IPT Energy: Boot Campaign Supporter of the Month for July!
As part of his remarks made in Scotland in 1908, Sir Winston Churchill said, “What is the use of living, if it be not to strive for noble causes and to make this muddled world a better place for those who will live in it after we are gone?” ~winstonchurchill.org
After twenty years of making a living by helping build the company he, and his friend founded—Integrated Petroleum Technologies, Inc.—Todd Poulson is now able to make his life’s work, give back today, and long into the future for the causes he holds most dear.
Based in Golden, Colorado, Integrated Petroleum Technologies (IPT) is an industry-leading, independent petroleum engineering services team specializing in the integration of modern well completion, hydraulic fracture stimulation and reservoir engineering technologies. Todd’s best friend, Billy Aud founded the company in 1991. In 1994, Poulson became an employee. In 1998, he became part owner of the company. Twenty years later, Todd now serves as IPT’s president, running all of its daily operations.
Needless to say, Poulson has been pretty busy over the last two decades steering the company in a successful direction. So, it would be easy to assume that he wouldn’t have much more time for anything else. But, one quickly discovers, Todd isn’t an ordinary businessman who is all consumed with just business. As a matter of fact, the seasoned entrepreneur has always had a strong affinity for the military. His father served in Korea and like many Americans, he too had family members who served in Vietnam. As a young man, Poulson also dreamed of his own military career and enrolled in ROTC. Later, he received a congressional nomination from the state of Missouri and was accepted to attend the prestigious United States Military Academy at West Point. While circumstances didn’t allow him to attend, his fondness for the military remained near and dear.
It wouldn’t be until decades later, that his love for the military would have a chance to serve itself out. Moved by a radio show he was listening to one day, which was shedding light on Battlefield of the Mind; a documentary that addresses the circumstances of homeless veterans and those suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); Poulson pledged some money and the rest is history, as they say. Shortly thereafter, because of Boot Campaign’s involvement at a screening for the documentary, he became acquainted with our mission. After that, a phone call with Boot Girl Sherri turned him onto BC’s efforts and it wasn’t long thereafter that he quickly geared up, got his boots on, and joined the Boot Girls on their quest to give back.
Poulson admits that once he spoke with Sherri and realized they both had the same sort of mindset, and the same alma mater (OSU, Cowboys), it was a fairly easy decision to offer his support. But ultimately, it was the shared passion for our men and women in uniform that solidified Poulson’s, Aud’s, and IPT’s commitment to give back by giving to Boot Campaign whenever and however possible—a support that continues more than a year later.
“These are people who walk the walk, when they talk it,” Poulson, expressed. “I’ve never had a conversation with [a Boot Girl], where they’ve ever talked about an ‘I’ or a ‘me.’ I don’t know how they do it. I run a company and I am swamped. I know that they all have lives that they have to deal with, but they do this more out of passion than anything else, and I can commend them wholeheartedly. What they’re doing is one of the greatest things I’ve ever seen. I just can’t [understand] why people don’t do it more, so I’ve got to support them any way I can,” he explained.
Today, that “like-mindedness,” as Todd refers to it, has made helping Boot Campaign’s efforts all the more important in furthering the cause. And yet, while he’s very impressed and appreciative that others have gotten their boots on, and celebrity supporters have backed Boot Campaign’s efforts, Poulson would be even more awe-struck if something else happened. “I would like to see more common people get their boots on,” he said. “I would be happier walking down the street, seeing everybody wearing combat boots in support of our troops.”
Boot Campaign would like to see that too. Maybe, one day.
