Interview with Sam Reeves, a founding partner of Dunavant Enterprises:

Some notes below (these are for personal reference only, any mistakes in transcription are my own):

• On getting his start early: he grew up in rural Georgia. Growing up in a small town had lots of advantages, in part because the competition wasn’t as great as in a big city. From an early age, felt he could accomplish things in sports and school. Was an idyllic childhood – he could go into the woods, go fishing, bicycle riding etc. Got his first job at the age of 9, this was during the time of WW2, around 1943. His father was an entrepreneur who had his own cotton gin. He was paid 10 cents a bag on cotton bagging. Also learnt about investing and stocks from his father. Made 124 dollars in his first summer. First investments were in AT&T and Chrysler. He loved it; once an investor, always an investor!
• On his early career: he graduated from UNC in 1956. Met his wife Betsy while he was in college. Was drafted after college, spent 2 years in the army. Loved his time in the army. Thinks all US citizens should spent at least 6 months in some type of service – you meet people from different cross-sections of society, great bonding experience. After the army, he went to Memphis to learn from Buck Dunavant, who was a friend of his father’s. Worked alongside Buck and his son Billy. In 1960, they went into business together Buck died 6 months later. Billy was 25, he was 23. They were competing with people who were 2-3 generations ahead of them. Billy was a great partner – you want to be with someone dynamic and a person of character. Knew they had to expand, so he moved to California, which was beginning to grow cotton at the time. That also opened up the Asia markets for them; they were one of the first to export globally from the US (2/3 of the business was export, 1/3 was domestic). 
• His advice for people wanting to be an entrepreneur: you have to learn how to create capital and then maintain, retain that capital. Once you lose your capital, they take you off the playing field, no matter how good or smart you are. Nowadays things are a bit easier in terms of access to capital. In his time, you didn’t have interstate banking, only intrastate, so many banks would have limits of 30, 40, 50m that they could lend to one entity. One of the reasons he went to California was so they had access to more banks. So for a private entrepreneur trying to grow rapidly, you need the ability to create capital and source capital.
• He encouraged his daughters to do 3 things when they were growing up, in college etc.: go to DC to see how the political system works, go to Wall Street to see how the money works and live overseas for a period in a non-English speaking country. You need to be citizen of the world. His business went global and worked in emerging markets before people really thought about it. Work for a year or so after school, then if you have a heart’s desire for something, put your own money in it. The risk taker has to be the decision maker. You have to have your own money at risk so you have skin in the game.
• On doing business in China during the Nixon/Kissinger era: at the time, China was still not open to the world. In the late 1970s, Deng came in and started to open things up, later joined the WTO etc. They were one of the first companies doing business in China, initially through Dreyfus and then they began to sell directly from the late 1970s. The road from Beijing airport into the city was 2 lanes. You were seeing China in its embryonic stage. Could see the vitality of the people. The Chinese understood one thing – revolutions are made of shortages of food and fiber. China gave their people economic freedom, but no political freedom. Russia had sort of the opposite when the USSR broke down after the early 1990s, more political freedom but no economic freedom. You can see what happened to those two countries. People want economic freedom. He saw that first hand in his trips to China, you could see what was going to happen. Every time he would go, there would be more development (e.g. hotels, airport, infrastructure). Made him very bullish on mankind.
• On his biggest deal: this was in 1979, still a closed economy in China so they didn’t know what their needs were. Him and his partner took their families and 1-2 friends, pretended they were going as tourists to not give anything away to their competitors. Negotiated with 10-15 guys on the other side, they would ganbei at night etc. By the end of the week, they had finally agreed on everything. No computers in those days – so if you moved 5-6% the buying or selling on a commodity, it had an enormous impact on the price. They had finished the deal for hundreds of thousands of bales (maybe 3-4% of the US crop at the time). Just as they were getting ready to leave, they said would you like to double the order? Their hearts sunk, they knew that meant they wanted to buy volumes and volumes of cotton. If they couldn’t cover what they had already sold, would have a massive loss. His partner Billy asked for 4-5 days, to give them the time to cover and double the order. Everyone stayed in China, he feigned that he was sick and caught the first flight back to the US. Got to San Jose at 7.25 am, market in New York opened at 7.30 am and they bought everything they could buy, knew the price was going up.
• On building the capabilities to scale up quickly: they became the largest cotton merchant in the world over a period of 10 years or so. Key is to find and partner with the right people. They were lucky in China to have a partner like David Hardoon. At the time, the Hardoons, the Sassoons and the Kadoories were 3 prominent Iraqi Jewish business families who came to China via India. Very well connected, allowed them to tap into the best people in each country.
• On failures along the way: in commodities, markets always move in different ways than what you think they might do. You have certain times, like 1975/76 when torrential rains destroyed crops and prices went up sharply. There were several times were worried about survival. One year was so bad that from October to December, he couldn’t keep down any food, all he had to eat was milkshakes and eggs for the protein. Out of that, creates more courage. For young people, you need to be courageous and have some grit. There will be difficult times, but you can get through it. Life pains are inevitable, misery is optional – he has a favorite saying, “it’s just like we like it.” No matter what the situation, it’s just like he likes it. If things are bad, you have got to figure out a way to get out of it.
• On the mentality needed to be successful: each year is another year starting. Whatever happened the last year is already behind you. You have to start afresh and be excited for the year ahead. You try not to make any mistakes early, get a little win, get some profits in and that allows you to take more risks, roll the dice a bit more. You never want to have a losing year. 
• Advice on being a father: His greatest insight, if you have more than one child, is to make sure you spend time with each child individually. He has 4 daughters, and every time he used to travel overseas, he would take one of them with him. This allowed him to spend more time with each of his kids. Relationships are built on shared experiences.
• Advice on learning from friends and being a good friend: all of us want to be valued at the end of the day. He always valued what people were trying to do. Over time, he learnt that there are only a few people in the world that know more than anyone else in their particular discipline. He loves to be with those people. Not looking for anything from them, just want to spend time with them, enjoy their company and learn from them.
• The key to a robust and balanced life: for him, can break life down into 5 aspects – occupation, family & friends, mental, physical and spiritual. You have to connect all of them. He didn’t want to live his life as a layered cake, wants a marble cake, you don’t have time to do all of them separately. We are here to be hosts in the world, not guests.
• On being a good competitor: you have to be prepared and being prepared is hitting a lot of practice balls. Learn how to create capital, have courage and grit. Look forward to life. He likes to tell a story about the golfer José María Olazábal. In April 1999, he and Greg Norman were in the day’s final twosome on Masters Sunday. On the 13 green, Norman makes his shot. José turns around and is looking at the crowd. Sam later asked him what he was doing/thinking? He said he was thinking 2 years ago he was in bed with an injury, watching the masters on television. He never thought he would play again. He said to himself “how fortunate you are to be here in this situation today, even though Norman just made his putt”. He had a love for the game – it wasn’t about whether he was going to win or lose. You play your best when you get in a state of gratitude. By the way, he made his putt too.
• 3 bits of advice to aspiring leaders: have courage, put yourself in a situation where you are valued and find a situation where there is joy. Joy and value are the mother’s milk of life.