FWinc.
POWER PLAYER
Chris Powers pulled off his first real estate deal at 18. Now 29, he’s banking heavily on West Fort Worth’s River District
ON-DEMAND IS IN DEMAND
Companies using the Uber model to expand markets and create new business in Fort Worth
DARLENE BOUDREAUX
Executive Director of Tech Fort Worth helping entrepreneurs reach for their dreams
5 M’S MEANS MONEY
Energy men strike rich ground with software for mineral rights owners
Amy & Jay Novacek Texas Land Owners
After a week full of deadlines, meetings and rush hour traffic, welcome to a quiet country morning. It’s just one of the rewards that comes with owning your own piece of rural Texas property. If you’re looking to buy land in Texas, Heritage Land Bank is the lender that can help make it happen. Ready to buy? Talk to a Heritage lender today.
D&M Leasing has been based in Tarrant County for 34 years and is excited to open the new Fort Worth Location, conveniently located at I-30 and Summit.
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With D&M Leasing you can save up to 50% each month over buying a vehicle, and the entire transaction can take place right over the phone.
Best of all, your new or pre-leased vehicle will be delivered to next vehicle can be.
Kelly Strausser President D&M Leasing Fort Worth
50 Powers’ Trip: Chris Powers pulled off his first real estate deal at age 18. Now 29, he’s helping redevelop a forgotten part of West Fort Worth.
42 Uberization of Business: Companies using on-demand technology to expand markets and create new ones.
58 Darlene’s Kids: After 30 years of breaking glass ceilings and launching an Inc. 500 pharma manufacturer, Fort Worth’s Darlene Boudreaux is comfortable helping other entrepreneurs reach for their dreams.
66 5 M’s Means More Money: Fort Worth startup strikes rich ground with software for mineral rights owners.
( BIZZ BUZZ )
11 Bootstrapping a Bootlegger: Entrepreneurs convert their retail store into a wine and beer bar on West Magnolia Avenue.
12 South Main Redo: A developer is changing another piece of the South Main corridor.
12 Comings and Goings: Game On gets ready to open second location in West Fort Worth.
14 Reviving Hemphill: Developers get ready to launch a restoration of a historic apartment building.
16 Face Time: Jodi Tommerdahl, entrepreneur and UT Arlington prof who’s trying to convert her love of language into an app that helps language learners and stroke victims.
18 Staying Informed: Fort Worth’s best places to work for women.
20 Around Town: Images from around Fort Worth.
( EXECUTIVE LIFE & STYLE )
24 Distinctive Style: BFFs Kacey Cargile and Alyson Johnson step out and launch Esther Penn.
26 Off the Clock: Adirondacks provide the backdrop for luxurious getaways.
28 Gadgets: Toys for the desktop.
30 Wine & Dine: Local restaurants increasingly use technology to increase consumer and employee satisfaction.
34 Health & Fitness: Schedulefriendly classes in Fort Worth for perfect work-life balance.
36 Office Space: Enilon, a digital marketing agency, opted for a custom-designed workspace when it moved offices.
( COLUMNS / DEPARTMENTS )
72 EO Spotlight: Entrepreneur and saleswoman Kim Booker moves from telecom, to insurance, restaurants, Tshirts and training.
74 Running Toward the Roar: Failing at business? Either you’re not cut out for it, or you’re due for a win.
78 Analyze This: FW Chamber report. Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce Quarterly Report. Private investment bolsters economic success.
82 Analyze This: Legal and Tax. Employers move to contain costs from government’s updated overtime rules.
84 Analyze This: Commercial real estate. Commercial Real Estate Council reaches out to millennials with mentoring and professional development.
86 Analyze This: Wealth. Twenty million more people have insurance under Obamacare, but the economic impact on individuals, companies, and the marketplace is still taking shape.
88 Analyze This: Insurance. Blue Zones gains momentum with well-being initiative.
90 Management Tips and Best Practices: How best to inspire a shared vision in your workplace?
92 Exceptional Entrepreneurship: Four potential solutions to the problem of getting people on board with your goals.
94 Day in the Life: There’s no way to tell what’s in store when Johnny Campbell, president of Sundance Square, shows up for work. But his day always begins with Scripture.
Calculated Risk
In the mid ‘90s, we were publishing a home improvement magazine called Builder’s Square Home Image. It was not doing great, and Builder’s Square (at that time the third largest home improvement store in the country behind Lowe’s and Home Depot) was having financial issues, so we mutually decided to sever our licensing agreement.
In our final issue, we focused on kitchens and baths and sold three times as many copies on the newsstands. Instead of closing it down, we decided to retain it and changed the name to Signature Kitchens and Baths.
Competitive magazines at the time like behemoths Better Homes and Gardens and House Beautiful sold on the newsstand for $2.95 and contained long editorials (lots of words) with minimal photography.
We flipped that traditional model, incorporated lots of pictures with minimal copy, and increased the price to $4.95. We then threw the dice and printed 100,000 copies (that’s two 18-wheelers filled from top to bottom) and hoped they would sell.
The gamble paid off. We increased the price on the next issue to $6.95 and continued to raise the price, before topping out at $14.99, the same price it is today, 20 years later.
Interestingly, publishing giants Hearst and Meredith now have vertical kitchen and bath magazines priced at $14.95, all because two Fort Worth guys were too naïve to know any better, and were willing to take a very expensive calculated risk.
In our cover story this issue, Chris
Powers, founder and CEO of Fort Capital, talks about risk and says, “some of the best ideas were started by people who were super-naive.”
Many businesses have not seen success because the owner was scared of failure. Scared of being or looking foolish, or scared of taking a risk. Often, the smartest people in the room know that they sometimes have to act on ideas that others might initially perceive as reckless. Chris is one of those people.
I first met Chris in 2010 to discuss his company building our 2011 Fort Worth, Texas magazine Dream Home. He and his former partner, who had primarily been working on smaller projects in the TCU area, had just moved into the high-end spec-home market.
I remember from this first meeting thinking that this guy was so much more business savvy than a kid two years out of college should be.
We awarded the Dream Home build to them, and they sold the house before the touring was complete. Two years later, he built our 2013 Dream Home. Talking to Chris the other day, he told me getting the Dream Home was a “big deal” and that he thought he’d “hit the pinnacle of his career.” If only he could have seen his future at that time.
Since our first meeting, he and his company have become a legitimate big deal, doing $78 million in projects, with $55-$60 million in assets under management.
What most excites the 29-year old Curtis today is his play in the River District, where Fort Capital owns 40 acres, half commercial, half residential and could invest $150 million-$200 million in the next five years. If it works the way he thinks it will, he believes it will change the lifestyles of the west side of Fort Worth. I wouldn’t bet against Powers.
Hal A. Brown owner/publisher
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher. how to contact us For questions or comments, contact Scott Nishimura, executive editor, at 817.560.6178 or via email at snishimura@fwtexas.com.
