_edited.jpg)
Flexsteel, Ashley, Room & Board, KI among furniture makers benefiting from industrial and product design grads’ skills
UW-Stout Polytechnic alum on industry publication’s ‘40 Under 40’ list
By Tom Giffey, UW-Stout
MENOMONIE, Wis. – With creativity shaped by universal design principles and honed by applied learning, graduates of University of Wisconsin-Stout Polytechnic’s B.F.A. industrial and product design program are creating industry-leading furniture designs, producing pieces you may already be working, sitting or sleeping on.
“One of the things that has always stood out to me about Stout's IPD program is that design is deeply connected to engineering, manufacturing and real-world implementation,” said alumnus Brian Linehan, merchandise and design manager at Room & Board in Minneapolis. “The focus extends far beyond aesthetics to understanding how products are built, produced and brought to market.”
In addition to taking leading creative roles at well-known furniture companies such as Ashley Furniture Industries, Flexsteel, KI, and Room & Board, recent industrial and product design graduates have been hired by the likes of Milwaukee Tool, Oshkosh Corporation, Procter & Gamble, Red Wing Shoe Company, Toro Company, and many more. Among IPD majors who graduated in 2024-25, 100% found employment or were continuing their education within six months, and they reported an average annual starting salary of $57,000.
“Great designers understand materials, manufacturing, craftsmanship and the people who will ultimately live with their creations,” said Associate Professor Dan Neubauer, director of the IPD program. “At UW-Stout Polytechnic industrial and product design, students develop those skills by working directly with materials, building prototypes, and learning through a process of iteration, refinement, and mentorship. The result is an education that extends beyond their design concepts to a deeper understanding of how products are developed and brought into the world. The alumni featured here demonstrate the impact of that experience. While their careers have taken different paths, they share a common foundation: the ability to transform ideas into tangible solutions and create products that improve everyday life.”
Four alumni of the industrial and product design program recently spoke about how their experience at Wisconsin’s Polytechnic University prepared them for success in the furniture industry.
Alek Eglinton, Flexsteel Industries
Alek Eglinton, a 2013 industrial and product design graduate, was recognized as part of the “next generation of industry leaders” who earned a place on the latest “40 Under 40” list published by Furniture Today.
“Successful product design isn’t about creating something that I would buy,” Eglinton, design manager at Flexsteel Industries, told Furniture Today. “It’s about understanding the customer, solving their needs and delivering products that fit their lifestyle and expectations.”
In practice, this has meant identifying unmet market needs. For example, a few years ago Flexsteel discovered data about the number of people who sleep in recliners instead of beds, often as a result of sleep-related issues such as sleep apnea or because of recovery and rehabilitation needs. This led to the development of the Zecliner, a line of recliners designed to be bed alternatives.
“I just loved working on that project because it was something very new,” Eglinton explained. Helping people with such needs lent extra motivation – and satisfaction – to the project, he said.
Eglinton came to UW-Stout Polytechnic with an interest in woodworking, leatherworking and metalworking, and found himself drawn to the applied nature of the university’s industrial and product design program. His projects at Stout included designing boots for Red Wing Shoes, creating a backpack, building furniture, and even addressing traffic safety for pedestrians.
“Our professors did a good job of forcing us to think and to problem-solve,” Eglinton said. “Obviously, we worked on our technical skills a lot. We did a ton of sketching and model making, but it wasn’t just about visuals; it was challenging the way we think that I really appreciated.”
Eglinton was most interested in designing furniture and went to work for Dubuque, Iowa-based Flexsteel shortly after graduation. Over the course of 13 years, he’s worked on everything from occasional tables to soft seating to motion furniture, the product category that includes recliners. He’s also had the opportunity to recruit numerous interns from UW-Stout Polytechnic, some of whom became full-time employees.
“What I’ve always loved about recruiting Stout grads is you just know that their skill level is at a certain bar,” he said. “Where Stout has the edge is in the skills that are developed, especially the problem solving.”
Angel Kraemer, Ashley Furniture Industries
UW-Stout Polytechnic alumni are well-represented at Arcadia-based Ashley Furniture Industries, the largest manufacturer of furniture in the world. This includes CEO Todd Wanek, a 1988 graduate, as well as dozens of others, including Director of Design and Merchandising Angel Kraemer, a 2011 graduate of the industrial and product design program.
While she originally intended to pursue a graphic design degree, Kraemer discovered industrial and product design by accident when the wrong sticker was put on her binder during orientation. Once she took a few classes, she was hooked.
Kraemer’s career at Ashley began with an internship in the casegoods design department, which led to a full-time job after graduation. “My internship showed me that you can make dreams happen anywhere,” she said. “In today’s mobile work environment that’s truer than ever.”
