"Gabriel Gomez runs on practical, apolitical experience; In a life of seizing opportunity, he reaches for one more" by Stephanie Ebbert | Globe Staff, April 22, 2013
The biography of Senate candidate Gabriel E. Gomez reads as though it might have been compiled by a team of Republican consultants trying to craft the perfect candidate.
Harvard Business School degree. Latino heritage. Military service. It’s all there.
In an age in which all politics is personal, Gomez is running a campaign unusually focused on biography. Although the 47-year-old Republican often seems hesitant and uncertain on the stump, voters are inspired by his personal story — the son of Colombian immigrants who became a Navy pilot and a SEAL, then a private equity investor who coached youth baseball in Cohasset.
His GOP Senate rivals in next week’s primary, state Representative Daniel B. Winslow and Michael J. Sullivan, offer more familiar narratives, They are both lawyers who spent years working in various branches of government.
“I’m exactly what the American dream is all about,” Gomez, of Cohasset, said in a debate on WRKO earlier this month. “And the reason I’m running is I want everybody to have the same chance I had when I was a kid.”
Gabriel Eduardo Gomez was born in Los Angeles to Colombian immigrants, but he was not a kid who came from nothing.
His father had been educated in the United States — first at the University of Pittsburgh, later at Stanford University, where his employer had sent him for a master’s degree.
On the campaign trail, Gomez says that he learned to speak English only when he went to school. By that time though, his father was vice president of exports for the world’s largest dealer of hops, traveling the world while his mother stayed home with the boys.
The eldest of Julio and Gloria Gomez’s three sons grew up comfortably in Washington state in a town where, as he put it, “we were a typical middle-class family, except that our name was Gomez.” Everyone but the youngest son grew up to be a Republican. Everyone in the family played tennis.
In high school, Gabriel and his brothers were athletic and competitive, waking up at 4:30 a.m. to practice tennis before school, recalled his brother Julio Gomez Jr., who is 19 months his junior. Gabriel got the best grades and in high school would have friends over for math meetings, said Julio, now a pilot for American Airlines. The third brother, Carlos, is a tour guide....
No offense, but I'm not interested in his family.
His military experience proved alluring again in 2001, when he was recruited to work in Boston for Summit Partners, a private equity firm, again by someone impressed with his boldness.
“I was intrigued that he took the kind of risk that he did,’’ in switching from pilot to a SEAL, said Joseph Trustey, a managing director involved in hiring Gomez. “We make investments in people who take risks.”
After three years at Summit, Gomez went to work at Advent International, another private equity firm. It was lucrative work: Tax data provided by his campaign show that Gomez earned $8.5 million over five years at Advent, from 2007 to 2011.
But for all his financial success, during his nine years at Advent, Gomez never made partner. His biography lists a handful of companies he worked with, but in most cases he served on their boards after they were bought or sold by Advent. He wasn’t actively involved in acquiring or selling the investment, which is generally how people measure their success in the field of private equity.
Advent listed one deal in which it said Gomez helped lead the investment: Synventive Molding Solutions in Peabody, which the firm bought in 2005 and sold last summer for $335 million.
Asked about any other deals he had worked on, Gomez cited Lululemon Athletica Inc., the popular yoga-wear company based in Vancouver. Advent led a $93 million investment in the company in 2005. Advent and another firm made about seven times their money after Lululemon went public in 2007....
Related:
"Lululemon late last month pulled its Luon see-through pants from store shelves because the fabric was too sheer. On Wednesday the company said after evaluating its production issues, it found the problem stemmed from incomplete testing protocols combined with a style change in the pants pattern. Lululemon hired a new team, including senior-level positions in quality, raw materials, and production, to look into the problem and oversee production of the Luon pants, which cost $72 to $98. Luon pants are one of the retailer’s product staples and account for about 17 percent of all women’s pants in its stores. The company is offering customers full refunds or exchanges. Lululemon did not say when it expects Luon pants to be back on shelves."
What is that, some kind of joke?
Also see:
See-through pants problem causes Lululemon recall
Lululemon yoga pants recall reveals Lulu rage
Are you seeing through this guy?
Tom Stemberg, the founder of Staples and a partner at Highland Capital Partners, which also invested in Lululemon, said he is supporting Gomez after checking him out....
After 11 years spent at two of Boston’s top private equity firms, Gomez is clearly well-liked, referred to familiarly as “Gabe.” But beyond the walls of Advent International and Summit Partners, he has remained relatively unknown. When he started seeking fund-raising support from prominent Republican contributors this spring, he had to introduce himself to private equity executives at TA Associates, a Boston firm whose senior partners have been major Republican contributors in the past.
Likewise, Gomez kept a fairly low profile in the community of Cohasset, the South Shore seaside town where he and his family own a $2.1 million home facing the historic town common.
In Cohasset, one of the rare Massachusetts communities where Republicans outnumber Democrats, Gomez was discovered politically in 2003 by Polly Logan, the so-called “grand dame of Massachusetts Republican politics” who had long groomed promising candidates....
--more--"
What was he doing in Peru?
Related:
Senate Election Special: Going With Gomez?
Nope.
Special Election For Senate Stinks
Yup.
Also see: Endorsement: Well-rounded pro Winslow is GOP’s best choice for Senate
No wonder the Globe took it easy on his wealth.
NEXT DAY UPDATE:
"The three Republicans seeking the nomination, private equity investor Gabriel E. Gomez, former US Attorney Michael J. Sullivan, and state Representative Daniel B. Winslow have all signaled they will adhere to civility in the closing days of the campaign. Voters in both parties are scheduled to pick the nominees on April 30, with the general election slated for June 25."
