Early lesson: Making money not a ‘trick’
PermuTrade CEO AJ Jama values hard work; firm may exceed $200M by 2022.
AJ Jama is president and CEO of PermuTrade, a fully integrated energy and construction dry bulk commodities marketing and logistics firm with a strong global footprint.
The company, headquartered in West Palm Beach, has satellite offices in Ottawa, Canada, and Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
Founded in 1999, it trades and distributes commodities such as cement, coal and limestone. The company changed its name to PermuTrade from Elite Global Import Export LLC in 2015 to increase the chances of showing up in Google searches.
“PermuTrade caters to the spot market with the necessary experience to help its clients learn how to protect themselves from exposure to price movements and to better deal with material surpluses and shortfalls,” Jama said.
“The company trades directly with end users and producers which provides them with greater control over their stock levels and prices of the raw materials they use,” Jama said. “Amid intense competition, PermuTrade has embarked on efforts to instill cost consciousness while streamlining trading efforts to locate more efficient opportunities.”
The company passed $1 million in gross sales in its first year of business, and projects gross sales to exceed $200 million by 2022, Jama said.
“Our biggest obstacle to reach this goal is getting funding to buy the raw materials we need to resell. We have no problem finding qualified buyers to buy our raw materials,” Jama said. Name: AJ Jama
Age :38
Hometown: Born in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, now lives in West Palm Beach
Education: Engineering degree from Algonquin College, a bachelor’s degree in applied science and an MBA from Bellevue University.
Family: Wife and daughter
First paying job and what you learned from it: My first paying job was at the age of 15 shoveling snow from driveways in Canada with my friends. At a young age, I learned that life is all about cause and effect. In other words, my output in life is directly in proportion to the level of effort I put into what I do. For example, the more doors I knocked on, the higher my probability of making a sale to shovel snow. I learned that making money is not a trick, it’s about hard work and the right attitude.
First break in the business: My first break in business was in 2006 when I got laid off from my third job due to company downsizing. I was a great employee, hard worker, loyal, smart and much more but still I got laid off for reasons out of my control. For the first time in my life, my theory “my output in life is directly in proportion to the level of effort I put into what I do” was in question. I was missing one part of the formula to be successful. So, I flew to the UAE to take some time to reflect on what happened to me.
One day, I went to an industrial trade show and noticed that the Middle East imported over $5 billion of raw materials in 2006 alone. I also noticed that a big portion of that was in lumber. I started to think about Canada and how it has a lot of lumber. So I spent several weeks researching the lumber market. Three months after my layoff, I was back in Canada. I cashed in my RRSP savings — Canadian equivalent of 401(k)s — and made my first lumber wholesale purchase and sale. The rest was history.
How your business has changed: My business has changed for the better operating out of Palm Beach County. Better port infrastructure speeds up our loading and unloading operations, saving us time and money. There are better banks with knowledge regarding international trade, strong community groups to network work with and close proximity to a lot of large supply partners such as Titan America and Argos USA.
Best business book you ever read: “The Richest Man in Babylon,” by George Samuel Clason.
Best piece of business advice you
Margaret May Damen has been elected president of the Planned Giving Council of Palm Beach County for the 2017-2018 year. She previously served as vice president for programs. Damen is a Leadership Palm Beach County alumna and is an Executive Women of the Palm Beaches Women in Leadership Award honoree. For the past five years, she has also been the facilitator of the West Palm Beach Chartered Advisor in Philanthropy study group honoree. Damen received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Boston University and is a speaker and workshop leader on women’s empowerment and generational issues in legacy gift planning.
Divine Blalock Martin & Sellari LLC announced that Mary Elias has joined the firm’s West Palm Beach office to develop and grow the forensic accounting department. She has more than 30 years of experience in accounting. Elias comes with a diverse set of accounting skills, most recently as owner of Divorce Financial Analysis, where she analyzed and evaluated divorce settlements, tax implications of dividing property, options for dividing marital property, and the awarding of spousal support and child support. She is a certified divorce financial analyst, a certified fraud examiner and certified management accountant.