Jody Sherman, a longtime web entrepreneur most recently known as the co-founder and CEO of healthy kids products site Ecomom, has passed away. He was 47.
Details on the cause of death have not been confirmed. The news was relayed earlier today to close friends, family, and business associates, and has spread this evening from a Facebook post written on his profile today by his wife Kerri, which reads:
“This is Jody’s final post, and it isn’t coming from Jody. He’s gone. This is not a bit of his wonderful twisted humor. This is sad and real and forever. He didn’t say goodbye to anyone because he knew he couldn’t. So I’m saying it for him. If you are reading this it’s because you are connected to Jody in some way. He loved you, respected you, admired you, valued your presence in his life, or felt some combination of any or all of these things. And he would want each and every one of you to know and understand exactly that. Please post anything you have to say to or about Jody here.”
Sherman, who grew up in Miami, Florida, joined the tech world in Silicon Valley in the late 1980s after a five-year-long career in the US Navy. He later moved to the Los Angeles area where he became a leading face of the “Silicon Beach” scene and co-founded the e-commerce site Ecomom. In recent years, he relocated his own family along with the Ecomom company to Las Vegas as part of the burgeoning Downtown project there.
Sherman has become well known and loved by many who worked with him over the years for many things: His sharp mind, his vibrant humor, the breadth and depth of his travels and experiences (and the great stories that resulted from them), his willingness to share his knowledge about business and life with others, and of course his love of surfing.
In an August 2011 interview with TheFirstWire, Sherman was asked what he’d like to be remembered for. He answered:
“I’d like to be remembered for being helpful to others. I’m not sure exactly what that means but it feels good whenever I know that my advice or my time spent with someone was of benefit to him or her. I don’t know that you have to impact huge numbers of people at once – although I am trying to do that with Ecomom. Personally, if I can be of real use to even one person at a time, I feel like I’ve been lucky enough in my life that I’m obligated to pay that forward.”
He will certainly be missed.