because at the time I was an avid runner,
a biker and a skier and a user of their
products,” Nelsen says. “So being able to
work in an industry that I had an almost
fanatical interest in was great.”
By the time Nelsen arrived, however,
the company was well into its very difficult
strategy of opening retail outlets in high-end
malls and storefronts across the country.
“You’re paying $50,000 a month for a
storefront on Madison Avenue,” he says.
“There’s no way that you can run enough
volume through that store to make it work,
and we had many that were like that.”
Nordic Track eventually closed its retail
outlets and was sold to Icon Health & Fitness.
Nelsen’s next move was again engineered
by Berg, who was then in Florida with Danka
Business Systems, a seller and servicer
of predominately higher-end printing
and copying equipment. Danka had just
acquired Kodak’s copier sales and services
division, doubling the size of the business
(to nearly $4 billion in sales) and putting it
in some 30 countries across the globe.
“Mr. Berg, who had hired me, left the
company, and the then-CEO gave me a bit
of a battlefield promotion into the general
counsel’s job. For someone who was really
only 11 years out of law school, to be the GC of
a public company was—well, I’d question the
decision on the part of the company,” he says
with a laugh. “But I threw myself into it and
really learned a ton over the next few years.”
Here’s a taste of what Nelsen’s life was
like for the next six years: “Danka was
headquartered in St. Petersburg, but it
also had a significant presence in the U.K.
and Europe, so the stock was traded on the
NASDAQ and the London Stock Exchange.
So we had compliance in the U.S. and
Europe, we had businesses in around 30
countries, we had just acquired a large
division of Kodak, so we had integration
issues going on, a ton of real estate
rationalization and banking facilities that
were constantly being renegotiated because
of the debt that we had taken on in the
Kodak deal. Ultimately, we had to dispose
of some of the noncore assets, so the last
four or five years, in addition to my day job, I
spent significant time traveling around the
world selling off noncore businesses.”
“Keith is a lawyer first,” says Berg, who
today is the CEO and chief customer
service officer at Z Wireless in Minnesota.
“But he’s very good at endearing himself
into the business and understanding it and
forming partnerships with the leaders of
units. He’s just one of those athletes you’d
love to have on any team.”
Berg ended up leaving Danka in 2000
and eventually took a leadership role in the
international business division at Best Buy.
And in 2006 he knew who he wanted to run
its legal division. So he dialed Nelsen. Again.
“He said,” Nelsen recalls, “‘I know you’ve
spent a lot of time working out of the
country for the last few years, and we’re
putting together an international team
here at Best Buy. Would you be interested
in being the general counsel of the
international group?’ I got to be involved in
helping acquire a large Chinese consumer
electronics company, originally a state-owned enterprise, which hadn’t happened
very often. We were opening stores in
Turkey. We were talking about Mexico; we
were beginning discussions with a partner
in Europe to begin opening the big-box
stores in the U.K. All of that was going on.
I was on a plane all the time all over the
world—if I wasn’t in Shanghai or Nanjing,
it was Istanbul or London or Vancouver or
Mexico City.”
He manages a department that includes
a wide range of languages to serve the
company’s international needs. “We have
approximately 45 lawyers here, a staff of six
or seven in China, and work with a similarly
sized team in Canada.” He also assisted in
working with 15 or so legal professionals in
the company’s European Joint Venture.
His job was evolving into what he’d
envisioned in Madison. “At some point,”
he says, “you become a little bit less of a
lawyer and more of a business person.”
This was particularly true during the
recent crises at Best Buy.
“Keith is a very talented lawyer, and
a trusted adviser. He is a critical leader
within our executive team and the
company,” says Hubert Joly, Best Buy’s
current CEO, who’s receiving some
huzzahs from Wall Street for leading the
company’s 2013 financial recovery.
Berg isn’t surprised by what he’s seen
out of Nelsen during this time of crisis.
“I think counselor is a good word for
him. He’s good not only at evaluating the
risks and why you shouldn’t do things, but
bringing solutions to the table on complex
issues that drive the business forward,”
Berg says. “He’s a very steady hand.”
Nelsen received a battlefield promotion at
Danka, and in a sense, he received another
one here. He kept his renowned cool and he
took notice of colleagues who didn’t flee the
ship when things ran aground.
“It’s a remarkable turnaround from a year
ago. I am so proud of the fact that people put
aside all the distractions and the bad press
and focused on the things they could control.
I could walk you through this building and
introduce you to hundreds of people, and
there are thousands more people out in
the field running our stores ... people who
would say, ‘Yep, that was tough, but I knew
what I had to do.’ People who went through
it developed very thick skins, but everyone
believed that we had a great brand, a great
company, and that we would emerge from
this challenging period of time.”
And what of the low points? “I think
the lowest point [for me] was the, albeit
temporary, split with the founder [Schulze]
of the company, for whom I have a
tremendous amount of respect. To have to
take a somewhat adversarial role to him
was a challenge.”
Nelsen credits Hubert’s leadership of
the company at that time. “[It] enabled an
amicable reconciliation with Mr. Schulze,
and an endorsement by him that we are
indeed steering the company in the right
direction. Today is far more focused on
assisting the business in moving forward
with Renew Blue, which is Best Buy’s
transformation plan and program.”
NELSEN LIVES RIGHT OUTSIDE
Minneapolis with his wife, Kathy, and two
children, Grace and Max, making Nelsen
one of a very small club in the history of the
world to move from Florida to Minnesota. But
he loves the state, even though he’s an avid
Packers fan in Vikings country. “I often say
the only thing better than being a Packer fan
is being a Packer fan in Minnesota,” he says.
“We’ve had our way with the Vikings.”
Sounds like some good old drama. But for
a guy who seems to make a habit of walking
in the door with a crisis either unfolding or
about to, would he have it any other way?
He pauses. “Give me a call in a few
months,” he says. “Then I’ll let you know.”
