Today we’d like to introduce you to Welcome Wilson, Sr.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
After graduation from college in 1949, I spent the next 12 years in government service, briefly serving the University of Houston as a staffer, two years in Japan as a Naval Officer during the Korean War, 3 years as the director of civil defense and an assistant to the mayor of the City of Houston and 5 years working for President Dwight Eisenhower and John F Kennedy as the five-state director of civil and defense mobilization, a part of an executive office of the President.
After a life-changing conversation with my wife I resigned and became a real estate developer full time. My first project was Jamaica beach in Galveston, a 1,600 lot real estate development on the west end of Galveston Island. It is now a separate city in Galveston County; I went on to developed Tiki island in Galveston county “1,200 Lots” and 5 other projects on Galveston Island.
In Texas, I developed and sold a total of 8,000 lots. After several years I started also developing apartment projects in Houston and Galveston in the 1960s. There are 5,500 Marriot hotels in the world today. When there were 5 Marriott hotels in the world, I developed number six here in Houston by the Astrodome; I bought a couple more hotels as well. I went on to develop retail centers and 3 downtown office buildings.
Twenty-one years ago, almost by accident, we got into the single tenant industrial business. We liked it so much we have stopped doing all other kinds of development.
Today we own 4 million square feet of manufacturing and industrial space in 87 locations in Texas; its value is approximately $450 Million. Along the way, I have been the chairman and principal shareholder of a bank and a Savings Loan Association as well as Chairman of the Board of an American Stock Exchange company.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
There has only been one bump in the road, in the late 1960’s I was planning to take my company public and at the assistance of the underwriters I bought a lot of raw lands to prove to the market that I had plenty of inventory.
The Dow Jones dropped 40% in 5 weeks, and my public stock issue was canceled, and I was stuck with the debt on all of that land, I survived.
Please tell us about Welcome Group.
The Welcome Group, LLC is owned by Trusts for my 5 children. My son Welcome Jr. is the CEO (67 years old,) and my son Craig is the Chief Operating Officer. Currently, we have a $24 million facility under construction in metropolitan Houston for a German company.
Our company will be the landlord, and the German company is the tenant. It’s a manufacturing facility and the average wage of the employees that will work there is over $100,000 dollars a year.
It is so slow to expand by construction that we have started an acquisition program to buy completed projects that have a long-term left on their leases. Our portfolio includes 19 such facilities in the metropolitan areas of Texas. Our plan is to grow the portfolio to the total value exceeds $1 billion.
The family also has an interest in a major construction company in Houston, Kingdom Dalton Wilson; it does about 75 million dollars’ worth of construction each year. Our specialty is complicated construction, and our customers love us. We do a lot of business with companies from Germany.
What’s your favorite memory from childhood?
I grew up in the great depression in Corpus Christi, Texas and as a teenager in Brownsville, Texas during World War II, my entire memory from my childhood is filled with great events. The great depression was very hard on adults, but we kids had a blast. I’m sure it was hard on the adults, but we lived in a rooming house with all of our cousins. It was wonderful.
At age 15,16 and 17 I was a newscaster and a disk jockey on the local radio station in Brownsville, Texas. Anybody that was 17 and a half was gone to the army. I was a senior in high school at 15 and was sophomore in junior college at 17.
Contact Info:
- Email: WWilsonSr@welcomegroup.com
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