Art Fuccillo- Guided by a Legend- He Lived Out His Lifelong Dreams (#88)

Art Fuccillo & John Coe Art and Cill Fuccillo Art at 8 yrs. old Bio Arthur (Art) Fuccillo is the Executive Vice President of Development for Lerner Enterprises, perhaps the most valuable private real estate company in the Washington, DC region. Art has been with Lerner Enterprises since 1981 and began his career there as General Counsel. He expanded his role to lead development efforts for all retail properties and subsequently coordinated construction of Nationals Park and the West Palm Beach, Florida Spring Training facility for the Washington Nationals Baseball Team. Show Notes Origins & Family Grew up in Patchogue, Long Island, NY (6:45) Italian immigrant family Grandparents lived next door (7:10) Grandfather moved from Italy in 1909 and met his Grandmother and married when he was 28 and she was 18 yrs. old (8:00) Married in the depression Grandmother asked a neighbor about a 275 gallon gas tank in his yard and bought it and added it to a truck (9:15) She was a “go getter” and recruited her daughter and her husband built a “fuel oil” business (10:00) Fuccillo Oil built up over 80 years when it was sold (10:30) He grew up working in the family business working fuel oil business (11:00) During the summer he harvested clams during high school and college (11:45) Hard working and hands on enterprise growing up gave him the work ethic he used the rest of his live (12:30) “Learned to think like an owner” (13:00) Explained the process of delivering fuel and his customer relationships (13:30) Everyone in the Fuccillo family was an entrepreneur, except him…he learned that you should consider working almost around the clock and “hands on” (14:45) Work 24/7 Reference to Titan by Ron Chernow about John D. Rockefeller (16:00) Story about his Father attempting to keep their company going in the “oil crisis” in 1973. (16:30) Ladder into a large old storage tank to clean it out…shoveling dust and dirt out of these tanks (17:15) “Don’t be afraid to get your hands dirty” (18:20) He was an athlete, yet his parents didn’t recognize it, since their focus was their business (19:30) Never called anyone to fix anything…always you had to learn how to fix what needed to be fixed…he is very “hands on” (20:30) Story about his Father’s letters that he wrote at 18 years old when he worked on a ship in the Merchant Marines reading them to him now at 96 yrs. old (23:45) Mother’s family was in the oil...