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Retail vet joins Wakefern as group vice president of fresh

Wakefern Food Corp. announced the appointment of Mark Van Buskirk as group vice president of fresh.
 
“We are excited to welcome Mark to our leadership team at Wakefern,” said Wakefern Chief Sales Officer Darren Caudill. “High-quality fresh offerings have always been at the heart of the customer supermarket experience — and we know Mark’s expertise and leadership will help us continue to grow these categories and take fresh to the next level.”
 
sdfAs group vice president of fresh, Van Buskirk will oversee Wakefern’s fresh food divisions, ensuring the cooperative’s high standards while helping grow fresh food categories for stores.
 
A respected retail leader, Van Buskirk brings more than 35 years of expertise in marketing, sales, operations and private brand development for supermarket and convenience chains.
 
He most recently served as senior vice president of merchandising and marketing for The Save Mart Cos., based in Modesto, CA. As a member of the executive leadership team, he was responsible for overseeing the corporate merchandising and procurement teams, as well as leading efforts in strategic and financial planning, merchandising analytics and shopper insights.

Prior to that role, he worked at Jacksons Food Stores, a convenience store outlet with more than 300 locations in Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, Arizona, California and Utah. Serving as vice president of marketing and merchandising, he led teams that successfully leveraged consumer data and insights to create strategic plans that boosted the company’s market share.   

At Albertsons Cos. Inc., he presided as group vice president of merchandising for grocery, frozen, dairy and liquor, and was responsible for corporate merchandising teams, strategic planning, procurement and shopper analytics and insights.

Earlier in his career, Van Buskirk served as executive vice president of merchandising, marketing and corporate retail and private brands at SuperValu. There he developed and led operations and sales teams for Cub Foods, Hornbacher’s Shoppers, Shop n’ Save and Farm Fresh and grew annual sales to over $4.7 billion. He also oversaw the private brand teams, managing a diverse portfolio of products, servicing the company’s retail banners and 1,900 independent wholesale customers. 

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