Legend

2023 Inductee

Henry Gerstel

Henry Gerstel was one of three partners behind a food brokerage firm Crombie, Kennedy and Nasmark, a business they acquired in 1977. Gerstel and his partners spent the next 35 years building the company, which grew to become the largest food brokerage firm in Canada with more than 500 employees. The company represented some of the biggest CPG brands in North America at the time. In 1985 he established a private label dry packaged goods manufacturing business called Associated Brands. Like the food brokerage business, Gerstel helped to build the company and by the time it went public in 2002, it was the largest Canadian private label manufacturer of items such as soup mixes and jelly powder supplying both Canadian and U.S. supermarkets. In 2007 Associated Brands was acquired by Advantage Sales and Marketing and Gerstel remained president for four years and the served as chairman until the end of 2015.