Ex-McDonald’s exec to run Northern Illinois Food Bank

Pete Schaefer learned the value of every morsel of food to a hungry person over threats of lard and onion sandwiches.

Last Friday was Schaefer’s first day as the new CEO of the St. Charles-based Northern Illinois Food Bank. He replaces H. Dennis Smith, who will fully retire as of March 31. Schaefer comes to the position having already served on the nonprofit’s board of directors for the past five years. But his reasons for even coming to that position took root in his mother’s kitchen.

Schaefer’s mother was a child of the Great Depression. She spent some time in an orphanage after her father died.

“There’s weren’t food pantries back then,” Schaefer said. “There weren’t food banks. What they had were orphanages. She wasn’t bitter about it, but she was always thankful for being able to get through the Great Depression. But I had six brothers and sisters growing up. If we left any food on our plate, she’d say, ‘When I was in the orphanage, they used to serve lard and onion sandwiches. Would you rather eat that?’ ”

That was his lesson on the preciousness of food. His lessons in the value of it came whenever he had an exam to take. Test day meant Schaefer’s mom would cook a hot, healthy breakfast.

“She called it ‘brain food,’ ” Schaefer said. “And then you’d go in and take the test. I got all the way through law school because I got pretty good at taking tests.”

Schaefer put that law degree to use as an executive for McDonald’s for more than 15 years. He joined his wife’s communications company to spend more time with his young children. Now he’s with the food bank and on a mission to apply the food lessons he learned growing up to the future of an organization that serves more than 60,000 hungry people each year with about 40 million pounds of food.

Feeding children remains one of his top priorities.

“We have to think about good nutrition and helping kids,” Schaefer said. “How are they going to compete? How are they going to learn? And you want to talk about the cycle of poverty? Here’s how we can help end that cycle.”

Schaefer plans on ending that cycle for even more people within the next five years. The food bank is already opening an expansion facility. But he has visions of distribution centers in Will and Kankakee counties as well as improved infrastructure at the food bank’s Rockford outlet.

“I’m excited about the next five years,” Schaefer said. “We can get to 80 million pounds. We can get to 100 million pounds. We’ve got to get more trucks. We’ve got to get more food. We’ve got to get more volunteers. We can help twice the number of people we are now because they are out there. This isn’t just a city or ghetto problem. The people that need this help are right down there at the end of your block.”