Who is Zander Holdings?
And what we do
Zander is a family owned business with two primary focus points. Our name comes from our two sons ZAch and alexaNDER = ZANDER. The dog in the logo is a mash up of the hounds we’ve had over the years (Buddy, Windsor, Murphy, and Milo).
I am Kirk Stewart, supported by my wife, Dr. Kristi EdD. We founded this business in 2024 after deciding to pursue an alternative path in our working lives. We are active travelers and have covered much of the globe but are humbled by how small we are and how blessed we have been over the years. Kristi continues to be a professor at the University of Michigan - Dearborn, but is a faithful academic which has been awarded two Fullbright Scholarships with charges in Greece and Indonesia. It is our mission to positively impact others which we do business with, be that in the land flipping, in business consulting, and in education.
Land Exchange
Through creative means, we acquire land in various areas around the country directly from owners who have not found reason to hold on to their properties. In turn we find individuals who have a different vision for the use of those properties and help them secure the freedom and security of being their own land owners.
Business Consulting
I am an established businessman who has worked his way up in the machine tool industry, since 1993. With my first employer I was exposed to hard engineering as a co-op student and later as a project engineer, before becoming a CNC applications engineer, but eventually leading an international team for a manufacturing site in southern Italy (which lasted for three years). After this adventure, I transitioned into a technical sales role with my second employer and had the opportunity live in Frankfurt, Germany for three years. In the 17 years with this company I worked my way through various growing sales roles including Regional Sales Manager, Sales Manager, Director of Sales and eventually VP of Sales for the various machining technologies we offered. For four years after this, I ran a subsidiary of a Germany company providing machining centers with responsibilities for the capital sales, marketing, service & spare parts, training, and apprentice programs.
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Scholarly Pursuits
Kristi did her undergraduate work at the University of Indiana in the field of K-12 education. Later, while we were living in Germany, she got her Masters online (before that was normal) also at IU. After we moved back to Michigan in 2007, she began to teach at Henry Ford Community College and then later at the University of Michigan - Dearborn in the writing department. Also at the University of Michigan - Dearborn, Kristi received her doctorate of Education; she was the recipient of the King-Chavez scholarship for her doctorate and spent three months in South Africa performing research for her dissertation. Kristi has continued her academic pursuits with ongoing peer reviewed publications and has served two Fullbright assignments.
University of Michigan Dearborn