Phil Troha is Sabine Parish’s Hall of Fame’s Achievement Award recipient. The 2023 Hall of Fame Banquet will be held Tuesday, March 28 at Saint Joesph’s Catholic Church in Zwolle, Louisiana. Doors open at 6 pm and the program begins at 6:30 pm. Tickets are $50.00 a person and can be purchased at The Sabine Parish Tourist and Recreation Commission, Robert Gentry’s office or by calling (318) 2943362. Profits will benefit SWAG of Zwolle and HELP of Sabine.
Phil Troha was born in Magee, Mississippi. Phil moved to Many, Louisiana in the summer after his 7th grade year where he finished out his high school degree at Many High School. Many became his hometown and till this day I still call Many home.
After high school, Phil attended Northwestern State University. In the summer and holidays, he would work with his father as a roughneck. This was his guide to let him know that he did not want to do that for the rest of his life. While in college, Phil’s draft number came up and it was one of the first numbers on the list. So, he joined the U.S. Air Force in 1968 and after basic training went to Keesler Air Force Base to train in Doppler radar and inertial navigation to work on B-52 bombers and KC 135 tankers. While at Keesler, Phil came back to Many for July 4th and married Carolyn, and after a one-day honeymoon went back to Keesler. A month later, Carolyn took the bus to join him. After only being there a few weeks, Phil and Carolyn experienced Hurricane Camille together.
After one year of tech school, Phil was sent to Barksdale Air Force Base. While there, Phil worked part time for Gibson’s Discount, and after getting out of the military Phil stayed in Shreveport to work with them before moving to work as assistant manager for TG&Y. After Carolyn got out of nursing school, they moved back to Many so that Phil could go back to school. After going back to school for a year, Carolyn’s uncle, who worked with West Brothers in De-Ridder, offered him a job. Thinking this was what he wanted to do, Phil dropped out of school and joined West Brothers. After working in stores as assistant manager for a year, they brought him to DeRidder, Louisiana to be an assistant buyer. After about three years Phil was offered a better job at Howard Brothers in Monroe. From there to Ayr-Way’s in Indianapolis. After only a couple of years, Target bought the company. He was one of three buyers they selected to move to Minneapolis. He became a senior buyer over sporting goods. It did not take but a couple of these winters to find out that Phil needed to get back in the South.
An old colleague of Phil’s was starting up an import company and invited Phil to come and work for him in sales. So, they packed up and moved to Dallas. After two years, one of his sales mentors offered him a partnership to start up a new company with his son and another friend. That was the start of LaPosta, Petty and Troha & Company. Over the years they became one of the largest houseware sales forces in Texas. They have had the company for over 39 years. Phil also started his own company, Parallel Marketing, which is a consulting company for imports in the far east and Europe. He was averaging 4-5 trips a year to China, Vietnam, Philippines, and Indonesia, as well as 2 to 3 trips to Europe each year to source factories and help design product for many retail stores.
Phil is still involved with both companies today. His partners in China have a showroom in Shanghai, and they now have warehouses in three U.S. locations to ship online products. Phil mainly works with retail buying teams to customize Christmas, Fall, Halloween, Easter, and Summer Garden products. They have about 20 designer personnel in offices in Shanghai. They work with almost all major as well as small retail companies across America.
Even though Phil has traveled the world, he still feels so lucky that his family moved to Many, and that he got to spend his high school years at Many High.
Phil always tells people he meets with pride when they ask him where he is from. He says with a smile, “Many, Louisiana; 1530 on the old radio dial, and Go Tigers!”