Detroit Colour Council Past Officers & Recognitions

Cari Coffer - Past President
Education: Bachelor of Science degree from Michigan State University and dual Masters Degrees in Marketing and MBA from Walsh College.

Lisa Benedict - President
Education: BBA and AA Residential and Commercial Design Management – Northwood University, Midland, MI
Major areas of study included material and textiles for commercial and industrial uses, and architectural design and layout.

Jeff Alspach - Vice President

Frank Pizzo - Treasurer
Color Experience: 20 years in the Automotive Coatings World and 4 years in the General Industrial Coatings market.
Bio: Currently employed with BASF as the General Motors Color Program Manager, responsible for new BASF Color Developments and secondary matches with GM Design and Engineering groups from inception through launch.

Sabrina Morris - Secretary
Education: Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Engineering Sciences from Michigan State University in East Lansing, MI.

Christie Navarre - Board
Previous employment in the industry was in the R&D lab at Kay Automotive Graphics, where she was responsible for color matching and formulation.
Education: Bachelor of Science degree from Michigan State University.

James Hall - Education
Responsible for exterior body color development. Includes assembly plant color processing, durability testing and color standards. Previous color engineering assignments in GM’s Interior Engineering organization and GM Design. Past President of the Detroit Colour Council. Current Chairman of Detroit Colour Council Education Committee. Worked with Bill Longley to create the Detroit Colour Council Metallics Course.
Education: Bachelor Degree from Wayne State University.

Don Castle - Board
Last 15 plus years in Sales( JS Chamberlain & Assoc., Inc ) which included painted automotive plastic products
Memberships at this time – ESD, MI.State Bar, AARP
Education:
ME from GMI (Now Kettering).
JD from Detroit College of Law (Now MSU).

Tracy Metivier - Membership
Education: Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree with Furniture/Design major focus from The College For Creative Studies, Detroit, MI

Bob Santine - Website
Color Experience: Bob has over 25 years experience in color measurement instrumentation sales, training, and support. Currently employed by BYK Gardner USA as the Regional Sales Manager for the Ohio Valley region. Previously held a similar position with X-Rite and HunterLab. Past President of the Detroit Colour Council.

Nick Lena - Board
Nick Lena has degrees in both Engineering and Marketing. He joined GTI Graphic Technology, Inc. as Director of Color Technology in October 2011. In this role Nick oversees the LightSupport Calibration and Re-certification Service Program and also provides technical and sales support for both the Graphic Arts and Color and Appearance products. Nick joined GTI from Gamma Scientific where he was the Product Line Manager for Commercial Lighting, Military and Display Measurement. He previously worked for KonicaMinolta as Director of Technology and Business Unit Manager for Radiometric Products and Solutions. In this role he was responsible for the technical support and marketing efforts for all Spectrophotometers, Spectroradiometer and Colorimeter products.
Nick was also with GretagMacbeth for 20 years as Lighting and Radiometric Product Marketing Manager. At GretagMacbeth he developed and taught over 300 seminars on topics including Fundamentals of Color, and Appearance, Color Measurement and Light and Light Measurement. He was the author of their still current course books, The Fundamentals of Color and Appearance and has been the guest speaker for such organizations as Detroit Color Council, Color Marketing Group, Estee Lauder, Sikorsky, General Motors, Mattel, Disney, Honda, Jaguar, Boeing, Bayer, American Greeting, Microsoft, American Gem Trading Association, Frigidaire, Steelcase, The American Society of Appraisers and The American Association of Textile Chemists and Colorists.
He is an active committee member of The American Society of Testing Materials, (ASTM) E12 Color and Appearance committees and is the Chairman of the ASTM E12.11 Visual Methods Committee. Nick has recently been appointed to the Board of Directors of the Detroit Color Council.
Nick has been a member of the Illumination Engineering Society of North America, (IES) since 1978, a member of IES Committee on Color and has developed webinars on lighting measurement and the color metrics used for LEDs on the IES Education web site. In addition Nick was an active member of the ANSI / ISO TC42 standardization efforts on Visual Evaluation of Color and Uniformity in the Graphic Arts and participated in AATCC RA36 on Lighting Communications for Textiles and Apparel and was an advisor to the CIE (International Commission on Illumination) committee TC1-44 for Practical Daylight Sources for Colorimetry,

Katie Miller - Board
Color Experience: Katie is currently employed by NPA Coatings Inc. as a Color Chemist II. She is responsible for the development of exterior body colors for the OEM segment. This includes color matching, color formulation and adjustments, material testing, color standardization, and customer support for new color trials. Prior to her current role she held Coatings Chemist positions with both Sherwin Williams and NPA Coatings where she was responsible for all aspects of coatings development.
Education: Bachelor of Science Degree in Chemistry from Cleveland State University.