SAKG Wins $6 Million Verdict For Kansas City Small Business

On May 6, 2019, Brent Coverdale, Paula Brown, and Andrew Lewis achieved a unanimous jury verdict for SAKG’s client in the Circuit Court of Jackson County, Missouri.

The jury unanimously awarded SAKG’s client over $6 million in damages (over $525,000 in actual damages and over $5.5 million in punitive damages) on claims for breach of loyalty, conspiracy, and tortious interference with business expectancies. SAKG and its client, All Star Awards & Ad Specialties, a small local business, brought these claims against the client’s former General Sales Manager, Doug Ford, and his new employer, HALO Branded Solutions—a much larger competitor of SAKG’s client. All Star makes and sells custom awards and recognition and promotional items. Its former sales manager Ford decided to join its competitor, HALO, but instead of resigning immediately, spent months gathering customer information and forwarding it to his new employer, HALO as well as contacting customers and sending orders to HALO while also still employed by All Star. After All Star learned of this conduct and fired Ford, he and HALO continued their efforts to divert clients and business to HALO.

At trial, Ford and HALO admitted they’d “made a mistake,” but downplayed the scope of their actions. As shown by the sizeable award of both actual and punitive damages, but SAKG was able to show the jury the complete scope of the illegal conduct by Ford and HALO and the impact on All Star.

Brent Coverdale

Paula Brown

Andrew Lewis