Donald Albrecht

Advocate for the “little guys”

Many decades ago, Donald Albrecht became majority stockholder and chairman of Federated Foods, which operates today as a division of the Arlington Heights, Ill.-based Federated Group. The company was and still is both a broker and a brand owner, with a variety of offerings that included — and still include — the now-iconic Red & White brand, created in 1908 by S.M. Flickinger, Federated’s founder.

“This was at a time when many retailers and wholesalers were still on the fence or not moving forward yet with strong store brand programs,” Marvin Benjoya, retired vice president of Perrigo Co., Alleghan, Mich., says of Albrecht’s beginnings with the company.

A believer in an age of skeptics

As one who helped shape the grocery industry into what it is today, Albrecht was a man who valued simple solutions and easy-to-execute programs. He also understood the economic, political and technological changes taking place throughout his career.

Albrecht convinced retailers and wholesalers that by stocking and promoting Red & White as their own brand, they could be more competitive, provide consumers with a good deal, and make more money, says Vince Wilson, former vice president of sales with Federated.

“Federated would not sell Red & White to a competing merchant,” he notes. “So [Federated’s portfolio of brands] became that merchant’s unique attraction. That is what … store brands are all about.”

The brand was a hit. And Albrecht continued to eliminate every frill from the “Red & White organization” in the ‘70s and ‘80s — a time of when food prices were on the rise — to promise the lowest possible cost of Red & White products to Federated’s customers.

Following the initial success of Red & White, Albrecht realized that if Federated owned more brands, then it could grow and, at the same time, help grocers that desired a private label program but lacked the capacity to develop one. So throughout the 1960s, Federated acquired the Hy-Top and Parade brands under Albrecht’s leadership. The company also developed Fine Fare, Seven Farms, Better Valu and other brands.

By the late 1970s, retailers and wholesalers stocking and promoting Federated brands included Brookshire Grocery, Tyler, Texas (Hy-Top); Merchants Distributors Inc., Hickory, N.C. (Hy-Top); Brookshire Brothers, Lufkin, Texas (Hy-Top); Grocers Supply, Houston (Parade); United Supermarkets, Lubbock, Texas (Hy-Top); General Trading, Carlstadt, N.J. (Parade); and many more. Today, many of these retailers and wholesalers still stock and promote these brands.

“He also helped tap the opportunity to work with the Piggly Wiggly folks — our first venture into managing other company brands,” said Richard Albrecht, one of Donald Albrecht’s two brothers, in an issue of Private Label magazine from 1991.

All of this was a testament to Albrecht’s vision, Wilson says.

“Don was a leader!” he exclaims. “Someone said that a leader must know, must know that he knows, and make it abundantly clear to those about him that he knows. A great example of that was Federated’s entrance in the late ‘70s into generics.”

Behind the early entry into generics

Albrecht saw a chance to further drive retailer and wholesaler customers’ sales by offering them no-name opening-price-point products. Within six weeks of spotting the opportunity, Federated was offering more than 30 of these products to its customers.

“Federated was one of the first to be in generics,” Wilson states. “Although they ran the course in about three years, Don got more done with three exclamation points at the end of a handwritten note than 15 e-mails can accomplish today. He cut expenses, grew the business, developed people and created customers who respected and believed what he said.”

Sadly, Albrecht passed away in August 1986 at the age of 58. At the time of his death, he was board chairman at Federated, according to his obituary in the Chicago Tribune. He also served as a trustee of Harper College in Palatine, Ill., and as a member of the board of directors of Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Ill.