Ali Sattler:
Bristol Farms Senior Category Manager, Produce
Life Happens When You’re
Making Other Plans
By Tim Linden
Though a devastating knee injury is hardly
a comfortable blueprint for the launch of
a new career, it clearly played a big role in
leading Ali Sattler to the world of fresh
produce.
“I was going to play college ball, go to the Olympics
and then launch my professional basketball career
overseas,” said Sattler, speaking of the career
path that she had in mind when she was a high school
senior.
This was no far-fetched dream for the 6-foot,
3-inch center who played high school ball at East
Bakersfield High and received a scholarship to continue
her basketball prowess at Biola University in
Southern California. “In my senior year (2007-08), I
led the nation in blocked shots,” she said. That fact is
backed up by Maxpreps.com, the bible of high school
sports statistics. That season, Ali did lead the nation
by recording 220 blocks, which averages out to an astounding
8.8 blocks per game.
She did enroll at Biola for the 2008-9 school year
and season, but a horrific knee injury ended her career
before it got going. “I had no Plan B,” she recalls.
But Ali loved the theater and loved kids, so she
considered a theater career in stage management. She
soon transferred to San Diego State University to
complete her college degree. While in college, she
also went through a management leadership program
with Apple Inc., which put her on a career path
in that direction. “But I asked myself is that really
what I want to do?”
In answering that question, the Bakersfield native
who grew up in a produce family started thinking
about her youth and what gave her satisfaction
outside of basketball. “I loved grocery shopping,” she
8 | Winter 2021/22
Ali Sattler
quipped. “I didn’t know you could go on a family vacation
without visiting grocery stores.”
In those days Ali was Ali Linsky, daughter of
produce industry veteran Todd Linsky, who spent 27
years at Grimmway Farms before starting his own
consulting company a half-dozen years ago. And why
wouldn’t she follow in her father’s footsteps? “He
was always there for me. He was my assistant basketball
coach in high school and practiced with me every
day growing up. I could not have succeeded without
him. A lot of who I am is because of him. My dad is
my hero!”
In relaying Todd’s influence on her life, Ali quotes
another basketball great, the late North Carolina
State coach Jimmy Valvano and one of his memora-