Connecting the Dots between CGA’s Past and Future

RON FONG PRESIDENT AND CEO CALIFORNIA GROCERS ASSOCIATION

This summer we celebrate 125 years serving California’s grocery community

In this issue we honor both the past and the future. 2023 is a special year for our association as CGA turns 125 years old. In a dynamic economy where more than half of the Fortune 500 companies from just 25 years ago no longer exist, 125 years marks a fantastic achievement in staying power and longevity for California’s grocery community. We also know it’s no time to rest on laurels, and both CGA and the grocery industry at large are intensely focused on continuing to succeed in the future. I think you’ll get that feeling from this issue’s content, which covers everything from media’s cutting edge to the future of food packaging.

Having been founded at the end of the 19th century, our association is now thriving into the 21st century. The world is a vastly different place, yet shockingly similar in some ways. The past truly does rhyme with the future as the famous saying suggests.

As we prepared for this milestone, the team and I went into the CGA archives to look through past issues and it can be surprising to see how cyclical politics can be and how many public policy issues are reoccurring today only in different iterations. The same is true in the business world. Did you know curbside grocery pick-up was a thing in the 1920s?

To explore the meaning of the Association’s anniversary, we focused on the last 25 years, which have been financially and politically transformative for CGA. The Association has built multiple streams of revenue to help diversify our funding and to make our community more robust to economic disruption. This financial strategy has also allowed for us to build new events, offer improved services, and better represent the industry’s political concerns. In 2019, we even purchased and opened our very own office headquarters just a block or two away from the Capitol building in Sacramento.

After reflecting on 125 years serving California’s grocery community, we switch gears to focus on the future of packaging, media, and grocery retail. There are some fantastic features and columns in this issue. Plenty to sink your teeth into while on summer vacation or enjoying a few extra hours of daylight in the evening—it is summer after all and a great time to find inspiration or new strategic insights heading into the always action-packed fall and winter for grocers.

In closing, I’ve always admired a quote from a commencement speech Steve Jobs delivered at Stanford University.

“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something—your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”

It’s a busy summer for CGA as we have several events on the docket. I hope to see you out there, connecting the dots and endeavoring to mark new points of achievement that we will all proudly call back to when we reach our next milestone. Cheers to 125 years! ■