{{Short description|American adventurer and businessman}} {{for|the Australian cricketer and referee|Steve Bernard (cricketer)}} '''Steve Bernard''' (August 25, 1947 – March 7, 2009) was an American adventurer and businessman who founded Cape Cod Potato Chips with his brother Jude.<ref name=NYTObit>{{cite news|title=Steve Bernard, Who Founded Cape Cod Chips, Dies at 61|first=Bruce|last=Weber|date=March 13, 2009|accessdate=March 13, 2009|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/13/business/13bernard.html|work=The New York Times}}</ref>
==Biography== Born on August 25, 1947, in Concord, New Hampshire, Bernard attended the University of Notre Dame, where he earned a degree in economics. A restless adventurer, he spent the decade following his graduation crossing the country by hitchhiking, in Alaska fighting forest fires and sailing to the Caribbean, working with chickens and catching tuna, as well as installing car sun roofs.<ref name=NYTObit/>
===Cape Cod Potato Chips=== {{main|Cape Cod Potato Chips}} With the idea of offering healthier foods made with little processing, his wife, Lynn, had started a natural foods store in the 1970s. Bernard pursued adding potato chips to the mix after tasting a natural potato chip from a successful company based in Hawaii. In 1980, he sold his auto parts business and established Cape Cod Potato Chips with an {{convert|800|sqft|m2|adj=on}} storefront in Hyannis, Massachusetts, that could reach tourists, an industrial potato slicer he had bought for $3,000 and almost no knowledge of the snack food business other than what he learned in a week-long course on potato chip making at Martin's Potato Chips in Thomasville, Pennsylvania.<ref name=NYT1986/>
Unlike typical commercial brands made using a continuous frying process, in which potato slices travel through a tub of oil on a conveyor belt, Cape Cod chips are cooked in batches in kettles, frying them in a shallow vat in oil while stirring with a rake, producing a crunchier chip. Snack Food Association president James A. McCarthy noted that Bernard "didn't invent the kettle chip, but he was involved in bringing it back to prominence."<ref name=NYTObit/>
The company struggled for months after it opened on July 4, 1980. The following winter a car crashed through the front window of the store, almost hitting his daughter. An insurance payment and publicity from the accident helped tide the company over until the following summer, by which time business was booming, and the company's chips were being sold through a number of supermarket chains.<ref name=NYTObit/>
The company was acquired by Anheuser-Busch in 1985, and operated as a division of its Eagle Snacks unit. Sales of the chips were up to 80,000 bags a day by the end of the following year, reaching the entire East Coast, with sales of $16 million annually.<ref name=NYT1986>{{cite news|url=https://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F50717FD3C5E0C758EDDAB0994DE484D81|title=CAPE COD POTATO CHIPS: A 'LUXURY' JUNK FOOD|work=The New York Times|date=December 26, 1986|accessdate=March 13, 2009}}</ref> Bernard bought the company and its factory back from Anheuser-Busch in 1996.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D02EFD61139F93AA15751C0A960958260|title=COMPANY NEWS;DETAILS OF CAMPBELL TAGGART SPINOFF ARE RELEASED|agency=Dow Jones|work=The New York Times|date=February 29, 1996|accessdate=March 13, 2009}}</ref> Snack food company Lance Inc. bought the company from Bernard in 1996, by which time annual sales had reached $30 million.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C06EFD8103BF934A25757C0A96F958260|title=COMPANY NEWS; LANCE AGREES TO ACQUIRE CAPE COD POTATO CHIP|work=The New York Times|date=April 17, 1999|accessdate=March 14, 2009}}</ref>
===Personal=== Bernard started a sandwich shop, which made croutons from leftover bread. This led to the creation of Chatham Village Foods, which manufactured croutons, a company he later sold to the T. Marzetti Company.<ref name=NYTObit/> Lured out of "retirement" by daughter, Nicole, they together co-founded Late July Organic Snacks, a company that produces organic cookies and crackers, in 2001.<ref>official obit and Late July corporate website</ref>
A resident of Marstons Mills, Massachusetts, and Sanibel, Florida, Bernard died at age 61 on March 7, 2009, in Hyannis, Massachusetts due to pancreatic cancer. He was survived by his wife, daughter and two grandchildren, as well as three brothers and a sister.<ref name=NYTObit/>
== References == {{reflist}} {{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Bernard, Steve}} Category:1947 births Category:2009 deaths Category:American food company founders Category:Deaths from pancreatic cancer in Massachusetts Category:People from Marstons Mills, Massachusetts Category:People from Concord, New Hampshire Category:People from Sanibel, Florida Category:Businesspeople from Massachusetts Category:Businesspeople from New Hampshire Category:Businesspeople from Florida Category:University of Notre Dame alumni Category:20th-century American businesspeople Category:21st-century American businesspeople