Keasby, New Jersey-based Wakefern Food Corp. has appointed Mark Van Buskirk as group VP of fresh.
“We are excited to welcome Mark to our leadership team at Wakefern,” said Darren Caudill, chief sales officer. “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.”
As group VP of fresh, Van Buskirk will oversee Wakefern’s fresh food divisions, including appetizers/foodservice, bakery, meat, seafood, produce and floral, ensuring the co-operative’s high standards while helping grow fresh food categories for stores.
Van Buskirk brings more than 35 years of expertise in marketing, sales, operations and private brand development for supermarket and convenience chains.
Van Buskirk most recently served as SVP of merchandising and marketing for The Save Mart Companies, based in Modesto, California. As a member of the executive leadership, 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.
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Prior to that role, Van Buskirk worked at Jacksons Food Stores, a convenience store outlet with more than 300 locations in Idaho, Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Washington. Serving as VP of marketing and merchandising, he led teams that leveraged consumer data and insights to create strategic plans that boosted the company’s market share.
At Albertsons Cos., he presided as group VP 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 EVP of merchandising, marketing and corporate retail and private brands at SuperValu. In this role, he developed and led operations and sales teams for Cub Foods, Hornbacher’s Shoppers, Shop n’ Save and Farm Fresh, growing annual sales to more than $4.7 billion. He also oversaw the private brand teams, managing a portfolio of products, serving the company’s retail banners and 1,900 independent wholesale customers.
