'Mayor Bob' Celebrates a Decade of Hard Work at The Grand

In a corner office of a Winnetka grocery store, Bob Bergman whips out a weekly calendar the size of a notecard from his back pocket.

"It's not how to remember, but how not to forget," said Bergman, 51. "It's a lot of little, tiny stepping stones."

For Bergman, who celebrates about one decade of bagging groceries at , there have been more stepping stones for him than most.

A brain injury in the summer of 1978 robbed Bergman, then a athlete and recent high school graduate, of his short-term memory and forced some hard choices.

With memory-impairment issues, Bergman said he knew that his future was not headed for certain high-intensity jobs. Instead, Bergman has developed a different role in Winnetka. He's become a hometown hero of sorts, with a celebrity born of familarity and friendly courtesy.

"I like to call him 'Mayor Bob,'" said Hazel Byerly, a colleague. "He is just like the mayor of Winnetka; everyone knows him."

Wear Your Empathy on the Outside

In his early 50s, Bergman wears a wide grin and specks of gray in his cropped, black haircut. He places groceries in thick, brown paper bags and says hello to the customer in line.

"Growing up here and having all my brothers and sisters, I have to find a happy medium," Bergman said. "I'm here to work and do a job, though it's nice to be polite to people."

For customer Mike Leonard, a Winnetka resident since 1985 and a features correspondent for the Today Show on NBC, Bergman reminds him of the values at the core of a tight-knit community like Winnetka. Leonard and Bergman talk shop at The Grand on a daily basis, usually having the same conversation about boxing each time.

"Bobby does his work, and you never see him slouching around, but he's also just so open, so verbal," said Leonard. "It's interesting because his accident could have made him non-verbal. He's aware that he might have asked the same thing 10 minutes earlier, but he doesn't shrink from talking to people, and people are patient with him too."

He adds: "When you wear empathy on the outside, your weaknesses become your strengths."

At The Grand, co-owner Kevin Salus said Bergman stands out among his approximately 200 employees for his friendly, courteous attitude. Salus dubbed him the "people ambassador."

"He's on our front line," said Salus. "He is the first people see when they come in, and the last they see when they leave."

Bergman's Background

When he was 13 years old, Bergman's mom had an aneurysm on the tennis court and died. His dad remarried a teacher's aid in Winnetka three years later, and together they raised 10 children.

"We had 12 people living in one house," he said, rattling off the names of his siblings like a Christmas card list.

After graduating from in 1978, Bergman painted houses as a summer gig until a jack broke and he fell two and a half stories from his ladder. When he returned to consciousness a few weeks later, Bergman could not remember the past two years of his life. 

"I didn't remember the two girlfriends I had senior year of high school, though my long-term memory came back as good as ever," he said.

Moving Forward

He learned how to motivate himself to push through his fears, Bergman said.

"After I had the accident, and when I was in rehab, I was scared," he said. "I didn't know what's going to happen to me the rest of my life. My friends and family were getting out and getting great jobs. But there is nothing wrong with being scared if you use it in a positive manner."

So, on most days, Bergman walks the 37 seconds to Mrs. D's Diner for scrambled eggs and waffles, and then goes to work and exercise (he likes to exercise four to five times a week at the Winnetka Fitness Centre).

"Kids need to learn that winning or losing is 99 percent in the head and the heart," he said. "All it really takes it really, really, really hard work. Once kids learn that, it's going to be a benefit for the rest of their lives."

With one hand on his knee, and one elbow on his other, Bergman leans in and pauses, as he thinks about his current work.

"A great job is not measured in how much money you make; it's what you can do, how you can contribute," he said, before returning to the check-out lane.

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