Lisa Rottmann

President & CEO Stowers Machinery Corporation

Last Reviewed: September 27, 2026

Executive Summary

Lisa Rottmann is President and CEO of Stowers Machinery Corporation, the Knoxville-based Caterpillar dealer for East Tennessee. Her grandfather and his two brothers founded the company in 1960, and she is the third generation of the family to own and run it. The company sells, rents, leases and services Caterpillar machines, engines and generators, and runs Stowers Rents, a rental fleet of nearly 2,000 machines, from seven full-service locations. She worked as a management consultant at Booz Allen Hamilton before returning to Knoxville in 2012 to join the business. Her father, Wes Stowers, has since handed her the President and CEO role and become Chairman.

Career Highlights

• President and CEO of Stowers Machinery, succeeding her father Wes Stowers, who remains Chairman.
• Named in the July 2025 announcement of the company’s new McMinnville, Tennessee branch, its seventh full-service location.
• Joined Stowers Machinery with her husband, Ed Rottmann, in 2012 as the family’s third generation of ownership. Caterpillar approved the ownership transition in June 2020.
• Senior Consultant at Booz Allen Hamilton in Huntsville, for nearly three years.
• Serves on the boards of East Tennessee Children’s Hospital, Safer Tennessee and the Knox County Industrial Development Board, according to her Safer Tennessee biography.

Professional Journey

Rottmann grew up around the business. Stowers Machinery was founded in 1960 by Bud, Dick and Harry Stowers, her grandfather and great-uncles, with 70 employees and branches in Knoxville, Chattanooga and Johnson City. It grew with the interstate highway programme and the mining industry. Her father, Wes Stowers, joined in 1988 after a career as an Air Force pilot. She worked there during college summers and has said that is when she decided to make her career there, having previously thought she would become a lawyer.

She studied political science and history at Furman University and then earned an MBA in organizational performance and finance at Vanderbilt University’s Owen Graduate School of Management. She then spent nearly three years at Booz Allen Hamilton in Huntsville, as a senior consultant working on strategy and organizational performance.

In 2012 she and her husband, Ed, left those jobs and moved back to Knoxville to join Stowers Machinery as its third generation of ownership. The move was not guaranteed to work: as a Caterpillar dealership, the company needed Caterpillar’s approval for any transfer of ownership. They worked in different parts of the business for several years, and Caterpillar formally approved the transition in June 2020. In a 2021 interview she described leadership in her father’s terms: “You (as a leader) have to be confident and engaged, but it’s really about the team.”

Wes Stowers has since passed the President and CEO role to her and serves as Chairman. The company employs over 600 people across East Tennessee and describes itself as the only locally owned equipment distributor in the region that also runs a full-line rental business. In 2025 it bought property for a seventh location in McMinnville, Tennessee. Announcing it, Rottmann said the company had served McMinnville for 65 years and was “excited to deepen our roots with a physical presence”.

Outside the company she serves on the boards of East Tennessee Children’s Hospital, Safer Tennessee and the Knox County Industrial Development Board. Her Safer Tennessee biography says she has been named a Knoxville Business Hall of Fame Emerging Leader and one of the Knoxville News Sentinel’s “40 Under 40”. She lives in Knoxville.

Education

Vanderbilt University, Owen Graduate School of Management

MBA, Organizational Performance and Finance

Furman University

BA, Political Science and History (magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa)