Texaco
Texaco was the name of an American oil company that was merged into Chevron Corporation in 2001. It began as the Texas Fuel Company, founded in 1901 in Beaumont, Texas by Joseph S. Cullinan and Arnold Schlaet upon discovery of oil at Spindletop. For many years, Texaco was the only company selling gasoline in all 50 states, but this is no longer true. Its logo features a white star in a red circle, leading to the long-running advertising jingles "You can trust your car to the man who wears the star." and "Star of the American Road."
Texaco is associated with the Havoline brand of motor oil and other automotive products. It is one of the sponsors of NASCAR.
It has also been associated with the Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts, as well as such entertainment legends as Bob Hope and Milton Berle (many of their shows were originally sponsored by Texaco).
Texaco's patented gasoline additive is called CleanSystem3.
Last CEO: Peter I. Bijur
Major events
- Late 1950s – Bought Paragon Oil, a major fuel oil distribution company in the northeastern United States.
- 1984 – Bought Getty Oil (including Tidewater Petroleum), the Getty name and stations in the Northeastern United States was sold to Power Test and is still today.
- 1985 – On November 19 Pennzoil won a US$10.53 billion verdict from Texaco in the largest civil verdict in US history (Texaco established a signed contract to buy Getty Oil after Pennzoil entered into an unsigned, yet still binding, buyout contract with Getty).
- 1998 – Formed joint venture Equilon with Royal Dutch/Shell, combining their Western and Midwestern U.S. refining and marketing.
- 1998 – Formed joint venture Motiva with Royal Dutch/Shell and Saudi Aramco, a joint venture combining their Eastern and Gulf Coast U.S. refining and marketing businesses.
- 2001 – Shell purchased Texaco's share of the joint ventures to permit Texaco to merge with Chevron. Shell may exclusively use the Texaco brand in the U.S. through 2004, and non-exclusively through 2006.
- 2001 – Chevron Corporation merges with Texaco.
- July 2004 – Chevron regains non-exclusive rights to the Texaco brand name.