Death of Bruce Wrenn

Walter Bruce Wrenn died on March 29, 2025, in Granger, Indiana, after a long battle with cancer.

 

Bruce was born Nov. 9, 1950, to Winona and Walter Wrenn. The family now had a son, in addition to daughters Joan, 15, and Karen (known by all as “Kitty”), 4. The family had moved into the new house they had built in Bay Minette, AL, merely three days earlier than Bruce’s arrival.

 

Bruce met the love of his life when he was 15. Bruce and a friend were playing in his yard when they noticed a neighbor girl classmate of theirs had a visitor at her house. Bruce said, “let’s go meet her,” and they crossed the street to introduce themselves. When they returned to Bruce’s yard about 20 minutes later, Bruce said to his friend “I just met the girl I’m going to marry.” Bruce and Jan were married on June 12, 1971, after his sophomore year at Auburn University. Jan delayed her own education and worked as a secretary on campus so that Bruce could concentrate on his studies without having to take a part time job. When he graduated in 1973, they moved to Evanston, IL, where he enrolled at Northwestern University’s MBA program. Upon his graduation, they moved to Kalamazoo, MI, where Bruce began work as a market analyst for the Upjohn pharmaceutical company.

 

Bruce accepted a faculty position in the School of Business at Andrews University in 1978. He completed work on a PhD in marketing at Northwestern University in 1989, when he accepted a teaching position in the School of Business at Indiana University, South Bend. He served on the faculty at Indiana University from 1989 to 2008, when he returned to Andrews as the J. N. Andrews Endowed Chair of Marketing.

 

Among his more than 100 scholarly and professional publications and presentations are sixteen books in marketing management, marketing research, marketing for religious organizations, consumer behavior and other marketing areas. He has been listed in Who’s Who in Finance and Business, Who’s Who in American Education, Who’s Who in Business Higher Education, and Who’s Who in America. He has been interviewed on National Public Radio, LifeTalk Radio, NBC, Hope Channel, and by numerous newspapers and magazines; he has also served as an expert witness to the Federal Trade Commission.

 

Bruce served on the editorial review board of several scholarly journals and consulted with organizations in the pharmaceutical, food, high-tech, bio-medical and hospital industries as well as numerous religious organizations on marketing matters. Doctoral candidates and scholars on four continents contacted him regarding his research in the application of marketing to religious organizations and his groundbreaking work in marketing theory.

 

Wrenn received numerous citations recognizing excellence in research (12 awards), teaching (4 awards) and service (2 awards). He served as a Subject Matter Expert in marketing to the American Management Association and a Marketing Mentor in the Harvard Business School’s ManageMentor program. He was co-founder and editor of the Scriptural Foundations for Business Series published by the Andrews University Press.

 

He was a long-time member of Pioneer Memorial Church in Berrien Springs. He dearly loved his God, wife and family, his golden retrievers, and a multitude of close friends. His family, friends and former students knew him as a warm, generous man with a quick wit and smile.

 

He was preceded in death by his father (1992), mother (2011) and sister Kitty (2011). Bruce is survived by his wife, Jan, professor of social work at Andrews University; sister Joan George; nephews and nieces Steven, Stephanie, Michael and Winona.