From the Publisher of Fort Worth, Texas magazine
At Gus Bates Insurance, our clients rely on us to help guide them through the complex world of insurance and investments. But b before
Top Row: Margaret Simmons, Chris L. Stewart, Roland Drechsel-CCIM, Lee M. Owen, John Casburn Bottom Row: Dick Myers, Nathan Vasseur, Gary E. Vasseur-Principal, Jennifer Beale
( BIZZ BUZZ )
What Everyone's Talking About Around the Water Cooler
Bootstrapping a Bootlegger
Tommy and Tammy Brown’s first shot at making a go on West Magnolia didn’t work, so they switched to selling wine and beer instead of home furnishings and gifts.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
There were a few signs that 44 Bootlegger should have been born a bar instead of a specialty retailer of gifts and goods for the home, owners Tommy and Tammy Brown say. One was sales that didn’t take off. Another was that most people who walked in thought it was a bar.
The Browns closed the store on Fort Worth’s West Magnolia Avenue the day after Christmas last year and re-opened as a wine and beer bar during the Near Southside’s Open Streets festival late this spring.
“A guy came in here early on (when the business was a retail store) and said people are going to tell you what you are and who you are,” Tommy Brown, 45, says.
The Browns – Tommy Brown is a longtime shoe rep for Ugg boot and shoe line – had their eye on West Magnolia for a store when they spotted a vacancy in a little strip shopping center with its own parking lot fronting Magnolia – an oddity for the street. “There’s no retail on the street,” Brown says of the couple’s rationale.
Moreover, an independent movie theater was in the rumor mill for the large neighboring lot (that idea faded, and a developer has since purchased the lot and is moving ahead with plans for a mixeduse development).
The available space was a dark, non-air-conditioned, 1,250-square-foot storage unit in a 30-year-old building whose other tenant is Jim’s Lock & Safe.
The Browns moved on it, investing savings of $150,000 to con-
vert the space into a retailer selling his-and-her home furnishings, décor, fine gifts, apparel, accessories, and strong footwear brands like Ugg. They chose the name because Tommy Brown’s mother sold beer and whiskey in the Texas Panhandle, and Tommy was in the boot business. “The 44 gave the store a little bit of mystery,” he says. Maybe too much mystery. The store opened in January 2014, but sales never took off.
During the Arts Goggle festival in 2015, West Magnolia was clogged with patrons. “Half the people opening the door thought we were a bar,” Tommy Brown says. So the couple decided then to convert the store to a bar.
The Browns invested another $60,000, including wine and beer, to convert to a bar. They added plumbing in the kitchen and a refrigerator. The menu features 44 wines and 44 beers, including more than 25 bottles available by the glass. On a street teeming with bars, the response so far has been good, the couple said. “It’s been phenomenal,” Tommy Brown said. “These first few weeks were tricky. We had a $3 day one day.” Says Tammy, 44: “When you walk in a bar, you’re going to order something.”
In October, they plan to add a charcuterie and cheese menu. The bar will call out for food orders today. A favorite nearby restaurant for 44 Bootleggers is Nonna Tata. “A lot of Favor deliveries happen in here,” Tommy Brown says.
44 Bootlegger owners Tommy and Tammy Brown
They’re also thinking of adding a patio in the parking lot, which would mean subtracting one parking space. “That’s definitely in the plans,” Tommy Brown says. They’ve even thought of adding a rooftop deck, which would cost about $50,000, he estimates.
The Browns, who live in the Eagle Mountain Lake area, still fantasize about retail on West Magnolia, which continues to have a dearth of it. “If we’d been in Uptown Dallas with the brands we had, I think it might have worked,” says Tommy Brown, who’s sold shoes since he was 16, first at Finish Line, then at Luke’s and Larry’s, where he was a buyer. In the ‘90s, he worked as a cook at a restaurant on West Magnolia. “In a thriving retail environment, there’s no reason why it wouldn’t have survived,” Tammy Brown says.
South Main Redo
Another piece of the South Main Street corridor in Fort Worth is changing.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
Developer Dak Hatfield is redeveloping the site at the southeast corner of South Main and Dashwood, a block north of Rosedale Street, taking down one building and planning to build a total 9,500 square feet. His plans call for a firstfloor restaurant, with a patio. “Hopefully, it’s something we haven’t seen before on the Near Southside,” he said. The second floor plan calls for office space.
Hatfield began demolition in August. Crimson Building Co. is the general contractor. “We are looking at being finished in spring 2017 if not before,” he said.
Real estate activity in the South Main corridor, south of downtown, continues to pick up steam as the city nears completion of a reconstruction of the street. “Ev-
erybody’s starting to get excited about the street now that it’s being completed,” Hatfield said.
Activity farther north of the site, including ongoing construction of the University of Texas Southwestern Monty and Tex Moncrief Medical Center at Fort Worth at Pennsylvania Avenue and South Main, and a major multifamily project under construction at that intersection, shows the appeal of South Main, Hatfield said. Development interests have been following the success of eating and drinking places like the Shipping and Receiving bar and venue east of South Main near Vickery Boulevard, Hatfield said. “It just shows we have a lot of demand for business in this area,” he said.
Hatfield’s other projects include teaming with partners to remake the Supreme Golf warehouse – its tenants include Shipping and Receiving - and Magnolia-May mixed-use spaces on the Near Southside. He has a few other projects going on around the one at South Main and Dashwood. One block to the east, he recently completed the renovation and conversion of a building at 1001 Bryan Ave., leasing it to the Pouring Glory Growler Fill Station and Grill.
At 916 Bryan, he and partner Andrew Blake have been bringing back a 1945-vintage building, putting office tenants on the first floor and nearing completion later this year on the second floor.
COMINGS AND GOINGS:
Game On for Sports Complex
Game On, the new West Side multisport complex, will open its second facility, Sept. 24, at 2600 Alemeda Drive.
On Oct. 8,
Media personality
Scott Murray and Fort Worth City Councilman Zim Zimmerman will headline a 1 p.m.-2 p.m. ribbon-cutting ceremony. Following that, Game On will host a Sports & Wellness Fair with its partners, including Active Spine & Sport Therapy, PRISM, and Rally Time Wellness, and top volleyball and basketball clubs from the area.
The center will include 12 indoor regulation volleyball courts, which are convertible to six full-size basketball courts; eight outdoors regulation sand volleyball courts; seven pitching and batting cages; a healthoriented dining facility; two event rooms; outdoor performance stage; full-service sporting goods store; wellness center; and an 11,000-square-foot
APEC performance training space that will have a 75-yard track and 25-by-40 artificial turf field.
The new Game On is in the path of projected high growth for Fort Worth and Parker County. Its owners expect to host a number of volleyball and basketball leagues and regional tournaments. It will employ 50 people, the owners said.
