Corporate Office

Trent was born and raised in Daytona Beach and has lived there his entire life, except for his years in college.  He has also been around Ben's his whole life; Ben Kimball was his grandfather.  Owners Dennis and Debby Emerson are dad and mom.  Growing up at Ben's, Trent has done everything there is to do in the business: sweep floors, work in the warehouse, deliver orders, mix paint, work at the counter and more.  Trent attended Clemson University in Clemson, SC from 1988 to 1993.  When he returned to Ben's after working on his Marketing degree, Dennis put him on the road as an outside salesperson in June of 1993.  In January of 1994 Trent was responsible for the launch of our industrial division.  Dennis promoted him to President/COO in 2002. He has two daughters and has been married since 1991. Trent enjoys playing golf, going to the beach and exercising.

Dennis' family was originally from Colorado but they moved to Florida when he was 12, residing in a home only one block away from the world famous Daytona Beach.  In his teens he worked some in his stepfather's body shop (Ben Kimball - yes, the original Ben), and when he graduated from high school, joined the Air Force.  While stationed in Georgia he met his wife Debby, who today is also our CFO.  Dennis returned from military service in 1970 and joined his stepfather as an employee of what was then Ben's Auto-Marine Supply.  Dennis kept the business going after Ben died in 1980 and today remains the CEO of the corporation.  Their only child, son Trent, is the COO and president of the company.  Of all things, Dennis values family the most.  In his own words, "It's great to have my family involved in the business.  I have a wonderful daughter-in-law and two terrific granddaughters.  Most of all I enjoy our family adventures and boy have we had some!"

Debby is the wife of CEO Dennis and mom to Trent, our COO and company president.  She's kind of mom to all of us too! 

Her background includes a BS in Education from the University of Georgia and an ME from Florida Tech (now UCF).  She taught for 5 years with a specialization in students with learning disabilities.  Having been self-taught in financial matters through "On the Job" training and meetings with advisors, Debby nows serves as our CFO and general overseer of Administrative and HR issues. 

Of course, even before coming on board as a paid worker, she was always a part of the Ben's team, serving at home as a sounding board to Dennis.  She came on full-time after the death of Ben Kimball, the founder of Ben's.  In addition to all the things she does, she is now a sounding board for the rest of us too!

Melissa joined us in Dec. 1999 and today serves as our company controller.  She came to us with background in communications sales and was Commercial Services Manager for the Hart Telephone Company from 1994 to 1998.  She then worked for Siemens for a year before coming to Ben's.  Melissa attended the University of Georgia and graduated with a Bachelors degree in Business Administration.  Originally from Hartwell, Georgia, she is the wife of Kip Jolly, who manages our Daytona and Deland locations. 

In 1997, Kip and Melissa chose to move to Florida for better career opportunites.  At Ben's she feels she has adopted a second family.  Among other things, her job is paying all those bills, and she has the 3ft. stacks of paper to prove it!    Apart from work, Melissa leads an active church life and enjoys time with her family.  She and Kip enjoy sports too - not the ones they do, the ones their 2 boys do: baseball and golf.  And then there's band practice....

Teresa serves as our Credit/Accounts Receivable manager and has been a part of the team since Nov. 2005.  If you don't hear from her, that means you're doing fine.  But if you're having trouble with your bill, she will do the best she can to work with you to get things back to where they need to be.  Teresa spent most of her life in Columbus, Ohio but has been a Florida resident since 2003, joining her parents who already lived on the Florida coastline.  She has a BA in Psychology, but has mostly held various administrative positions, inlcuding the Florida Poison Control Center in Jacksonville and also for a group of professional musicians.  The day flies by for her; as she states, "It's never dull and the people are great".  In her free time she enjoys aerobics, tennis and the common pastime that occupies most BA's in Psychology - belly dancing.

Originally a native of Minnesota, Bob has lived in Florida - let's say long enough to make snow a distant memory.  He got into the paint business literally by accident.  He was delivering newspapers in the middle of the night and one false move totalled his car dead center into a tree.  Needing something less dangerous, he was a friend of the family of a new paint jobber in Gainesville and was offered a part-time paint mixing job there.  Shortly after that he was promoted to manager and remained so for 25 years, surviving the deaths of two owners.  He joined the Ben's team in 1995 and started the Gainesville branch along with Randy Keene and Wayne Anderson.  He left store management in June 2006 and was offered the opportunity to become Project Manager, a new position at Ben's.  This proactive move has allowed him to take his years of experience and share it with others in the company, with the goal in mind of helping Ben's move forward and ahead of the competition.  In 2002, he received the Ben's Pursuit of Excellence Award and in 2007, the award for Leadership.  A graduate of the University of Florida, Bob and his wife Mary enjoy the blessings of 3 children and 8 grandchildren.  In his spare time he...forget that.  He has no spare time.