Despite dismissing his first job offer from West Pharmaceutical Services in Exton, Donald E. Morel Jr. is finally set to retire from that very pharmaceutical packaging giant after a decade as research director and another decade as chief executive.

“From start to finish, it’s been a wonderful journey with the company,” he said in a recent Philly.com interview that reflected back on his career.

So what caught his attention?

“It looks mundane when you look at a piece of rubber. [But] every day, 100 million pieces of something West makes gets consumed in the markets, whether it’s a syringe, whether it’s a drug package, a diagnostic test, an epi-pen,” he added. “You know that when your family goes into the hospital, odds are that many things that West makes are going to get used to help treat them. When your child goes for a shot, they are using two or three West components. Kids don’t like to get poked with a needle, but everything we do, you think about it being used on your own child. That message resonates with people.”

Read more about Morel’s career, the rigors of being CEO, the latest company developments and his future plans on Philly.com here.

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Top Photo from David Maialetti via Philly.com