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CHRIS UPTON
Industry Consultant
Mr. Upton has over thirteen years experience in the pawn industry and hands-on knowledge of the entire pawnshop automation and operational business model. From 1987 through 1988, he was a Manager for Big State which later became Cash America Pawn, one of the largest pawnshop chains in the country.
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In 1988, he joined Express Cash International, a 9-store chain in San Antonio, Texas in which Mr. Upton was Director of MIS. At Express Cash, Mr. Upton managed all aspects of the company's automation systems in anticipation of their IPO, which they completed in 1991. Initially, at Express Cash, Mr. Upton was involved in the development of an internally designed pawnshop automation system that was subsequently abandoned after Mr. Upton met Mr. Howell at the Texas Pawnbrokers Convention in 1988. Once Mr. Howell demonstrated the powerful features of CompuPawn, Mr. Upton influenced Express Cash to switch to CompuPawn as their automation choice. The implementation of CompuPawn into the Express Cash locations and their continued expansion to 18 stores was the start of Mr. Upton's long relationship with VCS. While at Express Cash, Mr. Upton contributed to the developed product through his assistance in suggesting and designing many new features and enhancements to the program, which are still in widespread use today.
The 18-store Express Cash chain was acquired in 1993 by Cash America, after which Mr. Upton accepted a position as Operations Coordinator at Texas State Credit Company, a chain of 50 pawnshops in three states. During Mr. Upton's tenure at Texas State Credit he was responsible for the success of the company's nine Houston, TX based stores. From 1993 through 1998 Mr. Upton supervised 75 employees and was responsible for increasing his division's sales from $1.6 million in 1994 to $6.2 million in 1997 and for increasing his division's loan base from $3.2 million in 1994 to $11.6 million in 1997. His responsibilities also included overseeing monthly inventories, negotiating leases, and supervising the acquisition and computerization of over 21 pawnshops.
After managing and operating these large pawnshop chains in Texas, Mr. Upton moved to Florida to work directly for VCS and manage their Support and Development operations. His 13+ year's experience in the pawn industry has been indispensable in assisting VCS implement features and benefits from the end user's viewpoint.
In 2004 Mr. Upton accepted an opportunity to join a growing chain of pawnshops in Texas as director of IT at Pawnshop Management, Inc. His first duty there was to convert their disjointed pawnshop management systems to CompuPawn. Utilizing his experience in the pawn industry as well as his extensive CompuPawn knowledge, Mr. Upton converted all PMI stores to CompuPawn within 6 months. Mr. Upton continues to assist CSI in development of CompuPawn, participates in the company’s design and roadmap, and speaks regularly on the advanced use of the CompuPawn product at tradeshows and seminars.
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