Jasper B. Sanfilippo, Sr. (born Gaspare Baratta Sanfilippo March 26, 1931 – January 28, 2020) was an

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rockf ...

-based businessman, industrialist and philanthropist.

Early life and education

Jasper Sanfilippo was born in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

, Illinois in March 1931 to John Battista and Rosalie Baratta, the former of Sicilian ancestry. He attended Lake View High School and graduated in 1953 with a degree in mechanical engineering from the

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the Univer ...

. After graduation, he served in the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

around the time of the end of the

Korean War , date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...

Business life

Sanfilippo started working at his father's nut business, John B. Sanfilippo & Son, Inc.("JBSS"), when he was nine years old. In 1963 upon his father's death, when the company's annual sales were just $383,000, he assumed day to day control. Over the subsequent decades Sanfilippo built the business into first a regional, and then national, major nut supplier, selling both branded and private label nuts and related products to primarily supermarkets, mass merchandisers, convenience stores and foodservice providers. A main focus of Sanfilippo's efforts was on the mechanical shelling and processing of a variety of nuts. He led the engineering of, and the design and installation of, the company's shelling facilities throughout the United States (pecans in Texas, almonds and walnuts in California, peanuts in the Southwestern U.S.), as well as the final processing facility in

Elgin, Illinois Elgin ( ) is a city in Cook and Kane counties in the northern part of the U.S. state of Illinois. Elgin is located northwest of Chicago, along the Fox River. As of the 2020 Census, the city had a population of 114,797, the seventh-large ...

, a one million square foot facility acquired from

Panasonic formerly between 1935 and 2008 and the first incarnation of between 2008 and 2022, is a major Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation, headquartered in Kadoma, Osaka. It was founded by Kōnosuke Matsushita in 1918 as a lightbulb ...

for $48 million and opened in 2007. In 1991 Sanfilippo led the company in becoming listed on the Nasdaq with then annual revenues of $151 million. Sanfilippo utilized strategic acquisitions over the decades to grow and expand the business. In 1995 Sanfilippo and JBSS acquired the ''Fisher'' nut brand from

Procter & Gamble The Procter & Gamble Company (P&G) is an American multinational consumer goods corporation headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, founded in 1837 by William Procter and James Gamble. It specializes in a wide range of personal health/consumer he ...

, which later became the best-selling recipe nut brand in the United States. In 2006, after serving as President and Chief Executive Officer of the company for 24 years, Sanfilippo retired from active management of the business and was succeeded by his son Jeffrey Sanfilippo.

Collection and Charitable Activities

Sanfilippo was also well known for his museum collection, Sanfilippo Place de la Musique, at his home and estate in Barrington Hills, Illinois,"Nuts About Collecting, Food Magnate Attracts Fun Machines", by Susan Kubian, Chicago Tribune, 3 January 1993. consisting of collections of music boxes, automatic pianos and orchestrions, as well as antique locomotives, circus carousels, slot machines, penny arcades and steam engines. The museum is frequently used by local and regional charities to raise millions of dollars. As a major collector Sanfilippo was a member of the Musical Box Society International (MBSI), Automated Musical Instrument Collectors Association (AMICA), the Carousel Organ Association of America (COAA) and the Coin Operated Collectors Association (COCA).

Personal life

Sanfilippo married Marian Fabsits in Chicago on July 14, 1956. The Sanfilippos had five children, two of whom are actively involved in running JBSS.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sanfilippo, Jasper 1931 births 2020 deaths 20th-century American businesspeople 21st-century American businesspeople American food industry businesspeople American people of Italian descent Businesspeople from Illinois People from Barrington Hills, Illinois People from Chicago University of Illinois alumni