Trident chief passes away in Alaska

Jerry Dowd, 60, the president of Trident Seafoods, died of a heart attack on Aug. 6 in Igiugig.

Dowd was on vacation at a sportsman’s lodge with members of his family during a fly fishing trip when he passed away.

Dowd came to Trident in 2004 as an advisor to executive managers and was named president of Trident’s domestic arm in August of 2006.

He began his career in 1973 with Swift and Company, moving to Tyson Foods in 1979 where he spent the next 20 years in a variety of senior-level sales, marketing and operations positions and was eventually named senior VP and general manager of Tyson’s Foodservice Division.

During his tenure at Tyson, Dowd helped grow the division from gross sales of $100 million to $2.7 billion in 1999. ConAgra Foods brought Dowd aboard that same year as president and Chief Operating Officer of the ConAgra Foodservice Poultry Company. Dowd grew that division into a $2.5 billion company – and the third largest poultry processor in the nation.

At the time of his death, Dowd was looking toward a major expansion of Trident’s operations in Asia, moving the company into a new international market for its products.