Leading great people to do great things

Craig Johnston

President & CEO, FCTG

Craig Johnston was appointed President and CEO on February 1, 2006. He was additionally appointed Chairman of the Board of Forest City Holdings on February 1, 2008. Craig has spent his entire career with Forest City, starting out as a trader trainee with American International Forest Products in May of 1981. Craig became manager of the Canadian lumber products and risk management group in 1986. In 1993 Craig was appointed Executive Vice President of AIFP and was named President in February of 1998.

In November of 2004, Craig helped lead a successful ESOP transaction resulting in the employee purchase of Forest City Trading Group from their longtime parent company Forest City Enterprises. Craig has led FCTG since 2006 as the company has grown into one of the largest diversified forest products companies in North America.

Craig is currently a Director on the advisory board of Mosaic Capital Partners, a private investment firm in Charlotte, NC. He also has served on the Board of Directors of charitable organizations in the Portland community supporting youth development, fish and wildlife conservation and arts advocacy.
Craig is a graduate of the University of Oregon College of Business Administration.

Bruce Johnson

President, Viking Forest Products, LLC

Bruce Johnson of Bloomington, Minnesota, has been President of Viking Forest Products since 1996, and has been employed by Viking/Forest City Trading Group since 1991. His first five years at Viking were spent trading. He has a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Forest Products Marketing from the University of Minnesota in 1979.

Mr. Johnson has spent 38 years in the lumber business. Previous to his time at Viking, he spent 3 years working in wholesale distribution, and 10 years in purchasing and merchandise management at a large retail lumber chain.

Bruce has been a member of the Board of Directors of Forest City Trading Group since 2007, and has been active on several committees within that. He also currently is Chairman of the Advisory Board and Council for the Bio-Based Products and Bio-Based Systems Engineering Department at the University of Minnesota. He has in the past been active chairing several committees for the North American Wholesale Lumber Association, as well as serving on the Board of Trustee’s for the Academy of Holy Angels in Richfield, Minnesota.

Dave Goodknight

Member, Board of Directors

Dave Goodknight is a former KPMG partner with over forty years of business experience. While at KPMG he served both large public and small privately held companies. He has wide ranging experience from participating in public offerings to assisting smaller companies in day-to-day issues. After he left KPMG he was Senior Vice President of Finance for the North Pacific Group. In 2000 Dave formed Goodknight Consulting to provide counsel to businesses and executives. He also assisted companies in transition that needed an independent assessment of the business.

Dave has assisted numerous companies that value periodic, independent counsel. He specialized in the formation of first-time boards. Past Board assignments include The Ulven Companies, Mitchell Lewis Staver, Silver Eagle Manufacturing Company, Assessment Training Institute and Tech West Vacuum. He currently serves on the Board of Forest City Trading Group and has served since the employee purchase of the company. He has served on the Executive Committee and currently serves on both the Compensation and Audit Committees.

Dave has a BA from the University of Northern Iowa and currently lives in Mesa Arizona.

Jon Curley

Member, Board of Directors

Jon is CEO of ButcherJoseph Asset Management, LLC, a registered investment advisor in Charlotte, North Carolina that works with high net worth individuals, families and institutions, and President of Sable Capital, LLC, a registered broker-dealer also in Charlotte.

Jon has had a more than forty-year career including Executive Vice President and Life Division for one of the country’s largest life insurance companies, and trust and insurance division head for one of the nation’s top 5 banks responsible for more than $17 billion in assets under administration, and over $200 million in total revenue.

He has served as a director of United Way of King County, Washington where he was Chairman of the de Tocqueville Society major gifts campaign for 2012-13.

Jon is a graduate of Holy Cross College in Worcester, Massachusetts and Purdue University Pension and Profit Sharing Institute. He holds the Chartered Financial Consultant (ChFC) designations from The American College.

Keith Butcher

Member, Board of Directors

Keith Butcher co-founded ButcherJoseph & Co. in 2011, a boutique middle market investment bank headquartered in St. Louis with locations in Charlotte, Chicago and Washington, DC.

Keith is also a founding partner at Mosaic Capital Partners, a $165 million private investment firm providing mezzanine debt and equity to middle market companies. Mosaic focuses on providing capital to ESOP-owned companies.

Prior to ButcherJoseph & Co., Keith served as Executive President of Purcell Tire & Rubber Co. and held a seat on the board of directors of the company. During his tenure, he successfully ran all day-to-day and strategic affairs for the company’s large, diversified distribution and manufacturing business. Under his leadership, the company successfully managed through the Great Recession and completed several M&A transactions from 2008 through 2010.

Keith joined Morgan Stanley & Co. in 2002, serving as an advisor to closely held businesses focused on middle market mergers and acquisition advisory services. Prior to that, Keith was an attorney with two noteworthy law firms practicing corporate tax, corporate law, mergers and acquisitions, and employee benefits law with a focus on ESOP transactions.

Keith has represented corporations, private equity groups, national and regional banks, and leveraged buyout groups as an investment banker or attorney in more than 100 merger and acquisition transactions. Throughout his career, Keith has served on a number of boards of directors, including Mosaic Capital Partners, Forest City Holdings, Purcell Tire and Rubber Co., Compact Power Equipment Centers, and Express Medical Transport.

Keith attended Bradley University where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in International Business. Additionally, Keith earned a law degree from Wake Forest University.

Lorin Rydstrom

Senior Advisor, FCTG

Lorin Graduated from the SUNY College of Forestry at Syracuse in 1972 majoring in Wood Products Marketing. After a brief tenure with Hines Lumber in Chicago, Lorin began his trading career at American International in 1973. In 1978, Lorin moved to the south east to help open Tampa International Forest Products.

In 1983, Lorin relocated his family to southern NH to start a new trading subsidiary for FCTG, Seaboard International Forest Products, Inc., in Nashua. With strong family support, the mentorship of then FCTG President Jack McKinnon and the very good fortune to find committed and skilled employees early on, Seaboard became the top performing FC company by the mid 1990’s. Lorin operated and grew SIFP until 2013. In 2004, he assisted in the ESOP acquisition of FCTG from Forest City Enterprise, and has since served on the Board of Directors of the company. After stepping down in his operational role at Seaboard, Lorin has continued with FC as the Senior Advisor to the CEO.

Over the 30+ years in Nashua, Lorin has served the United Way, Humane Society of Greater Nashua, been on the Boards of Directors of Beaver Brook Association, the Society for the Protection of NH Forests, Home Health and Hospice Care, and The Nashua Bank, as well as serving on either the town or the school Budget Committees continuously for 30 years.

Tom Hamilton

Member, Board of Directors

Tom Hamilton has been with Viking Forest Products his entire professional career. He started his career in the beginning of 2007 as the traffic coordinator at Viking and then moved in to a trading role at the end of that same year. Tom started trading lumber and industrial hardwood products and then went on to start the Viking Mat Division in 2009. He has helped grow the business into what is now one of the largest Matting companies in the country.

Tom is also an active supporter in Trouts Unlimited Minnesota Chapter as well as the Teddy Roosevelt Conservation Partnership nationally.

Tom has served as the FCTG Trader Representative to the Board of Directors since April of 2017.

Tom is a graduate of the University of Minnesota College of Natural Resources.