After 45 acquisitions, School Specialty is now the No. 1 supplier of products for educators.

By Alicia Orr Suman

Getting to the teacher is not always a straightforward affair, he admits. “The buying decision may come from the teacher or the principal, but the order may come from the school secretary, and this is an office where, believe it or not, many still are using typewriters!”

Often it’s the school’s front office that will get all of the catalogs and redirect them to the individual teachers, he adds.