Our Team
MICHAEL RHODIG – CEO/MANAGING PARTNER
Michael Rhodig has over 25 years experience in product engineering, product sourcing, product marketing, new product development, and user experience for product companies of all sizes and stages of development; from entrepreneurial start-up environments to process-driven Fortune 500 companies, including General Electric, Albertsons and Boeing. Michael started GarageMahals 7 years ago with the goal of developing the garage as a luxury space to encompass the unique characteristics of its owner. Whether it’s ideating features for a award winning themed environment or enhancing an existing environment Michael runs overall operations of GarageMahals to cater to our clients expectations. Michael leverages his breadth of knowledge to improve management across functional groups that drive successful results.
Michael’s unique approach focuses on using the voice of the customer to build and position products that meet the needs of a changing marketplace. His forte is managing the unique talents of GarageMahals from initiation of a project through its lifecycle, which often includes ideation, concept development, rapid prototype development, and installation.
Michael launched and positioned GarageMahals as the worldwide leader in the luxury themed, custom garage environments. All of Mr. Rhodig’s experience, knowledge, and skill has come together and enabled his team to produce the most stunning garage interiors ever conceived. This practice has resulted in Michael evolving into a world-class designer recognized and illustrated in leading luxury publications such as Forbes, Vogue, Millionaire Blueprints, Playboy, Robb Report and numerous others.
Michael holds a B.S. Degree in Mechanical Engineering, and graduated with honors from Oregon State University in 1987. Michael was immediately recruited to work at The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. At LLNL, Michael excelled in the science of composite materials analysis and design. Boeing recognized the capability and recruited Michael to work on its customer related product issues. Michael has worked as a Product Marketing executive with GE and Xceed Worldwide earning many awards and distinction covering over 50 brands and companies.
GARY KAHL – COO/PARTNER
Gary’s responsibilities encompass project management, sourcing, partner management and sales and marketing at GarageMahals. Gary has over 25 years of experience implementing strategic and tactical programs that encompass sales, marketing and operational management for several forward-thinking fortune 500 companies. He has demonstrated the ability to apply management best practices for organizations to realize investments both strategically and tactically.
Gary has a broad and encompassing background in developing and executing strategies to provide high-quality sourcing, product development, sales and management services to a variety of corporations. In doing this, Mr. Kahl has worked extensively with various industry market analysts to position these corporations as thought leaders in their industries. This has led to increased revenue, profitability, stock performance and stakeholder equity.
Gary and his assembled teams have provided products and services to several clients including strategic and tactical definition, sales and marketing strategy and implementation, automated sourcing compliance, vendor negotiations, sourcing strategies, corporate road mapping for strategic management, enterprise program management and planning with a wide variety of performance deliverables.
Gary has also served as an executive consultant to several corporations working in the area of strategy development and planning, most recently for companies such as Royal Dutch Ahold, Sears, Gallo Wines, Home Depot, Infopia and Tek Systems. He has served as Senior Vice President of Sourcing and Project Management for Albertsons, Inc., Executive Vice President of National Practices for Xceed, Inc., Senior Vice President for Impact Innovations Group/CBSI and Director of Western Operations for Virtual Solutions. He has a business management education from University of Southern California, International Trade education from Stanford University and Technical Project Management education from University of Washington.
WALLANCE HRDICKA – CA AREA BUILDER
Wallace Hrdicka runs an extension of GarageMahals installation and sales services for Southern California. Wallace has over 25 years of experience as a general contractor and developer and has been in business in Southern California, since 1995.
As an experienced luxury designer/developer Wallace brings a commitment to quality to finishes and state of the art architectural designs that allows GarageMahals to grow and satisfy the needs of many sophisticated clients in the Southern California area.
Wallace has a proven track record of applying creativity and technical expertise to a wide variety of projects. He brings the best of our business, financial, design, development backgrounds to ensure the success of every project.
P.J. HEIDEN – CONCEPTUAL DESIGNER
P.J. Heiden’s experience spans over twenty-eight years of architectural illustration, industrial design, and product creation and development. An old school craftsmen and artist, P.J.’s preference for using a pencil over a computer for his design and illustrations work, makes each rendering unique to every client’s needs. The scope of his work encompasses designing and developing environmental spaces, museum settings, visitors centers, trade show exhibits and product fabrication.
P.J.’s planning and design of physical rehabilitation environments for hospitals can be seen throughout the country. His work focused on creating environments for physically disabled individuals to interact with real world situations in a controlled setting. His work in retail design included the entire re-design of Eyemasters stores retail space, ophthalmologist offices and lens fabrication labs. On-site time-motion studies led to the re-engineering of the lab equipment which created a more efficient lens fabrication process and decreased product to customer time substantially.
P.J.’s design work can also be seen at the Heard Museum, the Arizona Science Center, the Phoenix Children’s Museum, the visitor center at Palo Verde Nuclear Plant, the Yavapai Museum at the Grand Canyon and numerous visitor centers for the Tennessee Valley Authority. In addition to P.J.’s environmental design work, his years in the trade show/exhibit industry has included clients such as Cessna, General Electric, Microsoft, Motorola, Intel, Avnet, and Ninetendo. His work with Ninetendo led to a redesign of their game platform components.
Although only recently having joined the GarageMahals team, P.J. has worked throughout his career with many of the people at GarageMahals who share in his life long passion for anything mechanical and automotive to the drawing table, whether it’s old chevy trucks or finely designed Italian motorcycles.
JOSEPH LEE EMERSON – LEAD DESIGNER
As Lead Designer for GarageMahals, Joseph responsibilities can be very multidisciplinary. Joseph graduated top of his class from Arizona State University with a degree in Industrial Design with emphasis in engineering. Joseph has contributed to design projects for companies such as Mazda, Volvo, US Navy, Honeywell, and has worked on products ranging from liquid injection molded parts, to hydraulic/electric motion simulators. With his diverse professional experience and excessive knowledge in material processes and manufacturing, Joseph delivers a very streamlined approach to our process. His role at GarageMahals ranges from the initial stages of concept ideation through the final stages of development.
MARIO RAMIREZ – PROJECT MANAGER
Mario Ramirez manages projects at GarageMahals, the world’s only company dedicated to the complete transformation of the garage environment. He is a product of being immersed in industry at the young age of 17 and has always found himself in leading positions. Before graduating from high school, Mario was recruited through a joint program between SkillsUSA and Honeywell Aerospace, earned a management internship, and subsequently became Six Sigma Green Belt certified by the age of 18. After being awarded an additional summer internship contract, Mario focused on pursuing degrees in Electro-Mechanical Drafting and Manufacturing Management Technology from Mesa Community College while developing production and inventory systems for Full-Race Motorsports & El Mar Diving Center. He is currently working on a degree in Operations Management Technology from Arizona State University Polytechnic and has what’s been called an “extremely hands-on” approach to his education.
Mario is always measuring something and has a strong passion for developing management systems with an emphasis on reducing cost and improving communication. Through working with a variety of companies from Fortune 500 to small family owned businesses, Mario has proved himself as an industrious and devoted professional with a dynamic thought process for effectively managing projects.
MATT HAMILTON – FABRICATION COORDINATOR
With over 8 years of quality projects under his belt, Matt brings a unique skill set to GarageMahals. His knowledge of traditional millwork along with general construction allows Matt to think on his feet and meet the required task. Matt has also shown a knack for finding unique materials to incorporate into the garage environment. At anytime, you may find Matt conducting a site survey or coordinating between design and fabrication.
Matt enjoys house music along with dressing up in character at the local renaissance festival.