John Benjamin Sainsbury

John Benjamin Sainsbury (1871 – May 23, 1956) was the eldest son of John James Sainsbury, the founder of the Sainsbury's supermarket chain, and his wife, Mary Ann Sainsbury. Early and private life John Benjamin Sainsbury was the second child of John James and Mary Ann Sainsbury and was born in 1871 above the Drury Lane shop and from an early age was trained to take over from his father at the head of the firm. John Benjamin Sainsbury married Mabel Van den Bergh, an heiress from a Dutch Jewish family whose fortune was made in margarine. They had two sons, Alan Sainsbury and Robert Sainsbury. Alan Sainsbury joined the family firm in the same year as his youngest uncle (John Benjamin Sainsbury's youngest brother, Paul Sainsbury), who was almost 20 years younger than John Benjamin Sainsbury. Both Alan Sainsbury and Paul Sainsbury joined Sainsbury's in 1921. John Benjamin Sainsbury's sons, Alan and Robert, built the reputation of the business for quality and innovation. Having inherited both Victorian and Jewish traditions of philanthropy, they also set the tone of the family's prevailing left-liberal social conscience. Business career John Benjamin Sainsbury ran the business in partnership with his father from 1915, and became a director of the newly formed Company 'J. Sainsbury Ltd.' in 1922 and chairman in 1928 after his father's death.