CAMARILLO : Woman Honored for Her Enterprise

Ten years ago, Ella Williams was scrounging aluminum cans from dumpsters to earn milk money for her children. Today, she’s the president of a Camarillo defense contracting firm that grosses more than $4 million a year.

“My husband left me with two girls, no job skills and a lot of bills,” said Williams, who has been recognized for her rise in the face of adversity.

Williams recently received one of five 1991 Women of Enterprise awards, given for five years by Avon Products. The honor was presented at New York’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.

“I lived in a very poor section of Long Beach growing up,” said Williams, 50, who founded Aegir Systems in 1981. “But I was able to get a loan through a government program and went into business.”

Before that, Williams took odd jobs, including collecting returnable cans.

“I’d turn them in at the grocery store for food money,” she said.

Her company, at 275 Airport Way, provides engineering and computer services for the U. S. Department of Defense and the transportation industry. Some missile tracking systems produced there make their debut at the Pacific Missile Test Range and the Point Mugu Naval Air Station just miles from the plant. Williams said she has about 70 employees.

Starting out in a business dominated by large, male-oriented companies was difficult, Williams said. So she buttered up prospective customers with home-baked bread.

“My mother told me the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach,” Williams said. “Well, it works in business too.”

The awards, given in association with the Small Business Administration, were created to provide a national network of female role models to encourage women business owners, according to a report from Avon.