“This new development is the fulfillment of a longterm vision for us to offer athletes of all ages the opportunity to reach their full potential,” said Trevor Armstrong, partner and general manager. “We’re able to provide the infrastructure and resources for all sports enthusiasts.”
Game On’s partnerships include APEC, a sports performance training company based in Tyler.
Game On in 2012 opened its first sports complex, a 48,000-square-foot indoor center at 251 Settlement Plaza Drive in west Fort Worth.
— FW Inc. staff
SISEMORE LAW FIRM
Justin J. Sisemore has been recognized by his peers as a 2016 “Rising Star” in Texas Monthly and Super Lawyers Magazines, as a “Top Attorney” in Fort Worth, Texas Magazine for the last eight years, and has been a guest speaker for the Tarrant County Family Law Bar Association and various law firms throughout Fort Worth. Samantha M. Wommack has been recognized by her peers as a “Top Attorney” in Fort Worth, Texas Magazine for the last three years. Zoe Meigs, of counsel, is an AV Preeminent Rated attorney and has been recognized for the second time as a “Top Attorney” in Fort Worth, Texas Magazine. We are proud to welcome Jerold H. Mitchell, Chris B. Norris and Pamela L. Wilder to the Sisemore Family Law Firm. Jerold H. Mitchell and Pamela L. Wilder have also been recognized by their peers as “Top Attorneys” in Fort Worth, Texas Magazine. With a combined 40 years of experience in complex civil and family law trials and appeals, our firm provides an extensive range of family law services: all aspects of divorce, cases with complex property divisions, and custody disputes. While we represent clients throughout Texas, we regularly serve Tarrant, Dallas, Collin, Parker, Johnson, Denton, Hood and Wise counties. The Sisemore Law Firm works diligently to provide highly competent and efficient service to each and every client. Our firm also works with various civil litigation firms throughout the DFW Metroplex to assist their clients in family law matters. Visit our website at www.thetxattorneys.com to view our client testimonials.”
Reviving Hemphill
Developers Terri and Gary West get ready to launch restoration of the historic Hamilton Apartments in Fort Worth’s Hemphill corridor.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
Terri and Gary West have redone four homes in Ryan Place on Fort Worth’s Near Southside. Their next project may be a little more ambitious.
They’re taking the 10,000-square-foot, 12-unit Hamilton Apartments building at 2837 Hemphill St., which they bought last year, and planning to bring it back. It’s the latest project to come off the drawing board on Hemphill, a huge canvas stretching from south of downtown to Interstate 20.
“We’re working towards an eight-plex,” with units of 800 to 1,000 square feet, compared to the former 480-650-square-foot units,” Terri West said, giving a tour of the boarded-up building in late August.
William F. Hamilton, a prominent real estate investor and mayor of the city of Polytechnic for four years until it was annexed by the city of Fort Worth in 1924, built the Colonial Revival Hamilton Apartments in the late 1920s.
Hamilton sold the property to the prominent Fort Worth contractors Charles Butcher and Robert Sweeney. Sweeney sold the property in late 1939 to Robert Stuart, a former state senator and Tarrant County district attorney, for less than two-thirds of the
1928 purchase price, with prices still depressed by the Great Depression.
The building has sat vacant and deteriorating for 20 years, becoming the residence of squatters. The real estate developer Fran McCarthy, the most recent owner, sold it to the Wests after starting the application process for historic tax credits. The building was listed on the National Register in 2015.
The Wests are working with development consultant Jim Johnson, architect Brandon Allen and builder Matt Awbrey. Southwest Bank is their lender.
They’re negotiating with the Texas Historical Commission and National Parks Service on requirements for their state and federal tax credit applications. The potential state tax credit, which they would likely sell at a discount to monetize it faster, is 25 percent of qualifying expenses. The potential federal credit is 20 percent. The project will also qualify for a 10-year freeze on the property’s valuation for city taxes and for a city Neighborhood Empowerment Zone waiver of permit fees. The Wests decline to say what they expect to invest in the project.
To qualify for the credits, the Wests will have to meet negotiated requirements for preservation. Because the originally laid out apartments are small, they’re negotiating to go to larger units and reduce their number to eight.
That would allow amenities such as larger kitchens and more closets, Allen, the architect, says. The dilapidated interiors will be “essentially gutted,” Allen said. “We’ll have to do it selectively,” to meet the historic preservation requirements.
The Wests plan to replace the roof with clay tile, which was originally on the building, and repair or replace all of the windows. Part of the foundation will require work. They plan to bring in separately metered electric service and water service that will likely be on a single meter, but divided among the tenants.
The Wests plan to demolish a non-historic garage and apartment and other outbuildings and build parking. They also plan to build a duplex in the back of the property and preserve the lawn defined by an old rock wall on the south side of the apartments.
The Wests plan to market the apartments at professionals. They’re not certain yet what rents they’ll seek. Terri West compared it to the nearby Bastion, a complex of apartments built around a restaurant and event center redeveloped by Chandra and Richard Riccetti. “They’re the bravest of all souls,” West said.
Developers Terri and Gary West, architect Brandon Allen, and consultant Jim Johnson
Jodi Tommerdahl
How the UT Arlington prof is trying to parlay a childhood love into a mobile app that helps people learn languages or regain their ability to speak after a stroke.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
Jodi Tommerdahl says she’s always been interested in languages. It started with Norwegian as a child when her grandmother would teach her bits. When she was 12, Tommerdahl, who grew up in Minnesota, began attending summer Norwegian camps in the state. When she was in her 20s, Tommerdahl learned French.
“I have a huge American accent because I learned it in my ‘20s,” she says. In the back of her mind for years: “Why is there no computer game or software that would show me the difference between these two sounds” – the correct and incorrect pronunciations?
“There’s language learning products, but there’s nothing for your accent, nothing with feedback,” Tommerdahl says.
Tommerdahl, who earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of Minnesota, lived in Europe for 18 years in Norway, France and England. She earned her master’s degree from the University of London and Ph.D. in neurolinguistics from the Sorbonne in Paris. She was a professor at the University of Birmingham in England when she learned the University of Texas at Arlington was searching for a professor in mind, brain and education for a new program in the College of Education.
Once at UTA, Tommerdahl – associate professor of neurolinguistics - was introduced to an associate professor of electrical engineering, Samir Iqbal. The two, with Motasim Bellah, a Ph.D. in Samir’s lab and an app developer, have teamed up on a mobile app that people learning languages or stroke patients learning to speak again can
use to perfect their speech. Using the app, still in development, users repeat words until a dot on the screen moves into the center, verifying correct pronunciation. The team has collected “hundreds of thousands” of language samples that it’s using to build the app, Tommerdahl says.
“We’re swimming in data,” Tommerdahl says. “It’s not just about building the app. It’s about building the science behind the app.”
The company, VisioSound, has joined the Tech Fort Worth incubator and thinks it can bring the app, called the Visual Accent Trainer, to market in six months.
