Richard Witaszak, the long-time head of Staples Promotional Products (asi/120601), the second largest distributor in the promotional products industry, is no longer with the Overland Park, KS-headquartered company, Counselor confirmed early Thursday.

Richard Witaszak

Witaszak had been with Staples Promotional Products for nearly 18 years – since January 2002. Formally, he was general manager and vice president of the business, which generated estimated North American promo revenue of $607.7 million in 2018. That was up 2.5% over the prior year. Sales were flat in 2017. Staples Promotional Products’ average annual growth rate over the last five years was 4.4%.

Contacted by Counselor, Staples said that it doesn’t comment on individual employees. Meghan McCarrick, a company spokesperson, added: “Any efforts we undertake to streamline the organization are aimed at speeding our decision-making and enabling us to focus on our customers. We will continue to look at the best structure to compete in a rapidly evolving marketplace.”

Staples wasn’t immediately saying whether or not a successor for Witaszak had been lined up. Counselor reached out to Witaszak, but hadn’t heard back as of this writing.

Witaszak was 16th on Counselor’s latest Power 50, a definitive ranking of the most influential people in the promotional products industry.