Distinctive Solutions, Inc. consists of account executives that are currently increasing and retaining the customer volume of our clients’ campaigns. In addition to these account executives, our management and administration team is dedicated to fostering the growth and success of the organization and its people. Our team comes from various backgrounds and cities around the world. The common link, however, is their incredible energy, enthusiasm, and ability to work with one another to accomplish their own personal career goals.

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Eric Chapman - Owner

Eric was raised in Easton, MD, and graduated from Frostburg State University with a marketing degree in 2002. In order to pay for school, he worked as a photographer, bartender, and snowboard instructor. After graduation, Eric began a career in education. After working as a school teacher for just one year, he realized that his ambitions would quickly outgrow his role with the school district. Eric's desired career change came when he moved to Washington D.C. After interviewing with Platinum Marketing, Eric was immediately hired as an account representative on a business campaign for a Fortune 100 telecom client.

Due to the company’s success in DC, an expansion took place. The Fortune 100 client needed immediate results in the Philadelphia market. Eric was selected to help lead this expansion – after having worked with the organization for only seven months. This proved to be a great opportunity. Just eight weeks after expanding to Philadelphia, Eric achieved a management position. In his new role he was able to work closely with the company's owner, to fine tune his sales training, public speaking, and management skills. Due to his extensive training and experience, Eric was ready to embark on another challenge.

In June 2004 Eric became an entrepreneur and established his own marketing firm. Since then Eric has enjoyed successful relationships with many Fortune 100 clients. Eric’s goal is to continue to expand DS, Inc. into more markets. With an ever-expanding client base, Eric’s goal is to open fifty offices in the next five years.

Rebecca Lancaon – Managing Partner, Baltimore

Rebecca was raised in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and graduated from Virginia Tech with a bachelor’s in biology in 2005. Upon graduation, Rebecca changed her focus from being a student of medicine to becoming a student of business. She realized that experience in sales would give her hands on experience and real-life business education necessary to grow within her career. Because of the previous plan to study many more years of medicine, she knew she would have to attack any career with that level of intensity.

She decided to start in an entry-level account management position in Washington D.C. Starting from the ground up with the company helped her to gain valuable experience in sales, human resources, and training.

Rebecca was promoted to assistant management in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in October of 2009. In February of 2008, she expanded the company to Livonia, Michigan to oversee sales operations for a Fortune 100 Client. After a year of increasing acquisition/retention for her client, she was invited to Baltimore, Maryland to be a partner of Distinctive Solutions. Her goal is provide the success she did for her client in Michigan for her market in Baltimore, as well as being a lead player in the company’s expansion.

Justine Bristol – Recruiter, Baltimore

Justine was raised in north central Pennsylvania and graduated from Clarion University with a degree in marketing in 2006. After spending some time in Ocean City, she moved to Baltimore to pursue new opportunities. She worked in the restaurant industry before she (and her sister Jacqueline!) joined the team at Distinctive. She began her career in a sales position, and is now working as part of our administrative team. She looks forward to being a part of Distinctive’s future expansion. With this expansion she plans to help continue to grow and eventually move into the financial aspect of the business.

Pam Musgrove – HR Manager, Baltimore

Pam grew up in Pasadena, Maryland, a suburb of Baltimore. After graduating from high school, Pam found herself in a management position in retail. While working full-time in retail, she took classes to finish up her associates degree in Business Administration.

Soon after finishing her associates, she realized there was no room for growth in the retail industry. After taking some time to explore several different career opportunities, Pam began working for the Baltimore location at the entry level account executive position.

After 2 short months of learning the business, she moved into the administration position. With the knowledge and people skills that she gained from the sales and marketing experiences, Pam plans to help in the aide of opening fifty offices across the US.

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George Papalexandratos – Manager, Philadelphia

George was born and raised in Athens, Greece, where he was a member of the Junior National Water Polo team. His ambition to continue his sport and receive an education sent him to the University of Richmond. He majored in business with a concentration in finance and marketing and a minor in Classical History. After graduation, George easily transitioned into a career in the finance industry as a financial advisor. However, during his time there, he still longed for a position that provided a competitive environment and an opportunity for advancement. He decided to relocate from Virginia to Washington, D.C and interviewed with Platinum Marketing. He was invited to join the company as a sales representative.

