AOPA Pilot Magazine - October 2013 - 60

“Aviation has been good to me—and I mean really good to
me. What could I do to help? How could I participate? It
was a little scary, to tell you the truth.” —Mark Baker
He took ground school while in high
school, but once he went to the University
of Minnesota he learned he could get credit
for the class, so he took it again. While in
college in the mid-1970s he sold his van to
buy his first airplane, a 1968 Cessna 150. At
the time he was working at a lumber yard
for about $8 an hour. “With gas at about 80
cents a gallon, I could fly for $4 an hour,”
he told AOPA staff in August a few hours
after he was introduced as the next president and CEO of the association.
Baker, a longtime pilot, aircraft owner,
and AOPA member, was appointed by the
board of trustees on September 6 as only
the association’s fifth president in 74 years.
He replaces Craig Fuller, who announced
to the board in early 2013 that he planned
to step down this year.
Baker, 55, says that learning to fly
changed his life and opened doors for
him. In his new role, he hopes to foster
that sort of opportunity for others—young
and old. He sees preserving easy access
to general aviation airports as a key initiative for AOPA. “We need open access,
not a place that looks like a maximum
security prison.” Encouraging the development of parks with grills and pavilions,
viewing areas, and amenities on the
60 | AOPA PILOT  October 2013

perimeters of airports will expose more
people to aviation, he suggests.
He joined AOPA when a CFI gave him
an application as a new pilot. Like a lot
of people struggling financially right out
of college, he dropped his membership,
sold the 150, and stopped flying for a few
years as he began his career in the retail
home improvement business. But soon,
the urge to fly and the need for transportation brought him back into aviation. With
a young and growing family, he joined a
flying club at the Lake Elmo Airport in St.
Paul, Minnesota, and flew the club’s Piper
Warrior, Archer, and Arrow.
Moving to Florida for work for a
few years, the Minnesota native bought
a Cessna 177 Cardinal, into which he
stuffed his family—which at the time
consisted of three daughters and his wife
Vickie. “Altogether the family weighed
422 pounds in those days, so it worked.”
Since then, the couple added a son, and
now sons-in-law and six grandchildren.
Baker has brought his sons-in-law and
father into aviation; his college-age son
and nephew are student pilots.
Over the years, Baker’s career progressed from a local lumber yard chain to
management and then executive positions

at The Home Depot, outdoor outfitter
Gander Mountain, The Scotts MiracleGro Company, and, most recently at
Orchard Supply Hardware, a West Coast
home improvement chain that was spun off
from Sears as an independent company in
2011. Baker was brought in as president
and CEO. “It was in a difficult place with
a lot of debt. I put it through a restructure
process and successfully got the business
turned around so that Lowes bought the
company…and is now continuing to grow
that business.”
The bankruptcy court approved the
sale of the Orchard Supply assets to Lowes
in mid-August. He sees the brand as now
being in a good place. “We turned around
sales and focused on what Orchard Supply
was so good at—taking care of customers.”
While his position at various companies has changed, the airplanes have stayed.
Over the years he has used various V-tail
Bonanzas, and a 36 Model Bonanza as
well as Barons to commute from his home
in Minnesota to positions in Chicago, for
example. On other occasions he has used
his airplanes to scout locations for new
stores and to support the opening of new
stores. He’s managed to accumulate more
than 7,500 flight hours in everything from
AOPA Pilot Magazine - October 2013

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