History

1981

The Company is founded by Wayne Kinsey in Odessa, Texas to provide custom dry and liquid chemical blending.

1983

The Company adds chemical distribution to its repertoire of services by acquiring The Weatherby Company, a regional (Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma) chemical distribution company.

1987

The Company forms West Texas Drum, Inc. to provide high quality reconditioned drums to itself and others. This subsidiary grew into the premier Permian Basin supplier of reconditioned containers.

1987

The Company changes its name to Benchmark Research & Technology, Inc. and acquires Zirtech, Inc., a Gainesville, Florida manufacturer of zirconium complexes whose assets are moved to Midland, Texas and used by the Company to develop and manufacture aluminum, titanium, zirconium and boron cross-linkers used in hydraulic fracturing fluids, paper manufacturing and explosives.

1991

The Company files its first patent application, and subsequently secures a patent on a method of preparing a boron cross-linking solution for gelling aqueous treating fluids containing hydratable polymers for treating oil and gas reservoirs.

1991

The Company forms StrataProp, Inc., the first company to build a facility with state-of-the-art process controls and devices specifically designed for the manufacture of unique, non-pneumatically handled resin coated proppants for oil field fracturing fluids.

1992

The Company acquires the assets of the aluminum acetate business unit of Niacet Corporation, allowing the Company to become more fundamental in the development and manufacture of its aluminum based cross-linkers.

1994

After capturing approximately one-third of its target market within 18 months, the Company sold StrataProp, Inc., as well as West Texas Drum Company in order to focus on its primary chemical products and services business.

1996

The company is receives the Texas Governor's Award for Environmental Excellence. Selected from a pool of over 350 applicants, Benchmark's green intiatives exhibit the company's great care for the envrionment through preservation and waste reduction.

1997

The Company forms a strategic alliance with DuPont Specialty Chemicals and secures a joint product development and marketing agreement with GenCorp Specialty Polymers (now Omnova Solutions, Inc.), allowing the Company to bring products and technologies developed by some of the world's largest chemical companies to the oil field pumping services industry.

1998

The Company acquires the Cement Technology Division of Dresser Industries, allowing it to offer the same level of product development, technical support and lab testing for oil well cements and additives that it offers for well stimulation fluids and components. The Company also establishes its value-added SlurryService^® and SlurryWatch^® programs, making oilfield polymers available in field-ready slurries more suitable to field operations than the difficult-to-handle powders provided by its competitors.

2001

The Company is issued its first well cementing patent relating to the use of modified specialty latex in well cement, to aid in the control of gas migration during well cementing.

2002

The Company reorganizes along product and service lines, forming Benchmark Polymer Products, L.P. to acquire the operating assets of Polypro, Inc., a Dalton, Georgia manufacturer of guar polymers with applications in the oil field, textiles, cosmetics, and industrial chemicals (explosives and firefighting) industries, allowing the Company to become fully integrated in the development, manufacture and delivery of high quality polymer powders and slurries. In the reorganization, the Company’s chemical manufacturing operations are focused in Benchmark Energy Products, L.P., and its warehousing and distribution activities are focused in Benchmark Distribution Services, L.P.

2003

The Company opens a warehouse and distribution facility in Bruni, Texas, to bring its products and services closer to its oilfield services customers in South Texas.

2003

The Company opens a warehouse and distribution facility in Patterson, Louisiana, to bring its products and services closer to its oilfield services customers on the Louisiana Gulf Coast.

2004

The Company opens a second laboratory in Houston, Texas to focus on fundamental research and product development.

2004

The Company acquires and opens a 90,000 square foot warehouse and distribution facility in Lovelady, Texas, to bring its products and services closer to its oilfield services customers in East Texas.

2004

The Company acquires and opens an 80,000 square foot warehouse and distribution facility in Grand Junction, Colorado to bring its products and services closer to its oilfield services customers in the Rocky Mountains.

2005

The Company opens a 30,000 square foot warehouse and distribution facility in Millwood, West Virginia to bring its products and services closer to its oilfield services customers in the Appalachian Mountains.

2005

The Company opens a warehousing and distribution facility in Rock Springs, Wyoming, and expands the facility to include oilfield slurry manufacturing, bringing that key component of fracturing fluids even closer to its oilfield services customers in the Rocky Mountains.

2005

The Company opens a 30,000 square foot warehouse and distribution facility in Duncan, Oklahoma to bring its products and services closer to its oilfield services customers in the Mid-Continent.

2006

The Company sells its polymer manufacturing facility in Dalton, Georgia, to Aqualon Company and enters into a strategic partnership for the development and long-term supply of oilfield polymer powders.