In memory of Ernie Collins

I don’t know how true it is that opposites attract, except in magnetism, but when opposites are attracted to one another, they can be very successful together. Ernie Collins and Fedele Bauccio are proof of that.

Ernie and Fedele were colleagues at Saga Corp. who joined forces in 1986 to found Bon Appetit Management Co. I only recently learned that Ernie Collins, now retired, had passed away late last year at the age of 67 after a battle with cancer, and I caught up last week with Fedele to talk about his partner and friend.

Ernie was always the quiet member of the team, working behind the scenes while Fedele served as front man. It was an arrangement that played to both men’s strength, Fedele said.

“We had two different skill sets,” Fedele recalled of his friend, a lawyer who was Saga’s general counsel when Fedele was a division president. “There was one of us for the front of the house and one of us for the back. It worked out great. Ernie was quiet, consistent and thoughtful. He developed all the support systems while I was out selling the business. It was a great partnership. We clicked really well, I think, because we respected each other’s talents.”

Ernie and Fedele working together was a lot like the process of making steel. Fedele would create the raw ideas and Ernie would temper them with careful consideration.

“We were very different individuals,” said Fedele. “He was very analytical and I was the emotional one. I would come up with all these wild ideas and Ernie would think them through so I wouldn’t get into trouble. Thank goodness I had him. He was the best partner anyone could have had.”

When Bon Appetit was acquired by Compass Group, Ernie decided to retire, and he spent the last seven years traveling the world with Susan, his wife of 42 years, and spending time with his daughters, their husbands and his four granddaughters.

Here is how daughter Jennifer Lonergan described her father: “a man who lived life with grace, honestly and loyalty. His gentle manner and fierce intellect were magnetic. His dry, dark-witted humor was notorious. He made a wicked waffle, loved his crossword puzzles and any sport, especially the San Francisco Giants. Opera was his weakness and he couldn’t resist adding a new contemporary art piece to his ongoing collection.”

Fedele noted that his partner chose to retire at the right time. “He got to spend some real quality time with his family and grandkids, and he loved to travel,” Fedele said. “I’m glad he got to do that.”

If you knew Ernie and wish to remember him, his family is requesting donations to either the Jimmy V Foundation for Cancer Research or the Bring Me A Book Foundation.