Maskery’s Merits: Mission-driven & responsive

FORT MYERS, Fla. – New president Andrew Maskery says Merits USA perfectly blends his background and interests in the manufacturing and medical fields, but as a company that designs and makes wheelchairs, it also meets his desire to do good. 

Prior to joining Merits USA as vice president about three years ago, Maskery helped to launch and grow two medical startups and before that he worked for nearly 18 years in aerospace manufacturing. 

“It goes back to our saying, ‘Enhancing life through mobility,’” he said. “You really have an impact on people’s lives. When I reflect on my time in the aerospace industry, I didn’t wake up in the morning and say, ‘Wow, I made a jet engine today.’ Every chair we produce and sell, it’s making someone’s life better, which is a nice thing.” 

Here’s what Maskery had to say about what Merits USA’s trajectory might look like under his watch. 

HME News: What will be some of your initial focuses as president of Merits USA? 

Andrew Maskery: We’ve experienced double-digit growth over the past few years and that growth, combined with coming out of the COVID pandemic, has resulted in some challenges in maintaining the level of customer support that we want to have, so that’s one of my focuses. We recently launched a new ERP system, and we’ll open a customer portal (in 2025), so customers can do things like place orders and review statements. This system allows us to not only make the back end of the business more stable but also add customer functionality tools. We want to make Merits easy to do business with. 

HME: Will use of the portal be mandatory? 

Maskery: If the customer still wants to call or email, they’ll still have that option. (In fact), we’ve increased our staff in customer service by one-third. We’ve done a lot of work related to onboarding and training, and we’ve added level 2 tech customer service, which is a high level of support and one that’s hard to train and keep. 

HME: Any other focuses? 

Maskery: I’m focused on growing our stairlift business. We’re adding a new model to complement our Pilot Aviator offerings, which gives us both the standard and heavy-duty options. I believe we have a very nice and full lineup now and we have new staff that’s focused on that as a growth area of the business.  

HME: From an R&D perspective, how is Merits responding to needs and developments in the market? 

Maskery: One of the things we’ve recently done is double the size of our U.S. R&D budget, which has allowed us to be faster and nimbler. For example, when reimbursement for power seat elevation was approved, that’s what allowed us to make quick changes and offer seat elevation on three models and then follow up with seat elevation on a fourth new model. To be able to leverage Merits Taiwan but also have our own R&D is a unique position to be in that, again, allows us to be faster and nimbler.