“There’s a big push now on the technical side,” Tommerdahl says. “What we’re doing with the app is we’re going back to how babies learn language. The babble. They’re listening to themselves, and they’re setting up this feedback loop.”
The company is talking to language learning companies about potential licensing deals. “Whether it’s available straight from us (in the app store) or from a third party remains to be seen,” Tommerdahl says.
Even if the company licenses its technology, it would likely retain rights for medical applications, Tommerdahl says.
UTA has been backing the group, paying for its patent application, patent attorneys, and university attorneys. Engineering students have been volunteering for the project, Tommerdahl says. The university owns the intellectual property, but VisioSound recently signed an option to lease it back for a fee.
The partners think there’s a huge potential market. “There are literally billions of people studying foreign language,” Tommerdahl says. “It’s just tinder waiting to be lit.”
Fort Worth’s Best Workplaces for Women
What’s it take? These winners offer a big mix that ranges from compensation and leave, to training and flexibility.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
Half of the members of the leadership team at the Balcom Agency, the Fort Worth brand marketing firm, are women. That says a lot about the company’s drive to recruit and retain women.
The agency joined the Girl Scouts of Texas Oklahoma Plains and Naval Air Station Fort Worth Joint Reserve Base as the winners of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce’s 2016 Best Workplaces for Women competition, in the small, medium, and large employer categories.
Judges reviewed the 26 applicants and 12 finalists on compensation and leave, ethics, work flexibility, training and mentoring, facilities, community involvement and wellness initiatives. The Chamber developed the award with help from Texas Woman’s University, which brought its research and results from focus groups and an online survey to bear.
BALCOM AGENCY, SMALL EMPLOYER
Established: 1993
Employees locally: 38, including 24 women
Benefits: Health insurance, cafeteria plan, 401k, vacation time, sick time, personal time, flexible work schedule. Also leadership, computer, and skillset training. Merit and holiday bonus, reimbursement for certification training, industry organization membership, paid attendance at industry conferences. Flex time for children’s school activities, discount at Zyn22 spin studios, employee recognition programs, maternity leave, flex time and resources for elder care, and telecommuting. Health premium fully paid for employees. Fulltime
employees eligible for 401(k). Employees 100 percent vested from enrollment. Balcom matches first 3 percent of employee contributions, then 50 percent for up to 5 percent of their contribution. New moms receive six weeks of paid maternity leave. Comp time available to employees who work outside normal hours. Agency offers discounted rates to nonprofits and pro bono services to certain organizations. Balcom touts its “creative and fun space” and is developing plans for expansion. Flexibility: “As long as employees log at least eight hours of billable time each day and make it to any scheduled meetings, the agency knows flexible schedules make us all more productive.”
“Four-Legged Fridays,” early shutdowns one day a month for work anniversaries and birthdays, active outdoor meetings, company on path to certification as a Blue Zones workplace.
GIRL SCOUTS OF TEXAS OKLAHOMA PLAINS
Established: 1912
Employees locally: 57, including 54 women
Benefits: Health insurance, dental insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, 401(k), vacation, sick time, personal leave, flexible work schedule, employee assistance program, paid time off for bereavement. Also leadership, computer, skillset, diversity and sensitivity, and customer relations training, paid membership dues
for job-related associations, flex time for children’s school activities, employee recognition programs, flexible time and resources for elder care. Vacation: 15 days in first year, 20 days after five years. Ten sick days per year, one floating holiday such as a United Way day off. Sixteen paid holidays. Three days bereavement leave. Half days on Fridays. Flexible or modified work schedules available. Scouts use Welbe, a corporate fitness platform that levers wearable devices like FitBit to track wellbeing, organize challenges, set goals, and offer rewards.
NAVAL AIR STATION JOINT RESERVE BASE
Established: 1994
Employees locally: 10,000, including 2,900 women
Benefits: Health insurance, dental insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, cafeteria plan, 401(k), vacation time, sick times, personal time, flexible work schedule, employee assistance program, company car. Also leadership, computer, skillset, diversity and
sensitivity, and customer relations training. Team bonus, loans for continuing education, reimbursement for certification training, tuition reimbursement, free family classes and counseling. On-site day care, time off for community service, child care referral service, flex time for children’s school activities, lactation room for new moms, employee recognition programs, maternity leave. Tricare health insurance at no additional cost for all military members. Civilian employees offered several health insurance options, with reduced costs and co-pays. Complete coverage of breast pumps and supplies. Twelve weeks paid maternity leave. Opportunity to freeze eggs to provide greater flexibility in starting a family. All NAS members are assigned a mentor. Formal career transition programs and staff. Paid tuition for college courses or classes at technical institutes. NAS provides nursing room, with kitchen, bed, TV, and multiple outlets for pumping. School Age Program allows students in local schools to be picked up and dropped off at NAS. Onsite gym, pool, track, playing courts. Womenonly locker room and cardio center. Thirty days annual leave.
(1) Leadership Fort Worth LeadershipClass Amie Hebdige, Kimberly DeWoody, Vicki Ellis-Olson, Kristopher Schleicher
(2) VisionFW school supply drive for Nash Elementary School VisionFW Chair Nicole Stanley and committee member Trisha Killen
(3) Tech Fort Worth 2016 Impact Awards
(4) Texas Health Resources Blue Zones Celebration Barclay Berdan, Lillie Biggins, Betsy Price, Matt Dufrene
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Contact Dr. Conditt’s practice today to schedule your smile consultation. We are ready to help you start the journey to a smile that is unlike any other.
The Adirondacks provide the perfect backdrop for a luxurious getaway.
24 Distinctive Style / 26 Off the Clock / 28 Gadgets / 30 Wine & Dine / 34 Health & Fitness / 36 Office Space
Moveable East
BY NICOLE CRITES
Kacey Cargile and Alyson
Johnson were just two best friends working together when they decided to step out on their own and become entrepreneurs in 2014. The duo opened Esther Penn, which went on to become one of Fort Worth’s most popular and fashion-forward boutiques, on West Seventh Street. In April, the store expanded to Dallas.
The co-owners were not exactly in the market for a new location when they were
driving in Dallas during the holidays, but an open space along Henderson Avenue caught their eyes.
“We pulled up and were like ‘Oh my gosh! This is what we always dreamed it would look like,’” Johnson said, “just a little white stand-alone building. So we just saw it and had to have it.”
Johnson and Cargile said they mainly chose Dallas as the location for their second store because of its proximity to Fort Worth. It is a good place for the two to go
back and forth and be in both places while continuing to expand.
“I think another reason we were drawn to Dallas was so we could still work together,” Cargile said. “That’s kind of why we did this in the first place because we are best friends and want to work together as much as we can. That’s why it’s fun.”
Like with their store in Fort Worth, Johnson and Cargile plan to put their relationship with Dallas customers as a top priority.
