In October, my father-in-law (Wayne Smith) passed away. I was fortunate to join my wife, mother-in-law, and a handful of other family members at the graveside memorial on October 12. Later in the month, we convened a service at the church.
At the graveside memorial, his Pastor (Jim Medley) mentioned that he was reading Terry Looper’s Sacred Pace and believed that book was a good description for how Wayne lived. I picked up the book and strongly agree with Pastor Medley’s assessment.
James Watt, former U.S. Secretary of Interior, wrote the Foreword to the book and described author and friend, Terry Looper. As Watt put it, “At the leading of the Lord, and at great risk after a terrifying personal crisis, he started a niche energy-commodities marketing company with a determination to do two things differently: he would hold to a forty-hour workweek, and he would emphasize customer service over numbers by setting no sales goals. Both approaches are still in place today, thirty years later.”
That company, Texon, has been one of Houston’s top five private revenue producers, an industry leader in customer retention, and was selected as a “best place to work” by the Houston Chronicle.
Looper is a devoted Christian, mentor, and family man, who gives away 50 percent of everything he makes. As of the book’s publication in 2019, for twenty-nine years running, the company has earned a profit amid often-erratic economic turns, carried no asset debt, and has never been sued by any of its customers, partners, vendors, or employees. In such a volatile industry, these are remarkable results.
Click here to learn more about Looper’s Sacred Pace
