GERALD NORMAN PENCER, 52

TORONTO -- Services have been held for Gerald Norman Pencer, chairman and chief executive officer of Cott Corp. here, who died last week following a battle with cancer.

te-label deals with Loblaw and Wal-Mart, among others.

Pencer's illness led Cott last fall to name two executives co-chief operating officers, new positions for the company.

Pencer showed signs of his entrepreneurial spirit as a teen-ager when he started his own vending-machine company and food-service company, selling to several universities in his former home town here. He later moved to Calgary, Alberta, to start a meat-packing business before relocating here.

In 1989, Pencer took over the family-owned Cott business and turned the company into a private-label giant with sales of more than $1 billion last year.