Oland, Derek

ENCAENIA, MAY, 1998
DEREK OLAND
to be Doctor of Science

For six generations, the Oland family of Saint John has made beer. Derek Oland might have taken a different direction. Despite the fact that, as a youth, he saw plenty of the Moosehead Brewery, he was encouraged to choose his own path; no one told him he must follow in the family business. For awhile, he thought he might like to be a farmer, and he actually enrolled in MacDonald Agricultural College in Montreal. However, when he discovered that farmers are expected to do math, he quickly lost interest, and rather than return home he decided to take a job in Montreal. He found one in, of all places, Molson's Brewery. And the rest, as some might say, is history.

Back in New Brunswick, Derek Oland attended the University of New Brunswick and took his Bachelor of Business Administration degree in 1962. From here he went on to the Harvard Business School where he completed a management program before beginning his career in Moosehead Breweries Limited. Whatever one might think about a family business that has been around for generations, there is in fact no insurance against competition. Big companies love to swallow up successful small operations, and the power of the advertising dollar can quickly ruin a small company's niche in the market. Derek Oland faced the challenges of his time squarely. Despite resistance, including family resistance, he envisioned a bold foray into the American specialty beer market. It was, like most bold ideas, one that was laden with risk. "Could you sell Moosehead Beer in Texas?” The answer was yes; with marketing skill, New Brunswick's popular beer could become a premium beer throughout the United States.

Derek Oland has done more than inherit a business and a family name; he has made his own contribution by modernizing and expanding, creating and protecting jobs for New Brunswickers, and maintaining his commitment to this province which, above all the possible places where he might choose to live, he steadfastly calls home. While his business interests extend throughout the Maritime Provinces, and he serves as a director on several leading companies, he has never confined himself to the boardroom or the plant. He has actively supported sports and the arts, served as president or campaign chair of the United Way in both Saint John and Halifax, remains actively committed to an anti-poverty coalition and chairs its Public Awareness Committee, and takes a special interest in the needs of mentally challenged children.

There is, too, the private man: a man whom his friends claim has gasoline in his blood. From the time when, at the age of nine or ten, he first drove his mother's car — without permission, without the least knowledge of how to do it, and without the slimmest hope of negotiating the driveway without smashing the front in -- he has loved cars. He loved his Volkswagen beetle when he was a student at UNB. He loves his now-restored blue 1939 Mack truck which he puts to practical use around his property at New River Beach. Equally he loves his four-wheel ATV for odd-jobs around his garden and the beach. But most of all, he loves his Porsche 944T which he himself has raced at Sebring International Speedway in Florida. Car racing, he claims, is one of life's most relaxing experiences.

With his wife Jackie and their four sons, Derek Oland has reached out to the world and experienced what life has to offer. But when all is considered, he is a New Brunswick boy at heart, a businessman who takes nothing for granted, who sees his company's success as dependent on his practical good sense mixed with the willingness to try something new. In whatever he does, he brings drive and commitment. As one of UNB's most successful graduates and a leader in the Atlantic region's economy, Derek Oland is a fitting recipient of this University's highest honour.

From: Honoris Causa - UA Case 70, Box 3