In Remembrance of Jack Crocker

By: Leslie G. Sarasin, President and CEO, Food Marketing Institute 

I share sad news that the food retail industry recently lost one of its formative leaders when Jack J. Crocker died on October 18th. Jack served as president of Fred Meyer, Inc., and starting in 1972, guided SUPERVALU through a decade of growth as its president and CEO.  I'm told that his savvy wit and engaging spirit served the entire industry as he helped orchestrate the 1976 merger of Super Market Institute and the National Association of Food Chains to become today's Food Marketing Institute.

My favorite story about Jack J. Crocker comes from his time as FMI’s first elected chairman of the Board, when to help keep the various factions focused, he hung a banner for all to see that contained the Benjamin Franklin quote, “We must hang together, gentlemen, or most certainly we will hang separately.” It reportedly was his ability to keep a sensitive touch on the pulse of those around him and successfully guide them to conciliation and compromise that enabled the merger to succeed and thrive.

Always a man of vision, Jack not only helped weld the two associations into the vibrant new entity, he lead the charge in FMI’s reaching out to other trade associations to work together on large-scale issues like scanning and other technologies. He had a gift for bringing groups together and challenging them to work toward the greater good.

In his life, Jack helped bring the industry players together and now in acknowledging his death, he again brings cohesion to the community of food retailers as we mourn the loss of a friend, a colleague and a mentor.