The Woodlands (Houston), Texas, April 2019 … Burt Cabañas, founder & chairman of BENCHMARK®, a global hospitality company, announces that Nate Waldron, director of operations at The Ridge in Basking Ridge, New Jersey, is the recipient of the Chairman’s Award of Excellence. The award annually recognizes a Benchmark employee who has exhibited exemplary service, actively demonstrating the company’s “Be The Difference” service culture within Benchmark and the recipient’s local community. Mr. Waldron was nominated for the Award of Excellence by Mike Taylor, Benchmark’s general manager of The Ridge. Benchmark Founder and Chairman Burt Cabañas and company CEO Alex Cabañas presented the prestigious award to Mr. Waldron recently in a special ceremony at the company’s Home Office near Houston.
“Nate was selected out of an outstanding field of nominees from Benchmark properties across our global company’s hotel, resort and conference center portfolios, and based on the criteria of ‘providing truly outstanding acts of community service recognized by the community,'” said Burt Cabañas. “He is a remarkable person and a highly respected Chairman’s Award recipient, having served Benchmark’s customers and fellow team members with distinction for a quarter of a century, while also serving his community in important leadership and life-saving positions as a volunteer fire fighter, Fire Commissioner and more. Nate is a most deserving recipient of the Chairman’s Award, and serves as a daily reminder of Benchmark’s ‘Be The Difference’ service platform in his entire approach to life. He is loved and revered throughout our company as much as he is loved and respected in his local community.”
Nate Waldron is a 25-year veteran of Benchmark, initially working in the company’s conference services division. In this role he quickly established himself as Benchmark’s resident expert in this critically important discipline and was called upon to assist in many property transitions and openings, including for Eaglewood Resort & Spa in Chicago; Lansdowne Resort, Leesburg, Virginia; Stonewall Resort, Weston, WV; Virginia Crossings Hotel & Conference Center of Richmond, Virginia, and several private conference centers/hotels for major corporations, each of which Benchmark operated at the time. In 1998, Mr. Waldron was promoted to director of conference services for the AT&T Learning Center of Basking Ridge, New Jersey, later participating in the commercial rebranding of the hotel to North Maple Inn where he was instrumental in helping the property to achieve the prestigious AAA Four Diamond Award. He subsequently helped open The Heldrich, a Benchmark hotel in New Brunswick, New Jersey, where he was in time promoted to director of operations. He recently returned to Basking Ridge in the same position at The Ridge, leading operations for this newly renovated private conference center for Verizon.
Nate Waldron’s professional service success has been punctuated by his remarkable community volunteerism, as seen through his 33-year leadership within the Lambertville (New Jersey) Volunteer Fire Company. From his early role as fire fighter and driver to serving as 3rd and 1st Lieutenant and in the administrative offices of Secretary and Treasurer, his service to his home community of Lambertville culminated in two consecutive three-year terms as the publicly elected Fire Commissioner.
Additionally, for the past decade Mr. Waldron has been an important member of the Masonic Lodge No. 12, located near Lambertville, New Jersey. The Masons are one of the oldest fraternal organizations in the United States and renowned within their communities for their charitable work. In fact, many of the country’s founding fathers and several US presidents have been Masons. During his 10 years of service Waldron has gained further masonic knowledge with memberships within the Northern Masonic Scottish Rite and the Masonic Kilties of New Jersey. The Masonic Lodge 12 is well known for funding educational scholarships, investing in local revitalization projects and supporting the Boy Scouts and Eagle Scouts of New Jersey. Through this organization as well as the Lambertville Volunteer Fire Company, Nate Waldron has touched and continues to actively contribute to the high quality of life in his community. He is a most worthy recipient of Benchmark’s Chairman’s Award of Excellence.
