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Mark Cuban among 4 Dallas-Fort Worth tycoons inducted into Texas Business Hall of Fame

Mark Cuban's been making things happen his whole life.

Photo courtesy of Dallas Mavericks

Mark Cuban can add another trophy to his case. He and three other Dallas-Fort Worth business tycoons — John Goff, Morton Meyerson, and Randall Stephenson — were inducted into the Texas Business Hall of Fame recently, honored during a dinner at the Hilton Anatole in Dallas.

Also inducted were Austin billionaire John Paul DeJoria, who built his fortune through hair care products and high-end tequila, and Houston investment manager Gerald Smith.

A little more about the new hall of famers:

Dallas billionaire Mark Cuban, of course, is owner of the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, as well as chairman and CEO of AXS TV and one of the investors on ABC’s Shark Tank.

"Since the age of 12, Mark has been a natural businessman. Selling garbage bags door to door, the seed was planted early on for what would eventually become long-term success," his hall of fame bio says.

His latest initiative is Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company, a new venture designed to disrupt big pharma and keep the cost of prescription drugs down.

Dallas private investor Morton Meyerson — recognized most notably as the namesake of the Meyerson Symphony Center — is former chairman and CEO of Plano-based EDS and former chief technology officer at GM. He is currently chair of 2M Companies, a family office he established in 1983, and of The Morton H. Meyerson Family Foundation.

Fort Worth private investor John Goff was co-founder, vice chairman, and CEO of Crescent Real Estate, which Morgan Stanley bought in 2007 for $6.5 billion. Two years later, he bought back the company in partnership with Barclays Capital. Today, Goff is chairman of Crescent Real Estate as well as Houston-based Contango Oil & Gas. He owns The Ritz-Carlton hotel in Dallas and Fort Worth-based spa company Canyon Ranch.

Dallas executive Randall Stephenson is former chairman and CEO of Dallas-based tech, media, and telecom giant AT&T.

"As Chairman and CEO, Randall led AT&T’s transformation aligned with two major trends: First, that consumers will continue to spend more time viewing premium content where they want, when they want and how they want. And second, that businesses and consumers alike will continue to demand more connectivity, bandwidth, mobility and software-based entertainment," his hall of fame bio says.

Houston investment manager Gerald Smith is chairman and CEO of Smith Graham & Co., an investment management firm. He’s also a board member of New York Life Insurance and the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, and chairman of the Texas Southern University Foundation.

Austin hair care guru John Paul DeJoria and hairstylist Paul Mitchell, in 1980, transformed a partially borrowed $700 into Beverly Hills, California-based John Paul Mitchell Systems, which today sells the largest privately owned line of salon hair care products. In 1989, DeJoria co-founded Patrón, the first ultra-premium tequila. Patrón, now the world’s No. 1 ultra-premium tequila, was sold to Bacardi in 2018 for $5.1 billion.

“John Paul DeJoria’s rags-to-riches biography exemplifies the American dream. Once homeless, he has struggled against the odds to achieve success, launching multiple global enterprises while always supporting his motto, ‘Success unshared is failure,’” his bio says.

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Reduce, Reuse, Relisten

McKinney record store joins creative effort to give old vinyl a new life

Photo by Eric Krull on Unsplash

A new program is trying to keep old vinyl out of landfills.

North Texas vinyl collectors going through the disappointment of discovering a damaged record in their collection can at least avoid sending it to the landfill. A new initiative is turning 11 independent record stores across the United States, including Red Zeppelin Records in McKinney, into vinyl take-back points for potential recycling.

The pilot is a collaboration among the record stores, Warner Music Group (WMG), and Virterras Materials, a recycling technology business that specializes in "challenging" materials like plastics and rubber. It will run from "the end of June through September," a press release says.

All customers have to do is drop off damaged records — any kind or condition is accepted.

The program is still in an exploratory phase; the partners don't know the best way to organize the collection yet, and they are vague about what the records might become. The release says the goal is "to better understand how damaged or unwanted records can be collected, consolidated, and directed toward potential material recovery pathways."

Funding comes from a grant from the Vinyl Institute.

The partners will gather information about participation rates, material quality, the work it takes to move and process the records, and the different possible outputs after recycling. The release notes that vinyl records have become more popular over the past decade, but that industry-wide information about disposal is lagging.

This May, WMG, GZ Media, and Abbey Road Studios completed a manufacturing study that confirmed that it is possible to turn unsold and obsolete records into new pressings with audio quality that is high enough for commercial sale. The take-back pilot continues pulling that thread.

Launching the pilot at different stores around the U.S. — those in "major music markets," the release says — serves to diversify the communities getting involved, whether it's locals with specific preferences or fans of different kinds of music.

Two other stores in Texas are participating: County Line Records in Keller and Antone's Record Shop in Austin.

Red Zeppelin Records is a locally owned record store located at 206 E. Louisiana St. in McKinney. It's open 11 am-6 pm Monday-Thursday, 10 am-8 pm Friday-Saturday, and 12-5 pm Sunday.

"Independent record stores have long served as gathering places for music fans and stewards of music culture," said Warner Music Group senior director of ESG Madeleine Smith in the release. "The pilot brings together retailers, recovery partners, and music fans to explore an important question: what would it take to create practical pathways for recovering unplayable or damaged vinyl records? It’s a vital first step in understanding what’s possible."

Participating stores include:

County Line Records (Keller, TX)
Red Zeppelin Records (McKinney, TX)
Antone’s Record Shop (Austin, TX)
Amoeba Hollywood (Los Angeles, CA)
Criminal Records (Atlanta, GA)
Easy Street Records (Seattle, WA)
Home Rule Records (Washington D.C.)
Rough Trade NYC (New York City, NY)
Spin Me Round (Easton, PA)
Reckless Records (Chicago, IL)
Sweat Records (Miami, FL)

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