Midwest IT has grown a passionate, friendly, and service-first culture from their first response technicians all the way to their senior account managers since 2006. We instill our core values of being responsive, customer-centric, and solutions-oriented from first employment to maintaining the core values with decade-long employees. We focus on maximizing up-time for your employees by providing exceptional service, top-tier disaster recovery and premium ransom-ware protection.
We are not only experts at technology. We are experts at integrating technology into business to maximize the impact in the most profitable way. We assist businesses in using business intelligence to develop the right IT infrastructure through planning, analyzing, and implementing the technology needs of your business. Our team prides itself on matching the right technology with your business so you can leverage your IT investment to their fullest.
With Midwest, our team will learn your business inside and out so we can align your technology with your vision and budget. We keep things simple and powerful so that your business can focus on growing your business instead of focusing on IT.
Employee Bios
Pete Weigel - Partner, CEO
Pete has been a Systems Engineer and Account Manager since 2006 and learned very early on the importance of technology for business. He graduated magna cum laude from Northern Illinois University with a degree in Operations Management and Information Systems. He specializes in networking with key decision makers in business and helps them understand how much technology support and decision-making affect their bottom line. His passion is changing IT conversations to being about business impact instead of technology.
Pete is responsible for the Midwest IT’s strategic direction, mentoring account managers, and business growth. He works closely with Eric Grimes to ensure our client experience is best-in-class.
When Pete is not working he enjoys working on the house, testing his pool water, coaching sports, and helping his wife raise 6 energetic children.
Eric Grimes - Partner, CFO / COO
Eric developed an early interest in technology after pulling his first computer from a dumpster at 8 years of age. A graduate of Augustana college, Eric studied finance and marketing and applied those skills by helping a small 20-user insurance agency in Illinois grow into an influential agency with over 100 users and 7 locations. While serving as their VP of IT & Automation, the agency was nominated for the Agency Automation Award (netvu), awarded INC 5000 status, and a Risk Innovator award among numerous other accomplishments. His passion for working with small businesses led him to join Midwest IT in 2012 to help them grow.
Eric is responsible for the day-to-day operations while aligning our financial health with Midwest IT’s strategic goals and client service standards. He diligently works to mentor the service team to ensure our clients have an excellent experience. Eric also works with Pete Weigel to ensure Midwest IT delivers what they promise and that we are ready for the growth from our success.
Eric is a car nut, outdoor enthusiast, and uses his superior navigation skills as an avid boater.
Bill Weigel - Emeritus Partner
Bill has been an IT consultant since the 90’s and likes to scare younger consultants with tales of Novell NetWare systems and troubleshooting without Google. He has extensive experience with network design, project/client management, and systems implementation and troubleshooting.
Bill is an Emeritus Partner with Midwest IT. He is involved with strategic financial decisions and uses his extensive experience to mentor and to help with long-term planning.
Bass guitar is one of Bill’s lifelong passions, and is an avid camper and woodworker. He is married with three children and a cantankerous dog named Badger.
Karen Weigel - Controller
Karen worked as an IT consultant in the insurance industry for 6 years before taking over the role of Controller for Midwest IT more than a decade ago. Her experience with technology and business process allows her to help the engineers and account managers with their administrative responsibilities. Her experience as a mom helps her keep all of the engineers and account managers in line.
Karen earned both networking and programming certifications before her IT consulting career. She loves to read, dominates in fantasy football, and camps whenever possible. Karen has 3 children, a dog, and a cantankerous husband named Bill.
Ryan Sanders - Account Manager
Ryan’s interest in technology, computers, and problem solving started at a very young age. He started taking apart and reassembling computers early on and became very interested in building computers as a teenager. While working in his former primary position as a project manager with a consulting firm in the construction industry, he took on the secondary role of managing IT for the company. After maintaining these responsibilities for several years, it became evident that he wanted to work in IT full time.
Ryan joined Midwest IT in 2014 and is constantly developing his skills and learning as much as possible each day. He uses hard work, passion and his thirst for learning to ensure clients have excellent customer service and ensure they have all of the knowledge possible when making business decisions. He is also critical business expert in the areas of backup and disaster recovery and uses that knowledge to ensure Midwest IT’s clients are properly protected.
Ryan is married with 3 kids, so most of his time outside of work is spent hanging out with his family. However, he also enjoys mountain biking and snowboarding.
