Fedele Bauccio
Chief Executive Officer and Cofounder
When Fedele Bauccio cofounded Bon Appétit Management Company, he set out to revolutionize the food service industry by bringing fresh, made-from-scratch food to the contract market.
Fedele began his career in food service as a dishwasher in 1960 with Saga Corporation’s Education Division, while a student at the University of Portland. In 1972, he transferred to Saga’s Business Food Service Division, where he held many positions including Divisional President, President of Saga’s Specialty Foodservices Group, and president of the Stuart Anderson’s Black Angus Cattle Company restaurant chain. After more than two decades in the industry, he knew institutional feeding was ready for something better.
In 1987, Bon Appétit Management Company was born. For the first time, trained executive chefs were put in charge of the kitchens of colleges, universities, corporations, and cultural centers. Fedele’s dream of a company committed to culinary expertise was a reality — and customers noticed, fueling quick growth for the small, San Francisco-based company.
Now headquartered in Redwood City, CA, Bon Appétit serves more than 220 million meals a year at more than 1,000 locations in 33 states. In 1999, Fedele led his team to once again raise the bar for on-site food service by making a commitment to socially responsible food sourcing, starting with the launch of our Farm to Fork program. Today, Bon Appétit spends more than $45 million annually on food from small, owner-operated farms within a 150-mile radius of each café, and strives to serve only sustainable seafood, turkey and chicken raised without antibiotics as a routine feed additive, natural beef burgers, rBGH-free milk and yogurt, and cage-free shell eggs. In 2007, the company debuted its Low Carbon Diet, the first program to make the connection between food and climate change (since updated to the Low Carbon Lifestyle), and in 2009 partnered with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers to become the first food service company to implement a Code of Conduct for how Florida tomato growers treat their workers. (See full list of the company’s milestones.)
From 2006-2008, Fedele served on the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, a project of the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health that brought together leaders in veterinary medicine, agriculture, public health, business, government, rural advocacy, and animal welfare. Together they conducted a fact-based and balanced examination of how farm animals are raised in this country, and in April 2008 the commission issued a comprehensive report of its findings as well as recommendations for the industry and for policymakers.
Fedele’s and Bon Appétit’s work has been honored by many nonprofit and industry groups (complete list). Notably, he was named a Most Admired CEO: Community Champion by the San Francisco Business Times, won the EY Entrepreneur Of The Year 2014 National Retail and Consumer Products Award (for redefining the food service industry and pioneering environmental and local sourcing policies), was honored with the International Association of Culinary Professionals’ Lifetime Achievement Award, and received one of the James Beard Foundation’s inaugural Leadership Awards, along with First Lady Michelle Obama and eight others.
Fedele graduated from the University of Portland with a master’s degree in business administration (1966) and a bachelor’s degree in economics (1964). He is a 1985 graduate of the Advanced Management Program of the Harvard Graduate School of Business and has been awarded honorary doctorates from the University of Portland, the University of Redlands, Notre Dame de Namur University, and the University of San Francisco. He is currently a board member of Compass Group North America. Fedele regularly contributes opinion pieces to the national conversation:
- Try This Easy Recipe for Recruiting and Retaining Employees, LinkedIn Pulse
- An Open Letter to the Food Industry: It’s Time to Make Farmwork a Viable Occupation, LinkedIn Pulse
- “You Are What Your Employees Eat,” Harvard Business Review
- “Redefining Sustainability – or Practicing What We Preach,”Sustainability: A Journal of Record
- “Thomas Keller Has a Responsibility – To Set the Record Straight,” Huffington Post
- “Safe” Food Isn’t Our Real Problem,” Huffington Post