For generations of drivers between Philadelphia and the Jersey Shore, a stop at Wawa is a ritual: the same hoagie, built the same way, and coffee poured before a shift begins. Richard D. "Dick" Wood Jr., who spent 55 years turning that store into the institution it became, died peacefully at home in Wawa, Pennsylvania, on July 10, 2026, according to his family's obituary notice. He was 88.

Wood's connection to the company predated his own birth. His great-grandfather opened the original Wawa Dairy in 1902, and his father's cousin, Grahame Wood, turned the family's dairy stores into the first Wawa Food Market in 1964, the same year Wood, born in Philadelphia on March 4, 1938, earned his law degree from what is now the University of Pennsylvania's Carey Law School, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer. He had attended St. Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire, and the University of Virginia, served a year of active duty in the Marine Corps and continued in the Marine Corps Reserve, and worked as a Philadelphia public defender and then an attorney at Montgomery McCracken before the family business called him back.

Wood joined Wawa in 1970, not behind a hoagie counter but as the company's first general counsel. He became president in 1977, chief executive in 1980, and chairman and chief executive in 1982, a role he held until his retirement in 2004, when he stayed on as chairman of the board, PhillyVoice reported. Under his direction, Wawa added made-to-order hoagies and hot food, introduced its Sizzli breakfast sandwiches, moved many stores to 24-hour operation, and installed ATMs and touchscreen ordering. In 1992 he led the creation of an employee stock ownership plan that gave Wawa's own cashiers and cooks a direct stake in the company they worked for. By the time he stepped back, the single dairy stand his family had built had grown into more than 900 stores across six states, employing more than 36,000 people and generating more than $12 billion in annual sales. He also chaired the executive committee of the National Association of Convenience Stores, carrying Wawa's model to the wider industry.

Colleagues describe a leader who made a fast-scaling company still feel like a family shop. "He made people feel important, because to him, they were," Barbara Ennis, his longtime assistant, said, according to the Inquirer. Howard Stoeckel, a former Wawa vice chairman, president and chief executive, said Wood "had a special mix of heart, compassion, empathy, and humility that made him a true believer and practitioner of servant leadership." Current chairman and chief executive Chris Gheysens said "Dick Wood was our true lead goose who was the guiding heart and soul of the company." His daughter, Lisa Wright, put it differently: "His legacy is so much bigger than buildings, stores or business growth." In its own tribute to him, Wawa distilled that philosophy to Wood's own words: it was his job, he believed, "to create an environment where each of us believes that we can make a difference," according to Wawa.

Wood was inducted into the Convenience Store News Hall of Fame in 1996 and named Businessman of the Year by the Great Valley Regional Chamber of Commerce the same year. In 2019 Children's Hospital of Philadelphia honored him at its Carousel Ball. Wawa later placed a life-size bronze statue of him at its corporate headquarters, and in 2020, on the 50th anniversary of his arrival at the company, he was named chairman emeritus.

His giving reached well beyond the company he ran. Wood and his family donated $25 million to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia in 2021, and CHOP named its Richard D. Wood Jr. Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment in his honor and endowed a chair in pediatric diagnostic medicine bearing his and his late wife's names. "I will truly miss his warmth, wisdom, and generous spirit," CHOP chief executive Madeline Bell said. Wood also built a tuition reimbursement program for Wawa associates and, in 2021, established the Dick Wood College Scholarship Fund, and he served on the boards of Riddle Memorial Hospital, Philadelphia National Bank, and Bok Tower Gardens in Florida, and sat on Chester Heights borough council in the early 1980s.

Wood married Jeanette Andrews in 1964, and the two were partners for more than six decades until her death in 2025. He is survived by his children, Lisa Wright and Richard D. Wood III, five grandchildren, a brother, George Wood, and a sister, Elise duPont. Two brothers died before him.

What Wood built keeps running on the terms he set. The ownership plan he created in 1992 still puts company stock into the hands of the cashiers and cooks who staff the registers, and on July 20, 2026, Wawa gave away free coffee at every store in his memory, according to KYW Newsradio. The fetal diagnosis center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia carries his name into its exam rooms, the scholarship fund still sends Wawa associates' children to college, and the bronze statue at Wawa's headquarters keeps him on the shop floor he spent 55 years tending.