RosaMary Foundation

RosaMary Foundation

The RosaMary Foundation anchors itself in a family bottling fortune that shaped New Orleans commerce for much of the 20th century. Founded in 1939 by Alfred Bird Freeman, the former chairman of Louisiana Coca-Cola Bottling Co., the foundation has stayed under family governance for five generations. Chairman Andrew B. Wisdom, a great-grandson of the founder, leads a board that includes descendant Louis M. Freeman, Jr. and Luis C. Zervigon, who also serves as president of the related Keller Family Foundation. The foundation prioritizes education, human services, arts, community development, and government oversight across the Greater New Orleans area. The endowment, internally estimated at $52M (Altss estimate), pursues a multi-asset investment program designed to support a perpetual grantmaking mandate. Fund commitments span venture capital, buyout, distressed debt, growth equity, natural resources, and secondaries, with stage coverage from seed to expansion. The portfolio includes positions in the TIFF Multi-Asset Fund and TIFF Short-Term Fund, both advised out of Charlottesville, Virginia, and a donor-advised fund housed at the Greater New Orleans Foundation. This structure blends institutional fund-of-funds access with local philanthropic co-investment vehicles that directly serve the foundation’s geographic mission. The investment committee operates with a lean governance footprint — core decision-making sits with the board, where Wisdom and Zervigon, both principals at CAPTRUST, bring registered investment advisor infrastructure to the foundation’s oversight. No separate investment staff or additional offices are disclosed. Philanthropic activity is intertwined with allied family vehicles, including the Mary Freeman Wisdom Foundation and the Keller Family Foundation, and the foundation endows the RosaMary Foundation Curator of Decorative Arts position at the New Orleans Museum of Art. Family member Linda Gray maintains ties to peer networks through active membership in the Young Presidents' Organization and Chief Executive Organization. Structurally, RosaMary operates as a place-based endowment inseparable from its founding city and family. Unlike foundations that evolve into broad institutional allocators, it layers a diversified, TIFF-anchored investment pool beneath a grantmaking apparatus concentrated almost entirely on Greater New Orleans — a posture that preserves the donor’s original geographic intent while importing external manager selection discipline.