After five months into his new position, George was presented with an opportunity to be part of an expansion for a Fortune 100 client in Philadelphia, PA. He advanced into a role as an assistant manager where he trained to take on all the responsibilities and aspects of a business. During this time he was approached by Eric Chapman to be part of another Fortune 100 client expansion, which needed a direct marketing firm to increase and retain their customer base in Baltimore, MD.

Due to his personal growth and success working in Baltimore, George relocated to Memphis, TN to oversee all operations in that market. His next move was back to Philadelphia, where a Fortune 100 customer required a new client manager. His long term goal is to help the company with its future expansion into the growing European market and to be back in Greece in the next 5 years.

Dave Weisse – Assistant Manager, Philadelphia

Dave was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2006 with a B.A. in Political Science.  However, it was clear to him by the end of his tenure at Penn that he was uninspired by the proposition of attending law school or pursuing a career in politics.  As the lead singer in his band throughout college and a Film minor, Dave knew that his passion for music, film and media-related fields in general drove him.

After a year and a half spent working at a major publication in Manhattan, Dave was faced with a litany of options.  Certainly, assistant positions at magazines or production companies seemed glamorous, but he knew that ignoring the low pay and long hours would only earn him the pleasure of dealing with the hurdles of seniority and nepotism.  Deciding against a career path that was built around hoping to get lucky and land some position of "glamor", Dave decided to return to Philly to begin a career that would allow him to create those options for himself down the road.

Shortly after, Dave met George at Distinctive Solutions, and they began working together in early May of 2008.  Promoted to assistant manager in October of 2009, he plans to open a market in toward the end of the first quarter, 2010.  He strives to set new benchmarks for success within the company and eventually use his financial independence to finance his other interests in music and film production.

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Melissa White – Manager, Portland

Melissa grew up in New Jersey, where she was a competitive gymnast. After achieving multiple state and regional championship titles, she had the opportunity to train in Houston, Texas with Olympic coach Bela Karolyi. Her experience as a gymnast taught her to have an incredible work ethic and a strong desire to achieve high levels of success.

Later, she attended Towson University where she studied psychology & pre-med. In her senior year, Melissa worked closely with Dr. Howard Haft, MD, a professor at Georgetown University's Graduate School of Business. Through her internship, Melissa found that her love of business exceeded her love of medicine.

In the interim, Melissa decided to gain some experience in sales, which would help her future in business. She began working as an account executive at Distinctive Solutions and quickly began training for management. Melissa's success quickly allowed her to move into an Assistant Management position at Distinctive Solutions. Having received yet another promotion, Melissa now handles the client management in Long Island, NY. Her goal now is to become a top manager in the organization.

Zane Abato – Manager, Portland

Zane Abato was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. He was interested in sports at an early age. During his high school years, he played varsity baseball and advanced to the semi pro league. While attending University of Maryland, College Park, he continued family tradition and became a triple legacy member of his fraternity, Alpha Tau Omega. Zane graduated in 2006.

Zane’s love of business is born from his strong entrepreneurial background. He began working for his father’s Marketing firm as a door to door sales representative and has been intrigued by the interworking of consumer client relations ever since.

In February of 2007, Zane began working at Distinctive after realizing there was no upward mobility at his previous sales positions. After completing 16 months of extensive sales and management training, Zane was given the opportunity to open a new market across the country as part of an expansion for a fortune 100 client. Now located in Portland, he looks forward to exercising his training in sales by increasing the clients market share and developing future managers to expand to new markets.

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Matt Sileno – Manager, DC/Northern VA

Matt was born in Brooklyn, New York. He later moved to North Carolina and attended North Carolina State University where he received his degree in Biological Sciences with a concentration in Pre-Dental. While attending NCSU he quickly realized that the field of Dentistry was an avenue that he did not want to pursue. He decided to dedicate himself to the full time touring band in which he was the lead singer and guitar player. During that time, Matt traveled throughout the U.S. and landed songs on television networks such as MTV and VH1.

After 5½ years of touring, Matt learned more about the music industry and understood that he was not in total control of his career. A few months had gone by and Matt decided it was time for a change, so he relocated to Annapolis, MD with hopes of a new start. After hitting the glass ceiling in his retail management position, he moved on. His objective was to find an opportunity that would challenge him as well as offer an environment that would accept his competitive nature. After several interviews in the Baltimore and D.C. area, Matt met with Eric at Distinctive Solutions and quickly realized that this was his avenue to success.