Zachary Biel - Account Manager
Zachary joins the Midwest IT team with over 18 years of IT experience, working with companies ranging from 5 to 6,000 users. His latest achievements include helping a company increase their yearly sales figures by $20 million through integrating software and business process solutions. Zachary prides himself in his communication skills with owners and end users alike.
Zachary is a former competitive international trap, skeet, and sporting clays shooter who was fortunate enough to train with the 1996 USA Olympic shooting team, which included Kim Rhode, a 6-time Olympic medal winner. Now, in his spare time, he loves spending time with his lovely wife, Kelly, their three cats, and riding his motorcycle when weather permits.
Nate Weigel - Technology Director
Nate has been with Midwest IT since 2009 starting working for Midwest IT in the Twin Lakes shop helping home users and assisting the shop manager. In 2010, he was promoted to Support Technician and started learning how to support clients with excellent customer service while keeping business needs at the forefront.
From that experience, Nate learned that he had a passion to deliver technology to business in a way that helps them stay running at the best performance their budget allows. This lead him to pursue a his Bachelors in Information Technology from University of Whitewater and received his degree in 2016. Nate uses a combination of experience and knowledge to deliver business-critical technologies to clients that are proven and standardized. He was promoted to Director of Central Services in 2017 to bring those abilities to our clients.
Nate enjoys golfing and video games in his free time.
Jamie Deeter - Service Director
Jamie has been working with computers on the home front since he was 19, fixing PC’s for family and friends.
Jamie was invited to join Midwest IT in 2007 and has grown to be a passionate dictator about customer service. He is constantly working with operations and technicians to ensure clients receive the best customer service possible. He sets the tone for our helpdesk to be customer-driven while having fun at the same time.
RC cars, BBQing, and bargain hunting are some of Jamie’s many interests.
Ryan Oakes - Service Team
Ryan briefly attended the University of Illinois, first studying electrical engineering and then economics before switching gears and taking a support role in large Insurance agency. Starting with simple helpdesk items he expanded his role by creating procedures for the agency’s paperless transition which helped to safeguard content and train users in the new systems, enabling a smooth transition from more than one million individual paper pages in manila folders and file cabinets to a database of easily searchable digital files.
Ryan joined Midwest IT in 2014 and is a key component to Midwest IT for automation and security, and helpdesk support.
Ryan has more hobbies than he knows what to do with but building and tweaking audio equipment has been a recent obsession.
Matt Wilson - Service Team
Matt joined the Midwest IT team because of his love of technology. He started out by coding small video games in GameMaker: Studio, and taught himself how to code programs in more sophisticated languages along the way. Matt also enjoys building and repairing PC’s from time to time. He is currently pursuing a degree in computer science at UW Parkside.
Matt spends most of his time with his wife Karlee, who both enjoy playing video games and finding ways to annoy each other.
Tyler Jones - Service Team
Tyler grew up surrounded by technology. Since a young age he has been interested in computers and how they work. He started building computers for friends and family as well helping them pick out the correct parts they need to achieve their needs for home and business use. He has an Associates in Science from Mchenry County College. Tyler thrives on lending a hand and loves being thorough and providing the best customer service possible.
Tyler spends his free time playing video games and watching movies.
Troy Bantz - Service Team
Troy grew up surrounded by computers. He helped build his first a very young age and he has been hooked ever since. He started out repairing computers and phones at home before taking a job repairing electronics for a living. As his skills improved, he wanted a new challenge and decided to move over to the business side of the IT world.
He has his Bachelor of Science in Information Technology from the University of Phoenix. He uses his experience in the customer service world to strive for the best experience possible.
Troy spends his free time with his wife and daughter playing with toys, plays video games, and loves to research new technologies that are being released.
Shelby Wright - Controller Assistant
Before starting in the IT industry, Shelby worked in the personal health care field for four years. She also attended Rock County College with an emphasis on accounting. Shelby has now worked for Midwest IT for several years and works closely with our vendors. During this time, Shelby has acquired specialty knowledge of computer, networking, and software solutions. Additionally, she helps support the accounting side of the business. She is enjoying life with her new husband, Nick, who encourages her to utilize her artistic interests as much as she can – including drawing, painting, and even basket weaving. Nick is also working with Shelby to reduce her interest in the actor John Kusack. So far in this endeavor, Nick has gotten absolutely nowhere.