TERRITORY SALES MANAGER – MACHINE TOOL

Missouri, Kansas, and Southern Illinois | St. Louis Hub | Search managed by Bear Recruiting

ABOUT THE COMPANY

A long established CNC machine tool sales, service, and applications organization serving the Midwest, part of a larger private equity backed group of operating companies under a Minnesota based firm. The machine tool businesses sit alongside separate calibration and metrology entities within the same family.

The company distributes leading domestic and Japanese OEM lines across roughly twelve product categories, including turning centers, horizontal and vertical machining, 5-axis, Swiss lathes, mold and die EDM, bridge mills, production turning, and grinding. Every sale is backed by dedicated application engineers assigned by product segment, so the seller is never the sole technical resource in the room.

Customers are job shops, contract manufacturers, and OEM machining operations across medical, aerospace, defense, automotive, agriculture, and general manufacturing.

New executive leadership has brought higher energy, a faster pace, and a more hands on style, and a new sales leader now runs and coaches the territory sales team.

POSITION OVERVIEW

This is a full cycle territory sales role owning Missouri, Kansas, and Southern Illinois. You are responsible for growing the market: managing existing accounts, identifying new opportunities, and closing capital equipment sales.

This is a pipeline game. The work is finding shops running competitive equipment, learning where their pain is, and being in the running when they expand, replace, or finance out. Machines run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, and multi machine projects run well into seven figures.

The St. Louis metro, Kansas City metro, and the manufacturing corridors between them carry the bulk of the opportunity. Southern Illinois adds the Metro East and the manufacturing base along I-55 and I-64.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

Territory Ownership

•    Own and manage the Missouri, Kansas, and Southern Illinois territory end to end, from prospecting through close.

•    Grow revenue within the existing customer base while actively hunting net new accounts.

•    Plan and route the territory independently. Nobody assigns your calls.

•    Maintain accurate pipeline and forecast discipline in CRM.

Opportunity Development

•    Identify machine tool opportunities across job shops, contract manufacturers, and OEM machining operations.

•    Uncover triggers: capacity expansion, aging or financed out equipment, new part programs, quality or cycle time problems.

•    Build relationships across the buying group, from the shop floor and engineering through ownership and finance.

Technical Sales Support

•    Hold credible technical conversations about the customer's parts, materials, tolerances, and production process.

•    Bring in the assigned application engineer for deeper technical work, demonstrations, and proof of process.

•    Develop ROI based justification for capital purchases and guide the customer through the decision.

TERRITORY & TRAVEL

•    Missouri, Kansas, and Southern Illinois.

•    Live in the territory. St. Louis metro is the natural hub given the office location and account density, though Kansas City is workable for the right candidate.

•    Mix of day trips and overnight travel. The St. Louis and Kansas City metros are day-trip territory from either base. Wichita, outstate Kansas, and the far corners of Missouri will require overnights to work efficiently.

•    Home office based. There is a corporate office in the St. Louis area, but daily reporting is not required. Expect periodic visits for sales meetings and larger company gatherings.

QUALIFICATIONS

Required

•    Proven B2B outside sales experience in a manufacturing or industrial environment.

•    Comfort with long cycle, consultative selling. Capital equipment cycles here can run 12 to 24 months.

•    Genuine willingness to prospect and hunt. This role generates its own opportunities.

•    Enough technical fluency to hold your own with engineers and shop owners without being the product expert.

•    CRM discipline and the self direction to run a multi-state territory without daily oversight.

Preferred

•    CNC machine tool or capital equipment sales experience.

•    Cutting tool, tooling, workholding, automation, or metrology sales into the same customer base.

•    Hands on machining background: CNC operation, programming, setup, or manufacturing engineering.

•    Existing relationships with Missouri, Kansas, or Southern Illinois job shops and contract manufacturers.

WHO THRIVES HERE

The people who succeed in this seat are self directed, patient enough to work a real capital cycle, and energized rather than intimidated by an empty calendar they have to fill themselves.

•    Comfortable with an 18 to 24 month sale and the discipline to keep working it.

•    Willing to knock on doors and build relationships before there is an active opportunity.

•    Technically curious. You do not need to program a machine, but you need to want to understand the customer's process.

•    Motivated by uncapped earnings rather than by a predictable paycheck.

•    Comfortable with a territory that requires real windshield time and some nights away.

What Does Not Work

•    Fast transactional or consumable sales backgrounds where something closes every week.

•    Sellers who need inbound leads or an assigned call list.

•    Anyone who needs commission to land in the first 90 days.

COMPENSATION & BENEFITS

•    Salary plus uncapped commission. The company is flexible on the base and builds the package around what the candidate needs rather than working from a rigid band.

•    First year commission guarantee to carry you through the ramp, structured around the candidate's situation. Historically written as a draw and, in practice, never clawed back.

•    Verified W-2 total compensation for reps in this organization runs $175,000 to $300,000 in a typical year once established.

•    Aggressive tiered commission structure reaching roughly 25% at the top end.

•    Car allowance starting around $500 to $600 per month, reviewed annually and scaled up based on tracked mileage. Some reps have moved to roughly $900.

•    Full benefits package.

•    Dedicated application engineers by product segment supporting every technical sale.

CONTACT

This search is being managed confidentially by Bear Recruiting. For a full conversation on the company, the territory, and compensation, please reach out directly.

Kevin Kilday | Bear Recruiting