After one year into his position, Matt was promoted to Assistant Manager. As of March 2008 he is managing the client in Alexandria and has aspirations of helping the organization grow and expand even further. He is now learning and developing the skills necessary to manage a Fortune 500 client. His goal is to help develop other Account Executives in the office, so they too have the same opportunity in which Matt has earned. Matt also has aspirations to become one of the top Managers in the organization.

Brandon Smith – Manager, DC/Northern VA

Brandon was born and raised in Campbell, New York. After high school he was looking to further his education so he attended West Virginia University. He started his focus on business and then later graduated with a degree in Management Information Systems. Striving for more education Brandon decided to go back to school and one year later he completed his Masters in Communication in August 2005.

He immediately received a job in Roanoke, Virginia as Human Resource Recruiter, where he was responsible for interviewing candidates and placing them in positions throughout southern Virginia. After a short period of time Brandon realized the limited potential in his current position and decided a change was needed. Brandon moved to Baltimore, he was looking for a new opportunity where he could utilize his experience and education. He needed something that was fast pace and provided a lot of room for growth, both personally and professionally. While going on a number of different interviews in the region, he had met with Eric and felt that the opportunity was exactly what he was looking for.

As of September 2008, Brandon now resides in Mclean, Virginia. He manages one of our clients and has a numbers of goals to hit so he can further grow the size of the organization. His long term goal is to provide opportunity to others faster than any other manager in the organization.

Matt Donahue – Manager, DC/Northern VA

Matt grew up in National Park, New Jersey, a small town outside of Philadelphia. Matt attended Wesley College where he pursued his Bachelors degree in History Education. While at Wesley College Matt gained many leadership skills while playing varsity football.
After graduating, Matt wanted to gain more experience in the business world. Matt started with the company in May of 2008 while working with George Papalexandratos in Philadelphia. Matt has moved to Northern Virginia to open on the Verizon campaign on November 30, 2009.
Matt goals are to develop his account executives so they can reach their goals of running a market for a fortune 500 company.

Melanie Abajian – Assistant Manager, DC/Northern VA

Melanie Abajian was born in Westchester New york. She was always a three season athlete playing tennis, basketball and soccer respectively. Melanie earned a Bachelor of Arts in mass communications with a track in advertising at Towson University. While studying she competed on the Towson University Women’s soccer team for three years. She realized that her passion lied in event planning and conference and meeting management. During college, Melanie worked at an entertainment company where she learned the value of handling multiple projects simultaneously and organization. She soon realized that there was very limited room for growth at this company. She moved on to work at the Sheraton Hotel Inner Harbor in Baltimore where hopefully she would find room for advancement. However, this was not the case. So she perused opportunities elsewhere. In October of 2006 she interview at Distinctive Solutions with President Eric Chapman. She quickly realized that there was an infinite amount of room for personal and professional growth. In March of 2008 Melanie moved with the expansion crew and Manager Matt Sileno to the DC/Northern VA area to expand the Verizon Campaign. Shortly after, Melanie got the opportunity to participate on the Quill campaign for six months. In October of 2009 Melanie was promoted to assistant manager and is very eager to expand and move into management in the beginning of 2010. She is looking forward to being a key component in helping the organization double in size in her first year and continuing the growing success of the company as a whole.

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Eric Gillis – Manager, Seattle

Grew up in Nottingham, Maryland, and is the oldest of six kids. Being part of a large family who all played competitive sports, Eric played Soccer on several teams that competed on a National level and captured the State Title of Maryland.

Eric attended school in both Towson University and George Mason University in VA., where he graduated with a BFA degree in Visual Technology. Eric designed for several Large Companies in the Baltimore and D.C. area including Black and Decker, Rummel Klepper & Kahl and Ratner companies. Although he was passionate about his work, he grew increasingly impatient with the idea of promotion based on seniority. Instead Eric wanted to get rewarded for his effort, so he decided to work in a smaller private setting, and he joined Distinctive Solutions in 2003.

Eric worked to become considered one of the top reps at Distinctive by the end if his first year. His efforts allowed him to help in several expansions including New York and Seattle. Eric now runs his office in Bellevue, Washington where is plans on expanding to multiple markets in the North West.