“In Fort Worth, our customers are our friends. We have gotten to know these people and their kids and their cousins and when they got married. And, we are here for them for all of these events in their lives because we have been open two years and have a regular customer base,” Cargile said. “And in Dallas, we are still working on that. We are working on finally getting repeat customers, which is awesome, and learning more about them and what they like.”
The two said that one difference of being a business owner in Dallas now is how much more competitive it is. And, while competition is good, it is also hard trying to figure out where their store fits in.
“The market is pretty saturated right now,” Cargile said. “I feel like there are stores opening up every day and, you know, how do you stay fresh? How do you stay cool? What are you offering that is different? So it’s hard and it’s a constant process.”
One thing that remains the same between the locations is how supportive other local businesses have been.
“In Fort Worth, other small businesses really rallied behind us when we opened…” Cargile said. “[And] I mean, the people on Henderson have been so nice to us, the other stores and their customers down here, because we are different and we offer different things. So we have had a lot of support.”
Kacey Cargile and Alyson Johnson, wearing business casual looks from Esther Penn.
Cargile, far left, is wearing a Finders Keepers pencil skirt with metal grommets ($132) and a Rolla's plain white tee shirt ($55).Johnson is wearing an olive green midi dress ($58), no longer in store.
Photo courtesy of Andrew Adkison, AIA from GFF
Great Expectations
The Adirondacks provide the backdrop for unique, rustic and luxurious getaways.
BY KENDALL LOUIS
Prominent New York families in the early 1900s needed a way to get away from it all just as busy executives do today. But, rather than escape for a weekend to a tropical getaway, the wellequipped vacationers opted to build their own wooded retreats. So, families like the Vanderbilts, Astors, Rockefellers and Guggenheims escaped to the Adirondack Mountains to create what was perhaps the first form of “glamping.” The families would make the trip in the early summer to relax among glistening lakes and towering fir trees.
Dubbed “Great Camps,” many of these camps, situated in the largest protected wilderness in the continental United States, host curious visitors throughout the year. But, often, the hardest part is getting an invite. Luckily, one of the most luxurious Great Camp options,
Above the boats, The Boathouse has a wrap-around balcony, fully stocked bar and huge white canopy bed.
The Point, can be booked for public use. Built by William Avery Rockefeller in the 1930s as his family’s private home, The Point sits on a 75-acre peninsula stretching into Upper Saranac Lake. The resort, filled with antiques inside grandiose log cabins, was designated the first Relais & Châteaux property in North America – and still exists as one of only 50 today. Eleven guest rooms are spread among four log buildings, each one with lake views, hand-built beds, oil paintings, private baths and a fireplace. The most popular guest room, The Boathouse, is a vast open room above the boats with beamed ceilings and a canopied bed anchoring the center of the room. The room has panoramic views of Upper Saranac Lake and the distant mountains. Perhaps the most historic room on the property is the Mohawk, the Rockefeller’s former master bedroom, with a private corridor, outdoor sitting area and striking bath. True to the time of its conception, meals at The Point are a lavish event. Executive Chef Loic Leperlier, with a resume full of Michelin-star restaurants and five-star resorts, cooks with seasonal produce from nearby farms. Black tie attire is suggested for dinner on Wednesdays and Saturdays, per the tradition of Great Camps. Meals, rooms and cocktail hours are enough to keep guests entertained and satisfied for days, but in case a bout of boredom sets in, various
activities are available throughout the year. Lake swimming, water sports, hiking, croquet, canoes, mahogany electric boats and golf dominate activities in the summer and fall. The winter still allows for outdoor activities like cross-country skiing, ice-skating, curling and “snow barbecues” – yes, a Texas-style barbecue in the middle of the snow.
There are various ways to reach The Point from the metroplex, but the easiest is a flight from DFW to Boston Logan International Airport, where you can catch one of several daily flights to Adirondack Regional Airport on Cape Air. The Point is also a scenic 5-hour drive from New York City and Boston and just a 2 – 2.5-hour drive from Montreal, Albany, New York, and Burlington, Vermont. thepointsaranac.com. All-inclusive 2016 rates start at $1,600 per room. The entire property can be reserved for $25,650 for private family or corporate gatherings.
OTHER ADIRONDACK GREAT CAMPS
GREAT CAMP SAGAMORE
The former vacation home of the Vanderbilt family, this 27-building National Historic Landmark has played host to celebrities and world leaders. Now the Raquette Lake retreat hosts families and groups at the resort. A more rustic Great Camp option, guests share bathrooms and are encouraged to spend time outdoors taking in nature in true Adirondack style. greatcampsagamore.org. Call for prices.
CAMP TOPRIDGE
Originally built in 1923 by the Post family, this Great Camp is now owned by Dallas real estate tycoon Harlan Crow. The property sits on the Upper St. Regis Lake and is an invite-only getaway for the Crow family and guests.
WHITE PINE CAMP
Located on Osgood Pond, White Pine Camp was built by prominent New York Banker Archibald S. White and his wife Olive. Later, under new ownership, it served as the summer White House for President Calvin Coolidge. Thirteen cabins and cottages with hand-built Adirondackstyle furniture flank the 35-acre property. The two most popular cabins, Mrs. Coolidge’s Cabin and the President’s Cabin, where the subjects actually slept, book fast. whitepinecamp. com. Rates vary.
In spring and summer, guests can dine on Saranac Lake and enjoy views of the timberlands and mountains.
In the evening, guests gather for cocktails in The Great Hall.
Play With a Full Desk
BY KENDALL LOUIS
You work there, you eat there, and as much as you hate to admit it, sometimes you even sleep there. So, why not make your office as comfortable and functional as possible? These four gadgets make life just a little bit easier, or at least a lot prettier, while you’re working the week away.
(A) PhoneSoap
Smartphone Sanitizer
The perfect gadget for germaphobes, this smartphone sanitizer kills germs with an ultra-violet light. From your lunch meeting, to your desk, to (admit it) the restroom, to your pocket, your phone is a breeding ground for bacteria and viruses. And where does the phone ultimately end up? Your face. Zap the problem away with this sleek device. Place your phone inside, attach the charging cable, and close the lid. Once closed, a pair of specialized, ultra-violet lights clean the phone while simultaneously charging it. Exterior lights let you know when the phone is clean and charged. Large enough to accommodate most smartphones, it comes with a micro USB charging cable that can be easily switched out for your phone. The case even has built-in acoustic amplifiers that allow you to continue listening to music or use your phone’s alarm while it’s getting its treatment. Uncommongoods.com, $59.95
(B) Amazon Echo First books, then shipping, then TV, now Amazon is in the personal assistant business. Amazon Echo is a digital personal assistant that responds to your voice and gets to know you better each day. Connect it to your lights, your thermostat, your music; all you have to do is ask and Amazon will answer. Or, use its “skills” or connected apps to order an Uber, have Domino’s delivered or reorder paper towels. Just ask Alexa, Amazon or Echo – you decide its name too. Amazon.com, $179.99
(C) Petcube Check in on your furry best friend while you’re stuck at the office. Whether it’s meant for your pet's peace of mind, or your own, this device can make the whole family a little happier while you’re stuck at the office. Check in on your dog or cat, or even better, entertain them from your desk while watching their every move on the HD video. Petcube connects to your smartphone so you can watch, talk to and
play with your cat or dog from anywhere. A built-in, two-way microphone allows you to whisper sweet nothings to your lonely pet while you’re at work and even listen to him or her respond. You can also control a laser from your smartphone to keep them entertained and stimulated. Brookstone. com, $149
(D) Perpetual Calendars
Perhaps more form than function, this calendar can be used year after year. Created for the Museum of Modern Art, two magnetic balls mark the date and month. Mount it on your wall or place it on your desk for a calendar that won’t expire or go out of style. Uncommongoods. com, $45
(A)
(D)
(C)
(B)
DA Lamont Public Adjusters, LLC
Eating Up New Technology
Local restaurants use technology to increase consumer and employee satisfaction while encouraging personto-person interaction.
