The seven-word pickup Line!

Floyd and Barbara Hughes started Hughes Oilfield Transportation, LLC, in 2000 on 11 days’ notice, when their former employer suddenly decided to retire. Their own relationship began almost as abruptly, 16 years earlier. Both the marriage and the company have stood the test of time and of adversity. The story begins when Barbara, recently divorced, arrived after work at a Midland bar, accompanying an also recently divorced coworker who was hoping to see a man she was interested in. Meanwhile, outside the bar, Floyd was talking to the parking lot attendant, whom he had befriended across numerous trips to the establishment. A friend of Floyd’s emerged from the bar and reported that that Floyd’s ex-wife was inside with “the tallest blonde I’ve ever seen in my life. I don’t know who she is.” His interest piqued, Floyd strode into the bar to see this wonder of nature. As he did, Barbara’s friend saw him and exclaimed, “O my! That’s my ex-husband!” To which Barbara made her own exclamation regarding Floyd, allowing as how was “good looking.” Her friend replied, “Then YOU take care of him!” Taking the friend at her word, Barbara agreed to dance with Floyd, and the whirlwind romance had begun. As curtain began to fall on the magical night, Floyd and the two ladies were on the parking lot talking. Finally ready to leave, Floyd recalls looking at Barbara and using what he called his “pickup line: You going with her or with me?” Barbara made her choice and 43 years later she’s still going places with Floyd. Floyd and Barbara saw the other lady a couple of years ago, at which time she told Barbara, with a laugh, “I didn’t mean take THAT good of care of him!” The longevity of their relationship has been the linchpin in the stability of the company. Since their marriage they have just about always worked together. “If we couldn’t work together, it would be horrible,” says Barbara. “We had to be able to meld together in order to do this.”

She always traveled with him on long haul driving to keep him awake. They would return, both exhausted, and Barbara would lie down to rest while Floyd immediately began arranging another run. “I’d want to kill him,” she said, “but that was the drive that was behind him.” It’s also the drive that keeps the company going to this day, even in a downturn and after Floyd’s recent health-related retirement. It’s not just blood family that matters at Hughes Oilfield Transportation. There is also “adopted” family, which is every bit as important as blood kin. Learn about the time that family almost included a convicted murderer and how they accommodated an employee who listed his height at “five feet, 24 inches,” in the next issue of Oil and Gas The Industry.