Seizing opportunity when it comes knocking
Opportunity presents itself in various ways — through the right connections, the right attitude, the right preparation. As Brooklyn Dodgers executive Branch Rickey once said, “Luck is the residue of design.”
In Texas Inc. this week, we spend time with two very different people in two very different aspects of the energy industry. Yet while much separates Randy Velarde, chief executive of Plaza Group, and Billy Williams, an audit partner at KPMG, they were both ready when opportunity knocked.
For Velarde, whose business now generates about $250 million in annual sales by buying and selling so-called “aromatics,” chemical byproducts of the refining process, the opportunity came when his thenemployer was spinning off a line of business.
Texaco was about to sell most of its chemicals business to Huntsman Corp., and Velarde approached the refiner about taking over the sales and marketing of the parts of the business not included in the deal. Two years later, he struck an exclusive distribution agreement with Texaco. Other agreements followed.
“It wasn’t an opportunity of a lifetime. It was an opportunity of 10 lifetimes,” Velarde said.
Williams’ path was not as straightforward. He grew up poor in Marshall, Texas, and it looked like football was his longshot way out. Then that longshot started looking increasingly attainable.
“I really became good at football in my senior year of high school, and I thought I could make it to the NFL. When I started getting recruiting letters from all these big schools, I started believing I might actually make it to the league,” he said. He was a standout offensive lineman at Sam Houston State University, and pro scouts indeed started paying attention.
Then an injury ended his playing career. “Emotionally, it took a toll on me. I was a four-year starter at Sam Houston, captain of the team, and had NFL scouts looking at me. And then, in my senior year, all that disappeared.”
But with the encouragement of his mother and coach, Williams was prepared. He’d been studying accounting and had had an internship at KPMG, which turned into a job when he finished college.
“It was time to end one career and start a new one.”
Our columnist Chris Tomlinson engages another opportunity, yet unlike Velarde and Williams, whether it is capitalized on is something that is far from certain.
The petroleum industry is on notice that the use of plastics is on the decline and that, coupled with more efficient recycling efforts, threatens to cut into what has been a very lucrative business at a time when automotive fuel consumption is also declining.
The industry, Tomlinson notes, has been given an estimated five-year notice to plan for what appears to be inevitable.
Opportunity is knocking. Someone needs to step up and open the door.
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