Industry Broker Blackburn Dies at Age 82

CHICAGO — Marsh H. Blackburn, the former chairman and chief executive officer of Sales Force Cos., died last month at age 82 of heart failure.

As the head of Sales Force Cos., Blackburn was an industry pioneer in transforming the company into a multi-regional food brokerage, said Mark Baum, the former CEO of the National Food Brokers Association.

“He was a towering figure in the industry,” said Baum, noting that Blackburn served a “wonderful ombudsman” on behalf of the food-brokerage and food-products industries with the retail channel.

Blackburn was active with several industry trade groups, and was a past chairman of the Food Industry Crusade Against Hunger, now called Food For All. He was the first broker ever to receive Food Marketing Institute’s William H. Albers Award in 1994, and also won the FMI Distinguished Service Award, the National Grocers Association Industry Service Award, and the J. Frank Grimes Award from IGA.

He was also the Task Force Chair of an industry group that combined the Uniform Product Code Council with the Uniform Communication Standards organization and was on the Executive Committee of the UCC.

After he retired from Sales Force in 1994, Blackburn worked with Andersen Consulting and served on the USDA International Section Advisory Board, traveling to several Eastern European countries as they privatized their food industries.

Blackburn is survived by his wife, Mary, two children and three grandchildren.