Photo: Getty Images/Illustration: Chloe Krammel
Joe Coulombe reimagined grocery shopping as a South Seas voyage. Earl G. Graves Sr. helped millions of Black entrepreneurs realize their dreams. Frieda Caplan made kiwi a household word. Sy Sperling was the founder of the Hair Club for Men and lest we forget, he was also a client. Here are the notable entrepreneurs we lost in 2020.
Frieda Caplan (January 18, age 96)
Known as the Kiwi Queen, Caplan got interested in produce while working for a fruit and vegetable company owned by her husband s family. She opened a stand at the Los Angeles Wholesale Produce Market in 1962, selling specialty items like spaghetti squash, jicama, and shitake mushrooms. They were salad fixings from Mars, as far as shoppers at the time were concerned: as a marketing gimmick, Caplan even supplied alien fruits to the TV series