Demand for chemicals gives firm banner year
Strong demand for chemicals and a well-positioned portfolio lifted Houston-based Tricon Energy into the Chronicle 100’s top five private companies.
The petrochemical distributor said its revenues doubled last year to $10.2 billion from around $5 billion in 2020. The banner year put Tricon at No. 2 on the Houston Chronicle’s list of the region’s top private companies.
Founded in 1996, Tricon does business in 110 countries, marketing and distributing chemicals and maintaining relationships between chemical manufacturers and consumers.
This year, the company is on track to increase revenues to $16 billion as it benefits from inflated chemical prices, said the company’s CEO Ignacio Torras. The company also has benefited from having its own shipping company, allowing it to control its own logistics as global supply chains suffered from pandemic strain.
Torras said he reinvests 100 percent of the company’s income.
“We’re very committed to continue to grow and to continue to expand the company.”
Houston is “the place to be” to grow and maintain relationships with chemical manufacturers, Torras said, citing the region’s high concentration of chemical makers. Nurturing those relationships helps ensure companies such as Shell, which will soon open a new petrochemical plant north of Pittsburgh, Penn., turn to Tricon to provide a platform for their new product lines.
“Every one of those new business lines is just expanding our portfolio,” Torras said.
Recycled plastics are emerging as an important segment of the industry in which distributors such as Tricon have an important role to play: managing customers’ expectations. Torras said it is difficult to make recycled plastic clear, posing a challenge for customers expecting a transparent container for their products.
“We need to be the translators,” he said.
Demand for plastics that make vehicles lighter and more fuel efficient will only grow as the energy transition accelerates, he said, ensuring the long-term success of the industry.
“Your grandchildren will use much, much less fossil fuels than you use,” he said, “but they will use more chemicals than you use.”