Sal H Alfiero

Salvatore H. Alfiero was profiled in newspaper articles in the late 1980s, after his business, Mark IV Industries, had become Buffalo's first new Fortune 500 company in a decade Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Protective Industries, LLC from 2001 through 2005; Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Mark IV Industries, Inc. from 1969 to 2001; current director of Fresh Del Monte Produce, Inc., HSBC North America Holdings, Inc. and HSBC USA, Inc. Alfiero died June 7 2022 after a struggle with Alzheimer's disease. He was 84. Born in Westerly, R.I., the youngest of three children, Mr. Alfiero developed a deep interest in aviation as a boy in New Bedford, Mass., during World War II. He obtained his private pilot's license at the age of 16. In 1957 he enlisted in the Marine Corps and became a fighter pilot, serving in the legendary Marine Attack Squadron 214, the Black Sheep Squadron. After going into the Marine Corps Reserve, Mr. Alfiero went back to RPI and completed his bachelor's degree in 1963. He worked briefly for a roofing company, then went to Harvard Business School, where he earned an MBA in 1966. He came to Buffalo in 1967 to work for Radatron, a company in the Town of Tonawanda that made radar detectors. There he met Clement R. Arrison, who became his longtime friend and business partner. Together they went on to acquire Radatron and other small companies, merging them in 1976 to create Mark IV Industries, taking the name from Mark IV Homes, a mobile home manufacturer in Pennsylvania that was another of Mr. Alfiero's interests. The acquisition of Armtek Corp., an auto parts wholesaler, tripled Mark IV in size. Assets ballooned from $19 million to more than $1 billion after the Armtek deal. In 1994, he made Mark IV's biggest acquisition, Purolator Products, a leading maker of automotive and industrial filters. The 1990s also saw one of Mark IV's divisions develop the E-ZPass toll collection system. At its peak, the company employed 16,000 people worldwide. In 2000, Mark IV was sold to a British private equity firm, BC Partners, for $2 billion. At the time, it was the UK's largest private equity deal. Since 2020, the work of the Alfiero Family Foundation has been continued by Foundation 214, led by his son Chris and named in honor of Mr. Alfiero's Marine Corps squadron. Survivors include his wife of 29 years, Jeanne; three sons, Chris, James and Shel; a step-daughter, Audra Saleh; and nine grandchildren.