Wakefern Food Corporation Announces Record $10.6 Billion in Retail Sales
Keasbey, NJ, May 27, 2009 – Wakefern Food Corp.’s chairman, Joseph S. Colalillo, Dean Janeway, president and COO and Joe Sheridan, executive vice president, addressed Wakefern’s membership, store management and staff at the company’s annual meeting in East Brunswick, New Jersey on May 21. “Wakefern’s focus is to help the independent retailer do what they could not do if they were going it alone,” stated Colalillo in his opening remarks. “Wakefern is dedicated to helping our members, on a store-by-store basis, achieve the results they require and respond to any competitive threat they may face.”
The company reported that it had reached a record sales level of $10.6 billion in retail sales for fiscal year ending September 27, 2008. This is a 7.5 percent increase from same period last year. In addition, the company reported $8.4 billion in warehouse sales for the same period.
In his remarks, Mr. Janeway noted that the growth of Wakefern’s wholesale initiative had exceeded expectations and was on track to double its volume from the prior year. Janeway also spoke about the cooperative’s entrepreneurial spirit as the driving force behind Wakefern’s stellar year. “The reason for our lasting success is right in this very room. Every one of us – committed to all of us. No other company has that and it can’t be replicated.”
During Wakefern’s Annual meeting, Mr. Colalillo officially introduced the cooperative’s newest member, the Klein family, whose seven Maryland-based stores opened on March 9, 2009 under the ShopRite banner.
Wakefern shareholders re-elected to its board of directors: Joseph S. Colalillo as chairman of the board; James Sumas and Larri Wolfson as vice chairmen; Lawrence Inserra, Jr., Treasurer; Richard Saker, Dominick J. Romano, and Jeffrey Brown, assistant treasurers; Irv Glass, secretary; Ned Gladstein, Joel Perlmutter and Steven Ravitz, assistant secretaries; Thomas Infusino, chairman emeritus; Rocco Cingari, Lawrence Collins, Jon Greenfield, Charles Infusino, Bernard Kenny, Leonard Sitar, Richard Tully, Kenneth Capano, and Robert Clare.
Newly elected to the board is Richard McMenamin, Wakefern member since 1995 and owner of McMenamin Family ShopRites — comprised of two ShopRite supermarkets in the Philadelphia area.
Dean Janeway, president and COO and Joseph Sheridan, executive vice president were also re- elected as operating officers.
About Wakefern Food Corp.
From a small, struggling cooperative with eight members – all owners of their own grocery stores – Wakefern Food Corporation has grown into the largest retailer-owned cooperative in the United States and one of the largest employers in New Jersey. The cooperative is comprised of 45 members who individually own and operate supermarkets under the ShopRite banner. Today, Wakefern, the merchandising and distribution arm of the company, and the more than 200 ShopRite stores located throughout New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Maryland employ more than 50,000 people.
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