2024 ACG ASA April 23rd Lunch in S.A.

Marsha McCombs Shields is CEO/Managing Partner of McCombs Enterprises, Dealer Principal of McCombs Automotive, President of the McCombs Foundation, Owner and Manager of McCombs Family Partners, Ltd., and former CEO of Koontz-McCombs Construction, Ltd.

Active in McCombs Automotive various dealerships, Marsha trained and worked in each dealership department.  Her involvement in the establishment of new dealerships has included overseeing site selection, facility design, management hiring, factory training, and oversight of all operations.  In 2003, early in her tenure as dealer principal, Red McCombs Ford won the prestigious President’s Award.  Since that time, the Ford dealership and several other dealerships have earned multiple President’s Awards and other national recognitions. 

Marsha was named president of the McCombs Foundation in 2003.  She oversees the selection and distribution of donations to as many as 300 charitable organizations in the San Antonio and Texas area. The Foundation has invested more than $140M in Texas non-profits.

As CEO of McCombs Enterprises, in addition to the automotive business, she oversees an extensive array of investments, and participates in daily management of several companies. Marsha also is active in the day-to-day operations of McCombs Energy and oversees various long- and short-term investments and an extensive array real estate development properties.  Marsha served for 6 years on the board of a publicly traded international company.

She graduated from Duke University in 1976 and did post-graduate work in 1976, 1980 and 2002 in Education and Business at Trinity University in San Antonio and at The McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin.

Since 2005, Marsha has been actively involved with fourteen inner-city schools in a program that enhances parental involvement in the schools and the community.  The long-term goals of this United Way-community leader-school partnership are higher graduation rates, higher test scores, more family participation with the schools, community building, and parental education, training, and economic development.

In 2015, Marsha was selected as one of the 100 Leading Women in the Automotive Industry by Automotive News.  Also, Marsha received the Trefoil Award from the Girl Scouts of Southwest Texas.

Marsha and John H. Shields have been married for 45 years, and have two children and four grandchildren.