FMI Awards Go to Mayo, Janeway, Ball

SN STAFF

PHOENIX — Food Marketing Institute presented awards to three longtime industry veterans at the association’s annual Midwinter Executive Conference here this week.

Susan Mayo, who retired last year as vice president of consumer affairs at Norfolk, Va.-based Farm Fresh Supermarkets, received the 2011 Esther Peterson Consumer Service Award. She began her career at Farm Fresh, a division of Minneapolis-based Supervalu, in 1977, as director of consumer affairs. She founded the Farm Fresh Charitable Foundation and organized the largest charity golf tournament in the Mid-Atlantic region. Mayo is currently chief marketing officer at the Foodbank of Southeastern Virginia, and president and owner of Susan T. Mayo Consulting LLC.

Dean Janeway, president and chief operating officer of Keasbey, N.J.-based Wakefern Food Corp., parent of the ShopRite banner, was given the FMI Herbert Hoover Award for professional excellence in the retail and wholesale industry. He joined Wakefern in 1966 as a junior accountant and has been president and COO since 1995. Janeway is “credited with bringing innovation and creativity to the food-distribution industry,” FMI said.

Fred Ball, chairman of Balls Food Stores, Kansas City, Kan., received the FMI Sidney R. Rabb Award recognizing service to the community and strong advocacy on behalf of the supermarket industry. He began working at his family’s grocery store at age 10 and was named president of the company, which operates 29 Price Chopper and Hen House Markets stores in the Midwest, in the mid-1960s. Ball is credited with developing the price-impact Price Chopper banner during a period of high inflation in the 1970s. He also was on the FMI board of directors from 1995 to 2005 and played an integral role in supporting FMI’s independent operator initiatives, the association said. He was also chairman of Associated Wholesale Grocers, which supplies Balls Food Stores, for 28 years.