BY NICOLE CRITES
While dining at the upscale French restaurant Saint-Emilion, when you ask about its wine list, which exceeds 300 different wines, you may be surprised when the waiter pulls out an iPad rather than a large leather-bound binder.
It’s a sign that restaurateurs are finding themselves in the technology business along with the food business. More than one-third of consumers are more likely to use technology options at a restaurant, according to the National Restaurant Association’s 2014 innovation report.
Whether it is reading a wine list on an iPad, receiving a text when your table is ready at Brewed, ordering your meal on a tablet at Panera Bread or using a smartphone to pay for Starbucks, today you can find technology integrated into almost every restaurant in some way.
Saint-Emilion was one of the first restaurants in Fort Worth to use the electronic wine list when the highly acclaimed Cultural District spot rolled it out nearly five years ago, but now, they are hardly alone. According to Statista, a survey of professional chefs concluded that utilizing tablet computers for wine lists and order-
ing was the leading technology trend in restaurants in 2015.
“There’s a small percentage that find it confusing, but most people think it’s really good,” Saint-Emilion’s manager Joel Graham said. “It opens people’s eyes and doesn’t make them as intimidated because they are able to read about a bunch of different wines very clearly without any pressure from anybody.”
The restaurant even goes a step further with an option for customers to receive emails about their favorite wines.
“If you had a nice bottle of wine that you really liked at the restaurant, then we can
can pull it up and choose a mail option,” Graham said, “where you can put in your email address, and everything that we have found on the wine, like the price point and ratings, will go into your inbox.”
Downtown’s Capital Grille is another local advocator for electronic wine lists. The swanky steakhouse also uses tablets to present its dessert menu and even has an app that allows patrons who have wine lockers in the restaurant to manage their wine purchases and gift wine to other people.
In Statista’s survey, other leading trends in the restaurant industry were smartphone or tablet apps for consumers (e.g., ordering, menus, reservations), apps for chefs and restaurateurs (e.g., recipes, table management, point-of-sale tracking) and mobile or wireless payment options.
Starbucks is one of the first chains to implement an app with a system that allows customers to add their credit card and pay directly from their phone. While it may be one of the only businesses with that system, there are surely more to follow. Thirty-nine percent of smartphone users said they would pay restaurant and bar tabs via smartphone apps if offered, according to the National Restaurant Association’s 2016 report.
While paying for tabs on smartphone apps may be in our future, other restau-
rants are doing away with the traditional cash register system and opting for something more technologically advanced. For instance, Local Foods Kitchen, located off of South Hulen Street and Hartwood Drive, instead of registers, uses Square, a mobile point-of-sale system that connects a card reader to a smartphone or tablet.
“It has made life pretty easy when we have to-go orders or deliveries,” sous-chef Charlie Atkinson said.
Making life easier for the staff as well as the customer appears to be the leading incentive for restaurateurs to implement some type of technology. According to the National Restaurant Association, 72 percent of consumers say restaurant technology increases convenience.
Apparently, technology might also increase the amount of drinks you have in a single night at the Flying Saucer. The bar, that opened up downtown more than 20 years ago, has a program for avid beerdrinkers called the UFO Club, where if you drink 200 different beers from its list, you get your own “flying saucer” (a plate with your name displayed on the wall).
However, the trick is keeping track of what beers UFO members have already tried. It does this by giving each member
a card that they can swipe at an electronic kiosk. You choose your drink from its touchscreen list of beers and print out a ticket with a scanning code on it.
“We call them chips, and it’s going to say the name of the beer, what kind of style, a description of it, and then we scan it in and keep track of it for you,” manager Heather Rosemand said.
While technology is obviously involved in this process, the UFO Club tends to bring people together socially more than anything.
“The main people that start doing this are those who don’t know a lot about beer and are new to the area...,” Rosemand said, “so it’s a way for people to meet other people and actually just come around and learn about beer.”
Technology tends to get a bad rap for minimizing person-to-person contact, but even with this surge of technological advances, there are those who still value the social aspect of dining out. According to the National Restaurant Association’s 2014 report, most people who said they do not use smartphones for restaurant purposes or information give the same reason: they prefer to deal with people.
Saint-Emilion uses technology to simplify and explain wine list options.
Local Foods Kitchen attempts to speed up counter service with a Square.
MORE to take in.
Located in the heart of Fort Worth’s lively West 7th Street Cultural District—close to great shopping, live music, theater and fine dining— The Stayton at Museum Way is everything you love about senior living. In the center of a vibrant cultural hub, The Stayton has become Fort Worth’s most distinctive retirement destination for people with the zest and taste for the best in life.
At the center of it all.
The Stayton has become a vital cultural cornerstone of the sophisticated West 7th district. Attend a concert at the Bass Performance Hall, take in a Broadway-style show at the Community Arts Center or visit the funky shops and fashionable boutiques in Sundance Square.
We also enrich the lives of our residents and thousands of members of our Fort Worth community through our cultural and educational events, such as our renowned Red Carpet Series, and our unique partnership with the Cliburn.
2501 Museum Way | Fort Worth, Texas 76107
Call to schedule your tour today 817.632.3601.
Shaping Up Your Week
BY FW INC. STAFF
Thirty minutes or less. It used to be the promise at the end of a pizza order. But, now that lifestyles are speeding up, and workdays are getting longer, it’s a necessary time frame for almost any activity. Unfortunately, while your health should be a top priority, the length of many fitness classes leave you forced to prioritize between work and health. But, there is good news. The Center for Disease Control suggests just 2.5 hours of moderate exercise throughout the week to meet health recommendations. “We know that 150 minutes each week sounds like a lot of time, but it’s not. [That’s] about
the same amount of time you might spend watching a movie. The good news is you can spread your activity throughout the week, so you don’t have to do it all at once,” stated the CDC. You know what that math comes down to? Less than 30 minutes per day. We rounded up the schedule-friendly classes in town for the perfect work/workout life balance.
