On April 22, 2026, our SERVSIG Community lost an early service research scholar who helped build SERVSIG.
Steve Grove
June 1950 – April 2026
Steve was a postdoctoral student at Oklahoma State University when Ray and Steve met in 1982. They began doing service research together when Steve introduced Ray to a sociology topic he learned in his Sociology PhD – Dramaturgy. That conversation launched them into decades of doing service theater research. Such work exemplified Steve’s talents as a gifted and creative writer and services marketing scholar.
When Ray started SERVSIG in 1993, Steve was an essential SERVSIG volunteer. He became SERVSIG’s fourth Chair and ninth Chair. In those early years, Steve personified SERVSIG’s goals of being open, flexible, and fun. SERVSIG was the first AMA SIG, and with Steve’s enthusiastic help, SERVSIG threw the best parties at AMA Conferences.
Those who knew Steve best often remarked about his sense of humor. One of the most public examples was when he co-chaired the 2001 AMA Summer Educators Conference with Greg Marshall, and they entered the conference luncheon wearing space helmets as the movie theme of “2001: A Space Odyssey” played. Even Shelby Hunt thought it was funny!
Perhaps the greatest example of Steve’s humor was as a ringleader in the clandestine SIG – BeerSIG.
BeerSIG was started by Steve Grove, Mike Dorsch, Les Carlson, and Ray Fisk. We decided that the AMA needed to not take itself so seriously. We were able to get BeerSIG on the AMA Summer Conference program in 2002 for a session titled “BeerSIG Comes Out of the Closet.” Humorous presentations on “What BeerSIG Means to Me” were shared. That first session was packed with people, and the post-conference feedback on the session was so good that we were asked to repeat it at the next AMA summer conference, but we decided to hold BeerSIG sessions on even years.
When we tried to get on the AMA summer program in 2004, we were rejected, so we created our own session called “BeerSIG: Banned in Boston.”
Mt. Beermore was introduced in that session with a photo of the four BeerSIG founders: Steve Grove, Mike Dorsch, Ray Fisk, and Les Carlson.
BeerSIG held one more summer conference session in 2006 titled “Building Community and Strengthening the Marketing Discipline: BeerSIG Goes Legit,” which introduced the Journal of Beer Marketing.
Later, with Charlie Hofacker’s help, we shared news about BeerSIG with ELMAR messages on April 1, 2008 and 2009:
https://www.ama.org/listings/2008/04/01/beersig-now-an-official-ama-sig/
https://www.ama.org/listings/2009/04/01/beersig-banned/
https://www.ama.org/listings/2009/04/01/beersig-response/
It is difficult to say goodbye to a friend with whom we shared so much laughter and drank so much beer together!
Cheers Steve!
Thanks for the memories and thanks for being such a wonderful friend!
Ray Fisk and Les Carlson
