Ward Lumber named Bryan Mellick as the company’s new CEO following a national search, replacing Jay Ward.
“Bryan really stood out from our first conversation,” cooperative board president Tim Clark said. “It was clear right away that he had all the elements in a leader we were looking for.”
Mellick brings a career’s worth of leadership experience, including a decade in the lumber business. He has spent time in other industries, including technology and management consulting, and has spent time as an entrepreneur as well.
“Ward Lumber’s board and worker-owners stand out—in my 34 years working with mid-sized and entrepreneurial companies—as top 1% in this class,” Mellick said. “When you have people of this quality running and owning a business, it does not matter the industry, you have a foundation for continued success and that is what drew me to Ward Lumber.”
Ward Lumber has been in operation since 1890 and has been a worker-owned cooperative since 2021.
“I have taken very seriously the responsibility for our team and am happy to be able to hand off that responsibility to Bryan as our next CEO,” Ward said. Ward will stay on with the company as a purchasing manager.
