Auto mogul avoided spotlight
Billionaire helped shift course of American market
Thomas Friedkin wasn’t the first to sell Americans on the virtues of Toyota’s compact cars at a time when big domestic models ran rampant. But nearly 50 years ago, he did set in motion a supply chain that would fuel their ubiquity in the Gulf Coast region, forever shifting the course of the American auto market and changing the lives of local commuters with better gas mileage and smaller engines.
Friedkin, a billionaire auto magnate with a penchant for flying, stunting and big-game hunting, died March 14 at 81.
He founded Gulf States Toyota, one of the world’s largest independent vehicle distributors, in Houston in 1969 and propelled it to become the city’s largest private company.
Friedkin, who rarely appeared in the press during the course of his career, generally avoided the
spotlight save for his regular appearance on Forbes’ annual list of America’s billionaires. More than a week had passed before the public learned he died, first reported by the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday.
His family declined to comment about his death and has not disclosed details about his services. Gulf States Toyota issued a brief statement acknowledging him as an industry pioneer and a devoted leader with an enduring legacy.
Friedkin is survived by his wife, Susan, and four children. His son, Dan, has succeeded him as chairman and CEO of the company and amassed a net worth of $3.6 billion, Forbes reported this month.
Friedkin was born Aug. 19, 1935, in San Diego. He spent much of his 20s as a pilot with Pacific Southwest Airlines, a California carrier that his father founded in 1949 with flights priced as low as $5.65.
The company expanded quickly, adding planes and routes, and Friedkin continued to fly even when he became a top shareholder and board member.
It was a fun time to be in the airline business, said George Shortley, PSA’s former chief financial officer, recalling Friedkin’s dedication to the company and his passengers.
“He was reported to be an absolutely excellent pilot,” Shortley said.
Friedkin stopped flying for the airline around the time he moved to Houston and signed an agreement with Toyota Motor Sales USA, a nascent division of the Japanese automaker. As a distributor, Gulf States Toyota would buy vehicles wholesale from the manufacturer and deliver them to Toyota retailers.
Fueled by oil crises
At the outset, few likely would have predicted the meteoric rise of Gulf States Toyota, which now supplies hundreds of thousands of vehicles to dealerships in Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Oklahoma.
Japanese automakers, in the 1960s, had only just begun to rival General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, the “Big Three” domestic manufacturers that dominated the market after World War II.
“It took foresight for people to invest in Toyota and Nissan,” said automotive writer and historian Ken Gross. “They were smart in taking that gamble.”
Toyota first found success in the U.S. with its 1965 Corona, an automatic model with air conditioning, then a rare luxury even in the sweltering South. It kept up the momentum with the 1968 Corolla, a boxy and colorful option for drivers on a budget.
By 1972, Toyota had sold a million vehicles and was well on its way to becoming the top imported brand in the U.S. Gulf States Toyota had sold 5,000 cars and trucks to 14 dealerships by the end of that year.
Then, the oil crisis hit when OPEC halted exports in 1973. Gas prices soared, tanks ran dry, and fuel economy, hardly an issue among American consumers in the golden years of the 1960s, suddenly entered the carbuying lexicon.
“For decent gas mileage, you turned to Japan,” Gross said. “And once you had one, you didn’t go back.”
Prices surged again in 1979, when Iran slashed oil production in the wake of the revolution that eventually established the country as a republic. Gulf States Toyota had sold nearly 66,000 vehicles by the end of that year.
Toyota models, at that point, had become the most popular imported vehicles in the U.S. John McGovern, former senior vice president of Toyota Motor Sales, said that Friedkin and his company were integral to the brand’s success in the Gulf Coast region.
“They were definitely the forerunners for our doing business in the southwest U.S.,” he said.
Amid the surge in business, Friedkin leveraged his aviation skills to perform as a stunt pilot and actor in Hollywood cop thrillers and Westerns.
He appeared in several films, including “The Gauntlet,” “Pale Rider” and “The Rookie,” films Clint Eastwood directed around the time he challenged a robber to go ahead and make his day in the famous “Sudden Impact.”
Meanwhile, Gulf States Toyota continued to boom, and in 1989, Friedkin, an avid hunter and conservationist, established Tanzania Game Tracker Safaris. It’s now one of several adventure companies that help support the Friedkin Conservation Fund, which protects 6.1 million acres of land in Tanzania.
Barbara Crown, editorin-chief of the Hunting Report, said those companies have for years pioneered more sustainable wildlife hunting and preservation tactics in Tanzania. There, the conservation fund has invested millions of dollars in anti-poaching and education efforts.
“He had a passion for conservation,” Crown said. “He was fighting against poaching at every turn.”
Business hall of famer
In 1998, Gulf States Toyota outsold even Toyota Motor Sales USA in import market share. A year later, Friedkin was inducted into the Texas Business Hall of Fame, alongside former President George H.W. Bush and other luminaries.
He eventually passed responsibility for the company to his son, telling Forbes in 2001, “I am not a greedy person, and I don’t have to make the last dollar there ever was.”
The magazine in 2013 valued his net worth at $1.7 billion.
Gulf States Toyota, under Dan Friedkin, has continued to grow, reporting $8.4 billion in revenue in 2015.
A company spokewoman said dealers were informed of the founder’s death this week.
Vic Vaughan, a Toyota dealer in the San Antonio area who formerly operated in Houston, said he regarded Friedkin as an incredible man during the few times they met.
The company, he added, fostered the growth of Toyota throughout the region and invested in the infrastructure needed to bring the vehicles to consumers.
“They’re a first-class organization, highly regarded,” he said. “For me, it’s been a wonderful relationship.”