Supply Chain Hall of Fame to be hosted in Rogers

News BriefsNorthwest Arkansas

by Talk Business & Politics staff ([email protected]) September 25, 2019 12:57 pm 549 views 

The Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals has voted to host its Supply Chain Hall of Fame in Rogers.

Under the proposal, the Sam M. Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas will host the hall of fame for an initial period of five years. UA officials said the hall will be built as a multifunction exhibit and meeting space on top of the six-story Northgate Plaza building under construction at 5111 W. J.B. Hunt Drive in Rogers.

The building owner is Northgate Holdings, a partnership between the Blass family of Little Rock and Johnelle Hunt, chairman of Hunt Ventures in Rogers.

The building is expected to be completed by early 2020.

“The hall of fame will highlight achievements and innovations in supply chain,” said Matt Waller, Walton College dean and the Sam M. Walton Leadership Chair in Business. “Northwest Arkansas is the hub of supply chain innovation and research.”

Waller said the idea came at the suggestion of Remko Van Hoek, a clinical professor of supply chain at the UA. Van Hoek will serve as executive director of the hall of fame.

“Through exhibits, education and events the hall is also meant to educate and inspire future leaders in supply chain,” Van Hoek said. “By engaging our students and entrepreneurial region we can bridge the greatest of the past with the best of the future.”

Waller said the hall was made possible thanks to the generous support of Hunt, the co-founder of J.B. Hunt Transport Inc., along with her husband, the late J.B. Hunt. Waller also mentioned the support of Gus Blass III, general partner of Capital Properties LLC in Little Rock and a member of the board of 10 other companies, and Alex Blass, a partner at development firm Cushman & Wakefield/Sage Partners in Rogers. Both Gus Blass and Alex Blass, his son, are alumni of the Walton College.

The hall will feature space devoted to rotating exhibits about inductees and also will be used for lectures, roundtable meetings and functions for as many as 100 attendees.