From Grizzly Industrial:

As Shiraz Balolia, Grizzly Industrial’s founder, takes on the role of Chairman and CEO, Robert McCoy, who has been with the company for thirty years, has been promoted to the position of President of Grizzly Industrial.

“Shiraz is and was a consummate businessman who operates with fairness and integrity for his employees, vendors and customers,” says McCoy. “His legacy is one of hard work, dedication and innovation, and he created opportunities for countless  and families through his business ventures.”

Balolia started Grizzly Industrial in the spring of 1983 after his hobby of refurbishing and selling metal lathes took off. He discovered a great demand for quality machinery at an affordable price, so he developed relationships with factories overseas and began to import new machines under the Grizzly name. In those early years, Balolia did it all, from accounting, to marketing, to cleaning the floors, to delivering machines in person to customers, in his Volkswagen van.

Over the next thirty-seven years, Balolia successfully built Grizzly from a one-employee operation, to the first tool and machinery company with its own website (grizzly.com), to a huge business with nine-figure sales, employing over three hundred people in multiple showrooms and warehouses in the U.S. and in company offices in Taiwan and China. Grizzly now has the largest selection of woodworking and metalworking machinery under one brand in the world and remains the only direct-to-consumer industrial machinery company in the United States.

“I appreciate Shiraz’s integrity, vision and direction in leading the company over the last thirtyseven years,” says Juan Hernandez, Senior Vice President of Grizzly Industrial. “I have great respect for his dedication and leadership in transforming Grizzly Industrial into the industry leader.”

For decades, Grizzly has been a household name among professional woodworkers and metal workers, known for its excellent quality machinery offered at the lowest prices in the industry with world-class customer service and support. Now, that audience is growing and Grizzly is expanding. In his role as Chairman and CEO, Balolia will be able to maintain a flexible schedule that will allow him to spend time with family, enjoy his hobbies, and reflect on the life he built and the lives he improved along the way. Robert McCoy, whom Balolia hired in 1989, has the full confidence of Balolia and the company to take Grizzly into the future and continue Balolia’s legacy.