Emilio Miret (1937 – 2018)
A Personal Tribute
As David Louie e-mailed the news, I thought to myself “please, not another heartbreaking obituary, please…and certainly not one with the name Emilio Miret in the title.”
These successive months of grave losses from the “golden age” of the independent agent, as many friends have termed it, have set off a sense of despair in those of us who worked in the agency force and around it in the 70s, 80s and 90s when the sun smiled on the seemingly incessant golf outings, dinners, congresses, conferences, the new technologies, the lobbying battles, the company – agent relations, the associations – so many of them – the mighty leaders and the store front start-ups, and all of those who were personally involved – personally – in the future of a system that we did not know was destined to become vaguely impersonal, overly consolidated and concentrated, technically dominated, lacking in loyalty, and conducted with none of the aplomb that was needed for a more personally interactive structure. If it was an evolving old boys’ club, it was a good one and a pretty happy one. The friendships were far more enduring and meaningful than mere business card flipping and flimsy networking. And then there was the handshake culture. It worked. Sadly we are finding that the great and the small form that era are fulfilling the old maxim, that at the end of the chess game the kings and the pawns all go into the same box.
Among the greats who were at the center of the agency force in New York was Emilio Miret, who helped so many agents and brokers navigate the auto, homeowners and basic markets that he was able to take Empire Insurance in its hey-day to an 800 agency force. He was the spark of enthusiasm at agent meetings and was the promoter who argued, cajoled, beat up underwriters for agents and then took everyone to dinner to keep peace…and do it all over again. Hispanic brokers, Chinese brokers, you name it, got a shot from Emilio Miret and the business and the inner city markets were all the better for it. Here was a true mensch in many languages.
Emilio grew up in a family of eight – with seven sisters, spoiled, as he would recount it, by his parents who raised their family on the Costs del Sol in Spain before moving to Cuba pre Castro in 1953. Jesuit educated, religiously inclined all of his life, he studied law at Havana University but was married to Shirley at 22 and moved with their two sons, Kenneth and Gary to Queens NY. In 1961 he took a job at Empire Mutual, learned the business and was promoted to Assistant Renewal manager underwriting voluntary private passenger auto in New York and New Jersey. In 1974, he became manager of the department.
When Empire was placed in rehab in 1077, Emilio was promoted to production manager with a huge agenda: to undo the dominance of GA’s; to appoint more and diversified brokers, and to go beyond private passenger. He was part of a team led by Milt Kligler, Dick Greenwald, Andy Attivissimo, and many others along the way like Ollie Patrell and Mort Weinstein and Bob Iacona who delivered for Empire. But it was Emilio who energized the company and brought in the submissions and the agency force. He was not a traditionalist in the pejorative sense, but was able to improvise and win for his Company and his colleagues. When Empire emerged from rehabilitation in 1979, it emerged with Emilio as a Vice President and unique in the business as one of the few to serve as a VP with English as a second language. Always a dapper dresser, before the age of the internet, he would call out and drive out to see his agents, leaving the Company’s showy Broadway headquarters at 67th street to go to Westchester – which he considered “upstate.”
He retired in 1997 form Empire but was almost immediately picked up by First Rehab, today’s ShelterPoint Life as regional sales manager.
Finally, after 48 years in insurance in New York, he and Shirley moved to Florida where Emilio died September 24th with his family around him.
Many of the agents I have spoken with could imitate Emilio stating one of his well-known phrases or observations, could remember this or that about his style, his work, his pinky ring, his persistence, his openness to producers and his good, good soul, often well camouflaged under a bright, tough talking veneer needed to make the system work for Empire…and for so many of us. May I note here on a personal level, that when I decided to buy the Insurance Advocate from Manny Levy in August, 1986, after talking it over with my wife and having CIGGNY’s Treasurer, Martin Cowan, act as our attorney, I drove down to 122 Fifth Avenue and talked it over with Emilio Miret in his office and then used the outside phone to call John LaValle in Syracuse to get his “take” on it and be sure I was not crazy to make a go of it. Emilio and John helped me make it happen with their earnest pledges of support…and friendship.
The day after I signed the deal with Manny, Emilio and Dick Greenwald took me to Sal Anthony’s on Irving Place for lunch….and instruction. Emilio never stopped giving it…thankfully.
He will never know how many people he touched. And, ultimately, all for the better.
May God grant Emilio Miret eternal peace.SA
