Thomas Gary Rogers (June 5, 1942 – May 2, 2017) was an American entrepreneur and executive who acquired and built Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream into a major company. Rogers was formerly a director of Levi Strauss & Co. and he served as the first non-family Chairman of their board in 155 years. Rogers was born in

Stockton, California Stockton is a city in and the county seat of San Joaquin County, California, San Joaquin County in the Central Valley (California), Central Valley of the U.S. state of California. It is the most populous city in the county, the List of municipal ...

. He attended

Harvard Business School Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate school, graduate business school of Harvard University, a Private university, private Ivy League research university. Located in Allston, Massachusetts, HBS owns Harvard Business Publishing, which p ...

with Bob Haas who preceded him as Chairman of Levi Strauss. Rogers retired from the Levi's Board of Directors on December 3, 2009. He became chairman of the board of directors of the

Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco The Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco (informally referred to as the San Francisco Fed) is the Federal Reserve, federal bank for the twelfth district in the United States. The twelfth district is made up of nine western U.S. state, states— ...

for a term beginning January 1, 2009. He was also the chairman of

Safeway Inc. Safeway, Inc. is an American supermarket chain. The chain provides grocery items, food and general merchandise and a variety of specialty departments, such as bakery, delicatessen, floral and pharmacy, as well as Starbucks coffee shops, and veh ...

Rogers purchased Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream with his business partner, Rick Cronk, for $1 million in 1977. He was the

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...

and he and Cronk were managers and principal shareholders of Dreyer's for almost 30 years, until the company was acquired by

Nestlé Nestlé S.A. ( ) is a Swiss multinational food and drink processing conglomerate corporation headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland. It has been the largest publicly held food company in the world, measured by revenue and other metrics, since 20 ...

in 2006 for $3.2 billion. Rogers is an

Eagle Scout Eagle Scout is the highest rank attainable in the Scouts BSA program of Scouting America. Since its inception in 1911, only four percent of Scouts have earned this rank after a lengthy review process. The Eagle Scout rank has been earned by over ...

and recipient of the

Distinguished Eagle Scout Award The Distinguished Eagle Scout Award (DESA) is a distinguished service award of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA). It is awarded to an Eagle Scout who has achieved extraordinary national-level recognition, fame, or eminence within their profession ...

from the

Boy Scouts of America Scouting America is the largest scouting organization and one of the largest List of youth organizations, youth organizations in the United States, with over 1 million youth, including nearly 200,000 female participants. Founded as the Boy Sco ...

. He is the brother of James D. Rogers, who is also an Eagle Scout and Distinguished Eagle Scout. Their brother Don is also an Eagle Scout, as are seven of their sons, for a total of ten Eagle Scouts across two generations of this family. Rogers is an alumnus of the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

. He has been a substantial financial contributor to the university, particularly the

rowing Rowing is the act of propelling a human-powered watercraft using the sweeping motions of oars to displace water and generate reactional propulsion. Rowing is functionally similar to paddling, but rowing requires oars to be mechanically a ...

program. He recently gave a donation to build the new boathouse complex, which is now named in his honor. His various donations were made through the Rogers Family Foundation, which has made grants to fund eugenics research at Berkeley. He died in May, 2017.

References

External links

Dreyer's website

1942 births 2017 deaths People from Stockton, California American chief executives of food industry companies Harvard Business School alumni University of California, Berkeley alumni Levi Strauss & Co. people Businesspeople from California 20th-century American businesspeople {{US-CEO-stub

See also

References

External links