LOCAL FITNESS CLASSES FOR BUSY LIFESTYLES
Kickboxing & Boxing 30 Class, TITLE Boxing Club: When there isn’t time to dedicate to the Power Hour, TITLE Boxing Club offers a convenient solution. Whether it is a kickboxing class or a boxing class, the shortened high-intensity workouts offer just the right amount of cardio to satisfy a daily exercise demand. 400 W. Seventh St., downtown-fortworth.titleboxingclub.com
Smart Barre Express & Smart Cardio Express, Smart Barre Studios: Perfect to squeeze into a hectic day, the benefits from an express barre or cardio class make the 30-minute workouts totally worth it. Barre Express aids in strengthening muscles, increasing flexibility, and burning fat. Cardio Express, while still a barre class, focuses on increased heart rates and utilization of the whole body. Three Fort Worth locations, smartbarrebody.com
Kickboxing, 9Round Fitness: No set class time or schedules here. During business hours, members can walk in whenever they please and almost immediately start their 30-minute exercise with a trainer. Workouts start every 3 minutes and change daily. Each full-body workout session can burn up to 500 calories. 3049 Greene Ave., 9round.com
10 [30 Minute] Private Sessions, Abundio’s Studios: Since
Abundio’s Studios plans to relocate to the River District, group classes are on hiatus. But to fill the void, Abundio’s trainers still offer packages of ten 30-minute personal training sessions that focus on a variety of strength and endurance exercises such as weight training, cycling, kickboxing, and TRX. Perfect for those without a lot of time and with specific health goals in mind. 2927 Shamrock Ave., abundiosstudios.com
Express Jazzercise, Jazzercise Fort Worth Fitness Center: If a quick, preweekend workout is what you’re looking for, Jazzercise Fort Worth Fitness Center is here to help. A 30-minute, get-pumped-up for the weekend and dance-the-stress-away class for all those leaving the office Friday afternoon awaits. This cardio-heavy class makes the heart pump and calories burn in half the normal time. 2924 Cleburne Road, jazzercise.com
Meditation Class, Indigo Yoga: Hectic work hours and busy lifestyles don’t leave much time for focusing on mental health. If you want to cut down stress and get over the middle-of-the-week hump, Indigo Yoga offers an early morning meditation class. Meditating even for 30 minutes regularly can help with concentration and attention, slow down the aging process of the brain, and reduce anxiety or depression. 5111 Pershing Ave., indigoyoga.net FWinc
ALL YOU NEED IS 30 MINUTES OF MODERATE-INTENSITY EXERCISE, FIVE DAYS A WEEK TO:
• Lose weight. Studies show that 30 minutes a day versus an hour is enough for weight loss.
• Lower cholesterol
• Lessen risk of stroke and cardiovascular diseases
• Lower blood pressure
• Increase mood, energy, and stamina
• Increase libido
• Maintain mental well-being
• Improve circulation and digestion
• Strengthen the immune system
• Improve overall health and fitness
THE DIGITAL SPACE
Claire Brunner, Justin Rives and Jeff Ireland.
BY KENDALL LOUIS / PHOTOGRAPHY BY ALEX LEPE
The Enilon team didn’t move far when they left their office space of five years last March. But they did move smart, saying goodbye to their 4,400-square-foot office facing Foch Street on the east end of the West 7th development and opting for a new custom-designed one in the building next door.
Co-founder Jeff Ireland, TCU grad, calls it an upgrade. It’s an upgrade in the form of 7,000 square feet. Enilon, a digital marketing agency founded in 2005, enlisted VLK Architects to configure the formerly bland medical office space into an engaging and contemporary office. Project designer Niki Schoessow was first tasked with granting most of the office access to natural light, so they took down various walls and installed a storefront to allow it to flow throughout. One of the biggest transitions came with the ceiling. VLK, along with contractor Jensen Commercial (now Cooper-Jensen Contractors) removed tiles to reveal an exposed concrete ceiling that added a loft-like vibe along with height.
“The space reflects the personality of Enilon as the digital agency we have grown to become, and I could not be happier with the way it turned out,” says Ireland.
On the top of Enilon’s list with the expansion? “More collaborative workspaces,“ says Claire Brunner, partner and executive vice president
Art installed on a curved wall in the entry provided inspiration for the space.
A Family Room is available when “life happens.”
of client services. “Our old office only had one conference room, and it was constantly booked.” Problem solved. Enilon’s new office has four different conference spaces: one built-in table just when you enter, another “war room” for top-secret meetings, and a small conference room with a wall of windows. The fourth and largest conference room sits behind two formidable sliding barn doors built by Mansfield artists Mary and Eddie Phillips. While the doors are rustic, everything behind them is modern and tech savvy. Three screens flank one wall while another larger wall is covered by a Clarus glassboard. The local company, one of Enilon’s clients, creates modern-style whiteboards made from tempered safety glass that can withstand permanent markers, dry erase markers and even spray paint. The one in the Enilon office, in a shade of black, resembles a modern chalkboard with strategic planning notes written in neon colors on a dark glass board.
“In order to deliver dynamic 360 digital programs, we must constantly change the way we work, think and use the space around us,” says Justin Rives, partner and executive vice president of delivery. “In our new space, we wanted an environment that encouraged multiple working styles, from rowdy brainstorms with big teams to a room made for one – anything is possible in our new office.”
If an employee has had enough collaborating for one day and just needs time for concentration, he or she can retire to one of three “phone booths” with a door and some pint-sized privacy. While cubes, collaboration and concentration fulfill the function the
The largest conference room sits behind doors created by Mansfield artists Mary and Eddie Phillips.
Above: The Enilon team gathers in the large conference room. Right: The legs of a conference room table are made from repurposed railroad materials.
space was meant for, a large-scale piece of art as you enter anchors the design of the office. The industrial-looking art wraps around a curved wall. One might take a glance and assume the art was made to fit the wall. But, instead, the wall was created specifically for the art. Its curved presence directs the flow of traffic in two directions. One leads you to a room filled with open-air workstations. The other leads to executive offices. Both directions will lead a visitor to similar art. It’s all designed by the husband-and-wife Mansfield team. The fun and practical office is a nod to the kind of work that happens inside the Enilon walls. The digital marketing agency describes itself as “a grown-up digital agency for serious marketers.”
“Everything that we do is focused in the digital space,” says Brunner. “We focus on providing 360-degree holistic digital services. Digital is highly measurable. We take data very seriously and use that from the very beginning to help map out our clients’ plans.”
Ireland says Enilon has more than 100 open projects at any given time but names local players like Texas Health Resources, Flexjet, D&M Auto Leasing and Bell Helicopter as some of the clients that keep them the busiest.
