, and the firm employed three. Now, the firm has annual sales of about $90 million and employs 130.
He is a charter member of the Plastics Pioneers Association and has been instrumental in Toshiba placing machines in various university and college instructional programs.
Gage becomes chairman of SPI's Western Region on June 1, adding another position to his decade of board membership and service in every other key office. He was chairman of the region's 1999 conference in Coronado.
Since 1992, he has been president and chief executive officer of extruder and thermoformer Gage Industries Inc. of Lake Oswego, Ore. The firm employs more than 300.
Jeff Gage received his DSA at the same luncheon where the Western Plastics Pioneer Hall of Fame inducted his parents, Ripley and Betty Gage, as members.
The senior Gages started the Oregon firm in 1958, relying on his marketing vision and sales aptitude and her financial skills.
Ripley Gage was the first national SPI board chairman from the West Coast, holding the position from 1992-94. He has delegated Gage Industries' day-to-day responsibilities to his son but continues as the company's chairman.
Separately, the SPI Western Region presented its Community Involvement Award to Edwin Laird, president of Coatings Resource Corp. in Huntington Beach, Calif.