Frank Popoff, the chief executive and chairman who tried to make Dow Chemical more accommodating to regulators and environmentalists in the late 1980s and 1990s, and who pushed the chemical industry to adopt safer practices, died Feb. 25 at his home in Midland. Mich., where Dow is based. It was 88.
A company spokesman said the cause was cancer.
When the Bulgarian-born Mr. Popoff was named Dow’s chairman and chief executive in 1987, the company had begun trying to shed its image as an aggressive chemical giant that had made napalm and the defoliant Agent Orange for the US military during Vietnam War. released toxic waste, such as dioxins, into the Tittabawassee River from its Midland plant. and fought the Environmental Protection Agency to prevent aircraft inspections for its emissions.
An estimated $50 million advertising campaign launched two years before Mr. Popoff rose to the top used the tagline, “Dow lets you do great things.” It was intended to change public perceptions of Dow by promoting its image as a better company, highlighting the philanthropic giving and humanitarian uses of its products.
”I think we have a lot of work to do in terms of how we’re perceived,” Mr. Popoff told The New York Times in 1987, shortly before he succeeded Paul F. Oreffice as chief executive. “We know we will never change Ralph Nader’s mind. But Dow is at peace with itself, and we want our people to feel good about the company, too.”
The company was best known at the time for manufacturing chemicals, including chlorine, and for using the chemicals in the manufacture of plastics, pharmaceuticals and supermarket items such as Saran Wrap, Fantastik cleaning fluid and Ziploc bags.
Regulators and environmentalists focused heavily on chemicals at the time. In 1991, Mr. Popoff and another Dow executive, David Buzzelli, created a group of outside environmental policy advisers – among them Lee Thomas, a former EPA administrator – who looked into Dow’s operations and were able to obtain inside information. A current version of this table remains in effect at Dow.
Between 1988 and mid-1991, Dow cut its emissions of 121 harmful chemicals tracked by the EPA by nearly a third, and was on track to meet its goal of cutting emissions in half.
”I’m in the chemical business,” Mr. Popoff told The Detroit Free Press in 1992. ”That’s synonymous with a lot of bad things. But I’m in favor of environmental responsibility.”
In a speech to the Economic Club of Detroit a year later, he elaborated on the need for Dow to be open to ideas from regulators and environmental activists. “There is no alternative to environmental reform in our industry,” he said, arguing that chemical companies should lead such efforts or face poorly designed regulations.
Carol Browner, the EPA administrator at the time, recalled in an email that Dow was “easier to work with” under Mr. Popoff. But when he suggested in 1994 that the agency wanted to “replace, reduce or ban” the widespread use of chlorine and chlorinated products within three years, Mr. Popoff sent a tentative letter to President Bill Clinton.
“It would be irresponsible to pursue a policy that assumes all chlorine products are bad without considering either the weight of the scientific evidence for chlorine chemistry or the economic impact of banning chlorine,” he wrote. He added: “The decision to pursue such a sweeping approach to this very complex issue was made without industry input. The Dow Chemical Company is committed to constructive engagement.”
Jack Doyle, who wrote “Trespass Against Us: Dow Chemical & The Toxic Century” (2004) for the Environmental Health Fund, an advocacy group, said chlorine was too important to Dow’s bottom line for it to abandon company without a fight.
Dow’s commitment to the chlorination industry was “so dominant and so intertwined in the world economy,” he added, “that there was no way real dramatic changes could be made.”
Frank Popoff, whose given name was Pencho, was born on October 27, 1935 in Sofia, Bulgaria. His father, Eftim, who was also known as Frank, ran a dry cleaning business with his mother, Stoyanka (Kosorov) Popov, called Stany.
He immigrated to the United States with his parents and sister in 1939 and they settled in Terre Haute, Ind.
Inspired by a high school teacher who had been gassed during combat in World War I, Mr. Popoff studied chemistry at Indiana University, where he earned both a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in business administration in the same year, 1959.
However, he did not want to become a chemist.
“Maybe I lacked the creativity and vision that successful chemists have,” he said in a 2012 interview with the Chemical Heritage Foundation (now the Institute for the History of Science, in Philadelphia). “I was really interested in the commercialization and application of chemistry.”
He joined Dow in 1959 and stayed with the company for 41 years. He worked in its urethane lab and then in technical services and chemical sales in the early 1960s. Over the next quarter century, he moved into positions of increasing influence: president of Dow Europe in 1981, executive vice president of Dow Chemical in 1985, and , two years later, president and CEO. Appointed president in 1992.
Under Mr. Popoff, Dow Chemical expanded the company’s operations in Asia and bought a majority stake in drugmaker Marion Laboratories in 1989 (renamed Marion Merrell Dow) before selling it six years later amid patent expirations and intense competition.
In the early 1990s, Dow Chemical became embroiled in controversy over the safety of silicone breast implants manufactured by Dow Corning, its joint venture with Corning Inc.
“Rightly or wrongly, there are a lot of people who are outraged about implants,” Mr. Popoff told the Free Press in 1992, but added, “Our responsibility is limited to that of a shareholder, because that’s who we are.”
In 1995, however, the company was found liable by a Nevada court for more than $14 million in damages after a woman suffered health problems caused by leaking implants. The following year, the New York State Court of Appeals found Dow Chemical not liable in 1,400 lawsuits over the implants.
Mr. Popoff stepped down as CEO in 1995 and chairman in 2000. He later taught at Indiana University for a time and served on corporate boards.
He is survived by his wife, Jean (Urse) Popoff, whom he met in college and married in 1958. three sons, John, Thomas and Steven; and four grandchildren.
Jim Fitterling, Dow’s current chairman and chief executive, said Mr. Popoff’s most significant accomplishments revolved around making safety a critical goal – “not that it wasn’t important, but he put it front and center” – and that he was an early proponent of sustainability. This included creating less waste, consuming fewer resources and better ensuring worker safety. It helped promote an industry-wide voluntary code of conduct that formalized these principles, called Responsible Care.
But Mr. Popoff said it wasn’t always easy to get other companies to comply. Early on there was pushback.
“Some things have had a bigger impact for big companies versus small ones,” he told the Science History Institute. “Then the hard work began, making sure everyone was compliant. And what can you do? You can use whatever bully pulpit you have to assure others that not only is it in their best interest, but it is mandatory for the industry to survive without bringing down the hostility and ill will of society, which the chemical industry is capable of at times of doing.”
