Rags to riches: Bill MacAloney: from orphan to successful business owner to CBA.

• Author: Ascierto, Jerry
• Position: Government relations

As the newest public member of the California Board of Accountancy, W. "Bill" MacAloney looks to leverage a wealth of experience serving on the boards of businesses and trade groups, as well as his skills as a successful entrepreneur.

But the path to the CBA is a true rags-to-riches story for MacAloney, president and CEO of Anaheim-based Jax Markets.

Early Life

Born in Fitchburg, Mass., in 1935, MacAloney became an orphan at the age of two and spent his childhood in various boys homes and orphanages. At 16, he ran away from a boys home and hitchhiked to California with no money in his pocket, no place to stay and an education that ended at the 10th-grade.

Once in Los Angeles, he worked several odd jobs, including moving furniture and working at a chemical coating factory, until landing a job in the food industry, unloading boxcars in a warehouse for Mayfair Markets.

When that warehouse closed a few years later, MacAloney sought a job with the Certified Grocers of California, a much larger company.

"But the Certified Grocers of California wouldn't give me a job; they said I wasn't tall enough to reach merchandise over my head," says MacAloney. "You had to be at least five feet, eight inches."

But after moving furniture and working in a factory where "your clothes would get eaten up by acid," MacAloney was determined to stick with the food industry, and worked his way up to management at both independent and chain groceries.

His hard work and dedication led to several high-profile management jobs at numerous grocery stores.

Indeed, 30 years after being turned down by the Certified Grocers of California for being too short, "I became chairman of the board of the company," MacAloney says. "I guess their height limit went down by then."

Jax Markets

After four years at the helm of the Certified Grocers of California, MacAloney started his own independent grocery store--Jax Markets--in 1970, which serves the Hispanic community.

"It started out pretty rough," recalls MacAloney, who's married and has two children and 10 grandchildren. "I bought a company that was going bankrupt, and it took me three years to pay everyone off."

After years of careful planning, Jax Markets has expanded and operates three successful grocery stores in Anaheim, Santa Fe Springs and Ontario.

Through his tenure at Jax Markets, MacAloney became involved in several trade groups, which introduced him to state and national legislative efforts.

Trade Group Experience

MacAloney...