How This Kid Built The Biggest Oil Company In The World!

[Music] I'm going well on shell shell shell oh what a day I'm on my way I can be sure of shell I'm going well I'm going sh you can be sure of Marcus Samuel turned his father's London Business into one of the most important companies in the history of the oil industry but the path wasn't easy after striking gold and finding the right part partnership Samuel's business was on the brink of failure after a bitter decade long rivalry but ingenious engineering sponsorship and a deep involvement in both world wars ensured it would emerge as one of the top five oil companies on the planet even today this is the story of shell name of this new Gasoline Shell super regular designed to give your car better protection against engine knock than the average or ordinary regular you may never settle for ordinary regular again chapter 1 traveling abroad Marcus Samuel was born into a successful London Business family his father who had the same name owned M Samuel and Co a thriving import export Enterprise with a shop in Hound snitch that sold merchandise Sailors had collected from the Far East and was known for a popular item in particular small boxes decorated with painted seashells apart from the obvious perks of his wealth which afforded him an education in Britain Brussels and Paris Marcus was exposed to a world not many British had access to at the time throughout Marcus's youth he was able to travel to the Far East visiting cam the Philippines China and Japan where his father's merchandise originated a Upon returning he and his brother Samuel took over the business and immediately began branching out to new products like rice and commodities they found trading partners in Japan who were in the process of industrializing the country but there was a problem for the Japanese a lack of oil Marcus and Samuel sensed a huge business opportunity far beyond their father's relatively humble operation even with their Asian connections though they were going to need a powerful partner to enter the oil business that's where a deal was struck with the rosch child family who owned oil reserves in the caucuses the Rothchilds were looking for a way to transport especially to the East Asian market and to solve their problem Marcus Samuel proposed moving it through the Suez Canal Samuel's company became the exclusive seller of kerosene east of the Suez Canal but to transport huge loads of oil there would need to be a more modern better equipped vehicle available and Marcus Samuel was the man of the the moment this would be the turning point in his business revolutionizing the nature of the oil industry in the process chapter 2 a revolution in oil at the time oil was carried in barrels apart from taking up large spaces constant leaking was an ongoing issue in Samuel's most significant move he created a fleet of steam ships specially made for the task he even designed the tankers himself oil could be directly pumped into them at ports and on the return leg and these tankers were fitted out with various Goods making oil distribution exponentially cheaper and more efficient the first of these named MX was the first oil tanker to ever pass through the Suez Canal a watershed moment in global trade and that was only the beginning over the next few years almost 70 oil tanker voyages were made through the route apart from exploring the value of the company Marcus and Samuel's Innovation completely changed how oil would be transported now much bigger volumes could be transported with a much lower risk of leaks or damages during travel at the time their major competitor was Standard Oil which used distinctive blue cans of kerosene wanting to make their brand more visible the brothers decided to paint their cans a bright red color Instead This was successful and by the close of the 19th century their keros was the biggest part of their business in 1897 the company was incorporated under the name shell transport and trading company which he named in honor of the two brothers father who made his career as an antique dealer and was known as the shell Merchant the logo began as a realistic shell design and was slowly simplified over the years the company's first order of business was to open refinery in what is now Borneo but the late 19th century was a competitive time time for oil chapter 3 the oil Wars Just 4 years after changing the company's name a Dutch rival emerged on the scene popping up in North somatra named The Royal Dutch petroleum company and working in tandem with the Dutch government which had taken over the East Indies these were the two Titans of the region competing for an oil Monopoly elsewhere shell were fighting for their lives after securing an exclusive distribution deal in Texas after oil was found but less than a year later overproduction in the area caused the price to plummet causing huge losses for Shell around half of their oil tankers were not being used and these problems were exacerbated by Shell's regional conflict with Royal Dutch Shell's trade war with Royal Dutch lasted almost a decade with both losing out to their growing competitor Standard Oil company which was rapidly growing and in the early 1900s controlled 91% of oil refinement in the United States recognizing their intertwined Futures and that neither would survive continued fighting shell and the Royal Dutch petroleum company reached an agreement to merge in 1907 they would continue to legally operate as two separate companies with Royal Dutch taking 60% of control to Shell's 40% but their deal unified two of the biggest players in the market and consolid at the East Asia Market the Royal Dutch component of the company was responsible for manufacturing and production while the shellside was responsible for transportation storage and Logistics Marcus was appointed as director of Alliance Marine Assurance company but never again would head the company by then Marcus had been appointed as an alderman of the city of London and later mayor of London overseeing the creation of the port of London Authority what survived was was the name he and his brother had come up with the two unified businesses sometimes referred to as the group was more often than not shortened simply to Shell Shell soon after bought the Rothschild's Oil Company bito expanding their operations to include Mexico Venezuela the United States Romania Russian Empire while still remaining in the East Indies which still made up the bulk of their portfolio but as a global technological Revolution was kicking into gear and the battle for oil Supremacy was going to be waged in marketing just as much as it was over land chapter 4 pushing Ingenuity the early 20th century was full of mechanical Innovation and to keep their product front and center shell sponsored and supplied petrol to aircraft Automobiles and other vehicles the 1907 perking to Paris motorally was won by a vehicle using shell