In Memoriam: Robert C. Williams, Co-founder of James River Corp.

Robert C. Williams, co-founder of James River Paper Co., and a TAPPI member since 1956 (appointed a TAPPI Fellow in 1988), died this past month at the age of 86. Williams served as president and COO of James River for 20 years and then as chairman, president, and CEO until his retirement in 1996.

Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, on Jan. 24, 1930, Williams, a contributor to the TAPPI Foundation, was named donor of the Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermaking in the Paper Tricentennial Building at Georgia Tech. He was inducted into the Paper Industry International Hall of Fame in 1998. 

To form James River Corp., Williams and a paper industry colleague Brenton S. Halsey in 1969 engineered a $1.5 million leveraged buyout of the money-losing Interstate Bag Co. in Richmond, Va., a Walden, N.Y., subsidiary of Ethyl Corp. Williams succeeded Halsey as chairman and CEO of James River, retiring in 1996. 

Williams and Halsey made creative use of leveraged financing for most of the more than 50 acquisitions that led to James River’s phenomenal growth to become (for a short period), the largest paper company in the world. Most of James River’s acquisitions, especially in the 1970s and early 1980s, consisted of poorly performing or nonstrategic operations for their previous owners; often, they were older facilities that were deemed noncompetitive. 

James River became widely known for its ability to turn around poorly performing assets. For each acquisition, a plan was developed to turn the to-be-acquired assets into profitable operations. The partners were using a technique now known as "organizational reengineering" long before the term became popular in the business press.

Williams and Halsey felt strongly that all employees should have an opportunity to benefit from James River’s success and that a feeling of ownership could be a strong motivator. Thus, they implemented a stock purchase plan for all employees; a healthy company matching contribution was included, and 75% of all salaried and hourly employees would participate. Their stock option program was extended to levels of management that had never before been considered. In addition, a unique profit-sharing plan for all salaried and many hourly-unionized employees was based on both the company’s success and individual and division contributions to that success. 

James River’s growth through acquisitions included the pulp and paper assets of Crown Zellerbach from Sir James Goldsmith around 1985, making it the world’s largest paper company, until IP bought Hammermill a few years later.

In 1983, Williams was presented the Distinguished Alumni Award, Xavier University; and the Distinguished Alumni Award, University of Cincinnati, in 1984. In 1985, he received the Paper Industry Management Association (PIMA) Man of the Year Award.

"Bob was a very creative individual, always full of new ideas. He was a very outgoing person," Halsey said. "I originally hired him into Ethyl Corp. as director of research, and we were working together at Ethyl when this (James River) opportunity arose. It was very logical to do this together. It certainly was considered in the industry to be an aggressive move. It was risky, but we both were very familiar with operations and market and thought we could improve it and make it profitable quickly," said Halsey, who retired in 1992.

Williams and Halsey began to shift their business emphasis from commodity kraft paper and boards to automotive air filters, which sold for four times as much per ton as kraft, Halsey said. The company generated revenues of $6 million in its first year. The company then began to acquire factories whose old and slow machines were unsuited for commodity production and converted them to produce specialty products. 

James River Corp. went public in 1973, and by 1980 was producing thousands of specialty products, ranging from green confetti for Easter baskets to sophisticated filters for jet fuel. However, management began moving its focus away from specialty products, which became a minor part of production. By the late 1980s, James River had become one of the largest manufacturers of paper towels, bathroom tissue, and the like, Halsey said.

In 1984, the company had 23 other mills, 21,000 employees, and $2.2 billion in sales. Two years later, it ranked 153rd in Fortune magazine’s April survey, employing 35,000, 75% of whom owned stock in the company. Annual sales in 1990 were about $7 billion.

"We were known in the industry for doing things a little differently," Halsey said. "We believed strongly in employee ownership and participation. We were strong believers in ethical behavior, which we believed benefited a company instead of hurt it. That was an important part of our operation."

Williams’ survivors include his wife, Barbara D. Williams; a son, Robert C. Williams III; and a "second daughter," Donnie Walker.