Ailene Grego Returns To Lead SouthEast LINK

Grego left SouthEast LINK in the late ’90s to work in Philadelphia. Before she left, Grego wasn’t sure what she wanted her career path to look like.

“But the time away in Philly solidified what I wanted to do,” she says.

And that was to work her way to the top at SouthEast LINK. Grego says Larry, her father, had hoped she would one day take over the business. But Larry was also a tough sell.

“When you build something from scratch, which my father did, it’s really hard to pass it on to the next generation unless you’re absolutely sure they can carry it on,” says Grego.

And Grego, for her part, didn’t want anything handed to her simply because she was the owner’s daughter.

“I wanted to earn my stripes,” she says. “I wanted people to respect me for the work I put in.”

She eventually worked her way up to CFO in 2010 and then president in 2012. Finally, in 2016, Grego became president and CEO, purchasing both SouthEast LINK and American Formula from Larry, who is still chairman of the board for both companies.

In that time, Grego married, and she and her husband, Steve, have a 15-year-old daughter, Morgan, who Grego says has no interest in the family business.
Grego, however, has plenty of time left at the helm, focusing on what service she can provide to her customers next.

“We truly want to help the end user,” she says.

Nick Bullock is a former Associate Editor of Sanitary Maintenance.