Spirit motor oil and 2 years later Louis blero became the first pilot to cross the English Channel from Le barok to Dover a distance of 22 Mi using Shell's fuel shell also supplied fuel for the first historic transatlantic flight shell had rebranded with the now iconic red and yellow colors a reformed and simplified pcon shaped logo which was now appearing on cars motorcycles postcards and L bills all over the world these experiments with automobiles signal the shift to the mass adoption of automobiles and the increasing available commercial aircraft which drove a massive demand for oil especially after the invention of the jet engine shell was perfectly positioned to capitalize on this opening up the company for years of expansion giving them an advantage was the breakup of standard oil into 43 different companies after us lawmakers deemed the company in violation of antitrust legislation Standard Oil had become a monopoly two of the companies that emerged were Exxon and mobile later merging again but some economists have estimated that the company would have been worth around one trillion by 2000 if it hadn't been broken up standard oil's loss was Shell's gain between 1897 and 1927 the value of the company skyrocketed from 1.8 million to $26 million which would be the equivalent of a 66 to $456 million jump today with success came new problems though and would soon lead to the seizure of valuable equipment they were about to be entangled in a global conflict that would both make and nearly break the company chapter 4 the business of war with the outbreak of World War I shell quickly became a a key partner for the Allied Forces their office in London was solely for the war in particular specialized aviation fuel was being produced in the United States with the help of newly founded shell chemicals which innovated new refinements methods the partnership with the British paved the way for more expansion directly after World War I but it wasn't all smooth sailing when Germany invaded Romania in 1916 it wiped out 177% of Shell's world wide production this didn't slow down the Relentless March of the company though which continued to expand and by 1930 was the world's biggest oil company producing on10th of global crude oil this fuel source was vital for the allies during the war so much so that Shell's tankers were taken control of by the British government classified as essential for the war effort in 1927 between the two Wars Marcus Samuel now given the title of VIs account with commemorations led by the London Business and political Community his contributions to both the private and public spheres were enormous and what he had spawned had reached Heights that even he never could have imagined to break in the 1930s shell finished their Global headquarters in London named the shell Mech house by 1935 shell was already employing 180,000 people around the world after the war when its tankers were returned turn to private hands and facing the huge task of restructuring the company from the ruins of World War II shell set out on even more ambitious projects exploration programs in Africa South America Borneo and the Niger Delta were carried out with their newest addition to the fleet the super tanker over the next few decades shell was on The Cutting Edge of new research and Technology like improved drilling techniques and 3D seismic technology but some of this research was was kept hidden from the public chapter 5 heating up as an oil company shell has continuously been at the center of fears about environmental degradation pollution and climate change and during the 1980s nobody knew more about the impact of fossil fuels than oil Titans like shell and Exxon agreeing with an early report of internal research made by Exxon shell sponsored research in 19 88 which concluded that CO2 levels would double as early as 2030 and that the sea level would rise approximately 1 M and even more terrifyingly that the melting of the West Antarctic ice sheet would lead up to a 6 meter rise in sea levels experts at the company warned that large-scale ecosystem and agricultural destruction would follow and that sources of fresh water would be eliminated with changes in temperature and precipitation levels researchers wrote that policy option should be considered because the effects were potentially the greatest in human history despite having more evidence than any other organization though shell publicly denied any correlation between carbon emissions and climate change instead they sought to discredit any assertions made about the damaging nature of their business and the details of that confidential report were not released until 2018 in the 21st century shell began marketing itself as a border of climate change science and action advocating for the Paris climate agreement and a shift towards green energy the company now describes itself as an active player in transforming the global Energy System transitioning to cleaner and lower carbon Alternatives and making pledges to reduce fossil fuel dependency but talking is one thing actions are another shell still spends tens of millions of dollars each year lobbying against climate policies to keep the the company as profitable as possible chapter 6 now and the future Shell's projected emissions between 2018 and 2030 are on track to account for 1.6% of the global carbon budget and in the previous decade only 1% of its long-term Investments went towards energy like wind and solar going into the future shell plans to grow its fossil gas business by 20% while a study found that almost $4 billion of shell spending in 2019 conflicted with the International Energy agency's guidelines this has led to many critics accusing shell of greenwashing their corporate image and history by deceptively presenting themselves as environmentally friendly and it goes against what shell has been telling their own shareholders chief executive of the company while saan told investors that the company would abandon plans to cut oil production and that it would be irresponsible responsible to reduce output right now in response advocacy group Greenpeace installed a sign outside Shell's London office that read quote our profit your loss this year shell posted second quarter profits of $5 billion and last year was more than twice that the entire earnings for 2022 were almost $40 billion a company once started by Marcus Samuel along with his brother over 100 years ago has grown into the fifth largest oil company on the planet last year alone shell produced 692 million barrels of oil over 1,800 per day and now makes up almost 12% of global market share and the Shell logo which began as a tribute to a shell Merchant father is now synonymous with oil and one of the most recognizable on the planet

Channel: Business Stories

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Length: 15min 54sec (954 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 14 2023