Over the past 15 years, Kraemer has hired Stout interns nearly every summer as well as numerous Blue Devil alumni as designers. “Not only do I believe in what is supported and taught there but I have seen the determined, smart and passionate students that have been received from Stout,” she said.
As a way of giving back to their alma mater, Kraemer and other members of the Ashley design team have served on the industrial and product design program advisory committee, which also includes design professionals from companies such as Harley-Davidson, Polaris, Trek and Sherwin Williams.
Kraemer said she frequently tells students, “If you ever look at products and think to yourself ‘I have ideas, on how to make products work better, include more features, and be more affordable and aesthetically pleasing,’ and you have the urge to get your hands dirty to make it and see it come to life, than you belong in industrial and product design. That’s how I knew I belonged here.”
Brian Linehan, Room & Board
Brian Linehan, merchandise and design manager at Room & Board, first enrolled at UW-Stout Polytechnic to pursue a degree in graphic design, but changed his mind when he was exposed to the work students were doing in the industrial and product design program.
“I became fascinated by the thought and intention behind everyday products and how design influences the way people interact with the world around them,” Linehan said. “The combination of creativity, problem-solving and tangible outcomes drew me in immediately.”
Linehan recalls how a molded plywood project in late Professor Noah Norton’s class cemented his interest in furniture. “It opened my eyes to the blend of craftsmanship, engineering and storytelling that exists with furniture design,” he said.
Linehan earned his UW-Stout Polytechnic degree in 2010 and joined Minneapolis-based Room & Board in 2015. Soon after, he created a partnership between his employer and his alma mater, which evolved into a furniture-design contest for seniors in the industrial and product design program. Mentors from Room & Board, including Linehan, meet with UW-Stout Polytechnic students annually and provide ongoing critiques of their furniture designs. The process culminates in a student visit to Room & Board’s Minneapolis headquarters, where their final designs are judged. Winners receive cash prizes in exchange for Room & Board reserving the right to manufacture their designs. This year, for the first time, the company added one of the Blue Devil designs to its catalog: a coffee table created by 2024 alum Micah Loder.
The collaboration between the university and the company has led to six summer internships at Room & Board for industrial and product design majors and the hiring of three additional UW-Stout Polytechnic alums as full-time designers.
“For Room & Board, the partnership has become an important source of inspiration, creative exploration and talent recruitment,” Linehan said. “The influence of Stout graduates can be seen throughout our design team and product development culture today. Room & Board would be a very different place without their contributions.”
Jordan Dinwiddie, KI
While some industrial and product design alums made their way to the furniture industry after graduating from Stout, Jordan Dinwiddie actually began his career as a furniture maker. A native of Omaha, Nebraska, Dinwiddie moved to Minneapolis in his early 20s where he was employed as a woodworker, helping designers produce small batches of fine furniture. He became interested in industrial and product design, and a colleague who taught furniture design at another institution recommended he enroll at UW-Stout Polytechnic.
“Right out of the gate it was very clearly a great match for me because of the polytechnic focus,” Dinwiddie said. “I have a passion for craft and understanding the physicality of the objects we interact with, as opposed to looking at a screen or a piece of paper and saying, ‘This thing looks great, but I don’t know how to make it.’”
Once he entered the IPD program, Dinwiddie was able to exercise and expand his craft in the Materials & Process Lab. “That is just an unparalleled workshop that we have access to,” he said of the lab. “Most other programs in the country just don’t have that sort of access to real machines and real materials to make things at full scale.”
After receiving his degree in 2024, Dinwiddie went to work for CSI Creative, a Minneapolis-based architectural acoustic company that recruits extensively from UW-Stout Polytechnic. From there, he was hired earlier this year by KI, a Green Bay-based firm that creates furniture for educational, health care, corporate and government workplaces. Dinwiddie learned about KI through Design Wisconsin, an annual showcase sponsored by UW-Stout Polytechnic, which was most recently hosted at Oshkosh Corporation in May.
Dinwiddie loves his job because it gives him an opportunity to work on a wide range of design projects and even to spend time in the company’s prototyping lab. “There is a lot of emphasis and value at KI placed on knowing how to make stuff,” he explained. “That polytechnic education is what allowed me to get this job.”
And while he’s enjoying a career that took him back to the furniture industry, Dinwiddie knows the skills emphasized in Stout’s industrial and product design program can benefit graduates in many realms. “The industrial design process is universally applicable,” he said. “We weren’t taught so much in school how to design a water bottle, a remote control or a chair. We were taught the process of how to come to a solution, whether it may be a water bottle, a remote control, or now in my case, a chair.”
UW-Stout Polytechnic offers more than 70 industry-aligned undergraduate and graduate degrees and 40 professional certificate programs. One of the 13 Universities of Wisconsin, UW-Stout Polytechnic is distinguished by applied learning and research, business and industry collaboration, and career-focused experiences to prepare students for success in engineering, technology, design, management and other fields.
