Before I get into my review of the book and my assessment of Chuck Feeney, I want to give a shout out to the Boston Public Library. Without them I wouldn’t have been able to read this book. 

 

Like most self made men, Chuck Feeney has led an interesting life.  He and his business partner, Robert Miller, founded what would become the dominant Duty Free shopping enterprise in the world, Duty Free Shoppers (DFS).  Chuck, who grew up of modest means in

Elizabeth, NJ, didn’t set off to make billions, but the man was a natural businessman.  He put himself through Cornell through the G.I. Bill and by selling sandwiches to the student body.   He started what became DFS in

Europe when he found himself in

Europe after college, and spotted a unique opportunity to sell duty free products to American service men stationed in

Europe.  From

Europe, Feeney eventually found his way to

Hawaii and the expanding purses of Japanese tourists.  Chuck Feeney made his billions off the gift etiquette-minded Japanese salary men and office ladies.  Yet after becoming a billionaire, he decided the give it all away and avoid the high life. Chuck Feeney famously still flies economy. 

The early years of Chuck Feeney’s business are covered in frantic detail, but Conor O’Clery concentrates most of his effort on telling how Feeney began his enterprise of giving his money away.   Feeney’s foundation, the Atlantic Foundation, has not behaved as a standard foundation would.   Previous to 1997, the Foundation was able to maintain the strictest veil of secrecy.  His giving was all done clandestinely and with the strictest anonymity on Feeney’s behalf.  In addition, the Foundation, because it’s based in Bermuda, was able to operate in a way that no

U.S. based non-profit would be able to.  Chuck Feeney operated the foundation in the early days as a business more than a philanthropic organization.  It owned and operated businesses in an effort to increase the assets to eventually give away. 

U.S. based foundations are bound by law to give away at least 5% of their assets every year. 

 

The success of Chuck Feeney is very much a story about being the right person at the right place at the right time with an emphasis on the person.   I sometimes think back to my days in college and wonder why I didn’t start Yahoo or one of the many smaller internet portals that have come and gone (not without making the founders fabulously rich).  I was in the right place at the right time, but I wasn’t the right person.  The right person recognizes opportunity and takes the required risk.  Chuck Feeney showed his appetite for risk when he first set off for Europe with no job and no prospects.  All he knew was that post war

Europe was a place of opportunity for young bright American like himself.

The Billionaire Who Wasn’t, is officially sanctioned by Chuck Feeney and his foundation, Atlantic Philanthropies.  As a result it’s not surprising that the man is canonized by the author, Conor O’Clery.  O’Clery does not completely ignore what are some dark spots in the life of Chuck Feeney, but he does fail to add enough color.   There are paragraphs that beg more questions, but instead of answering or attempting to answer those questions, O’Clery quickly moves on.  Even the best of men have failings, and strained relationships.  Feeney is certainly no exception.