How Did Rockefeller Become Successful

John D. Rockefeller, America’s first billionaire, founded one of history’s most illustrious and dominating companies in the Standard Oil Company. There are few who will dispute the success of Rockefeller’s tenure as a businessman, much less his latter years a philanthropist, giving away what would be billions of US dollars converted into today’s currency (Kumar, 2012). Even as a young man, the relentless Rockefeller was “already recognized as one of Cleveland’s outstanding young merchants”, being described as “honest, reliable, and with a shrewd sense of commodity markets” (Morris, 2005, p. 17). These traits would prove to be useful, as the founder of the Standard Oil Company would take on numerous encounters with some of the most influential businessmen of his time. Rockefeller’s swift and ambitious strategies towards vertical integration, efficiency, forming partnerships and his efforts to expedite growth in his businesses were extremely effective in creating his success in such a nascent and wasteful industry such as oil. These efforts highlight Rockefeller’s obsessive nature, his discreet operations, and his confidence, which would all help create his successes in one of the purest monopolies in history.

Some refineries could even be set up with a mere start-up cost of $10,000 (Poole). Understanding this, Rockefeller had to act very quickly to find ways to expedite growth in his company. He would choose to expand his business in several different ways. One key difference between the Clarks and Rockefeller was that the Clarks were not very prominent on borrowing money, while Rockefeller was certain of his course. He made a commitment to the industry and borrowed heavily while putting profits into investing more in his company. These decisions were made without hesitation and in 1866, “Excelsior Oil had total sales of $1.2 million” which made his investment look very small (Morris, p.