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As the new director of marketing, industrial chemicals, for Ozark Fluorine Specialties, John R. “Jack” Sheets ’70 is responsible for expanding sales of fluorine chemicals in industrial applications. He also manages sales of grease products in the United States and Europe for Lithchem International.
Ozark produces high quality inorganic fluorine specialty chemicals, including fluorides for dentifrice applications, pharmaceutical intermediates, catalysts, and fine chemicals. Lithchem International, parent company of Ozark, manufactures lithium-based products for batteries and lubricants.
Before joining Ozark, Sheets was sales manager for lithium products at SQM North America Corporation and international sales manager at Cyprus Foote Mineral Company. A chemical engineering graduate with an M.B.A. from Furman University, he has been in chemical sales throughout his career.
“I enjoyed what we did in my chemical engineering classes, but I didn’t see myself doing that kind of thing every day,” says Sheets. “Fortunately, Allied Chemical offered me a job in their sales department. They said it was easier to teach sales to a technically oriented person rather than to teach chemical engineering to a salesperson.”
Sheets recalls that he didn’t want to tell Professor Zbigniew Jastruzebski, then head of chemical engineering, that he had accepted a sales job. “I just told him I’d be working for Allied Chemical,” he says. “But I’ve prospered. He’d be proud.”
John R. “Jack” Sheets ’70