But, the Enilon partners try not to overwork employees, keeping a close eye to ensure staffers don’t regularly put in more than 40 hours a week and offering a few bonuses around the office. Catered lunches are brought in for the team on Fridays. Employees are welcome to bring their pet dogs in any time they please. The fridge is always stocked with alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages, and the kitchen will soon be home to a kegerator so beer is always available on tap.
This larger office space also made it possible for Enilon to have a “Family Room.” The cozy room, furnished with couches and a TV, allows employees to bring their kids into work when their normal caretaking situation falls through. “Too many times people feel stress when something from their personal life bleeds over into work,” said Rives. “Simple solution: We created a room for ‘life to happen.’ A family room that allows employees to handle life from work without stress.” With board games and photos of the employees and their families throughout the space, it’s a practical acknowledgement that employees
have a full life outside the office walls.
And, there is plenty to do right outside the office walls. Since Enilon moved into Foch Street, both in this office and its previous space, it has watched the area grow and develop – in the form of bars and restaurants moving in and more businesses. “There are a lot of agencies around here so it’s kind of nice,” says Rives. “It’s definitely an innovative area within Fort Worth.”
The team also says it’s nice to have so many walkable places for lunch, coffee and happy hour. “We call Chimy’s ‘the cafeteria,’” Ireland adds. They find themselves enjoying both work and play at nearby spots like Avoca Coffee, Reservoir and Cork & Pig.
Ireland says he has also watched the digital space transform. “Ten years ago ‘digital’ was all about websites,” Ireland says. “Now that’s just one component of it,” he continues. “In order to survive, you have to be constantly changing. We worked hard to find the place that’s unique, that provides the value that clients are looking for and we are good at it. Now we have a model that’s very expandable, and we are seeing that right now.”
It’s because of this successful model that Enilon is now concentrated on growth. Ireland adds, “If things go as planned, we will outgrow this space in three years.”
The modern dry erase board was created by Enilon's client, Clarus Glassboards.
UBERIZING YOUR BUSINESS
From food delivery, to hauling stuff, and filling up your gas tank, entrepreneurs roll out apps to capitalize on the gig economy.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
Booster Fuels CEO Frank Mycroft, with one of his company's trucks.
Photography by Alex Lepe
From delivering food and gasoline, to carrying things around and just executing daily tasks, businesses are rapidly ripping off the Uber model and using ondemand technology to expand markets and create new businesses
“Entrepreneurs are going to be one-upping each other at an incredibly fast rate,” Michael Sherrod, a serial media entrepreneur and the William M. Dickey Entrepreneur in Residence at TCU’s Neeley Entrepreneurship Center, says. What’s plausible: “just about anything you can think of that’s something you would like to have on a moment’s notice that you don’t have access to.”
Food Fight! The Fort Worth food delivery segment, already crowded with the national GrubHub and Favor services and the longtime locally owned delivery service Entrees On-Trays, added the national Door Dash in May and – at the end of August –UberEats.
The services have some differences in the way their fees are structured; some allow tipping for their independent contractor drivers, and some have minimum charges while others don’t. But “it’s virtually the same thing,”
Sam Kalil, owner of Entrees On-Trays, says. “You’re going to order food, and you’re going to get it delivered to you.”
UberEats will lever its existing driver network by letting them deliver food as well. The service could also expand the driver network, because UberEats will allow drivers to use vehicles that don’t meet the company’s criteria for passenger service.
those restaurants.
Heileman said Favor is confident that its “Order Anything” option is a significant differentiator. Don’t see what you want among its list of partners? Click the “Order Anything” button, fill in the blank with what you want from anywhere, and Favor will handle the rest. CVS, Walgreens, Central Market, Target, Apple, RadioShack, and TCU Florist are Favor’s retail partners in Fort Worth. “With Favor, you can request for a Runner to pick up your dry-cleaning, dog food, really anything except alcohol,” Heileman says.
GrubHub, which entered the DFW market in 2011, connects restaurants to consumers, and most restaurants handle their own delivery. In the DFW market, as in some others, GrubHub also offers its own delivery. “We are able to leverage our national scale to provide delivery for restaurants at a lower average cost,” Lindsey Ruthen, a spokeswoman, said. GrubHub charges a $2.99 delivery fee in DFW. In 2015, companywide revenue rose to $361.8 million from $253.8 million the prior year, while net profit rose to $38 million from $24.2 million. What the company calls “active diners” rose 24 percent to 7.35 million.
“UberEats driver partners can deliver meals using two-door vehicles, which currently would not qualify for uberX” passenger service, Debbee Hancock, an Uber spokeswoman, said.
UberEats is trying to undercut competitors’ prices, charging a $3.99 flat delivery fee that will be “free for a limited time.” Favor, by contrast, charges a $5 delivery fee. Favor’s mobile app also allows tipping, where Uber’s does not.
“We are testing $3 delivery fees in some of our other markets (and) will eventually test it out in Fort Worth as well,” Tina Heileman, a Favor spokeswoman, told FW Inc. “But for now, we’re sticking with our flat $5 fee.”
Favor this summer teamed with eight restaurants in the West 7th area and offered free delivery for five weeks. “The promotion resulted in over 650 new customers for us and a 260 percent increase in take-out orders for those restaurants,” Heileman says. Over those five weeks, Favor completed 1,000 deliveries from
At Entrees On-Trays, a 30-year-old company Kalil bought in 2000, Kalil –whose family has been in the catering business in Fort Worth for years – has been trying to determine the impact on business from the new competitors.
Sales were off 12 percent two months ago but are now back to normal, Kalil says. “I attributed (the drop) to the new people coming to town, but I’m not sure whether some of that was (due to) the summer or not.”
Still, the June numbers were a “wake-up
Entrees On-Trays sees a shakeout coming among food delivery services, but believes it'll remain standing. Photography provided by Entrees On-Trays
Door Dash is one of the food delivery services that have proliferated in North Texas. Photography provided by Door Dash
call,” he says. The company emphasized to its drivers, who, like those of the other services are independent contractors, the importance of on-time delivery. It also kept up its schedule of email blasts to customers and fliers with coupons.
Entrees On-Trays is different from the services in that customers can order via the web, phone, or mobile app, which Kalil put into place at the first of this year, using his web program to set up the app. Seventythree percent of business today is coming from the web, 20 percent by phone, and 7 percent from the app, Kalil says. The company eschews small-ticket orders, requiring a $15 minimum and has an $80 average dinner ticket, he says.
That means Entrees On-Trays may be losing millennials to the other services, Kalil says. But he says he expects a shakeout among the various services within the next year and half or two years, and says Entrees On-Trays will still be around.
child. “I did not want her driving to the gas station,” says Mycroft, who at the time was running strategy and business for a company called Planetary Resources, which refuels spacecraft. “It wasn’t safe.”
Perot is an investor in Planetary Resources. “He was willing and happy and able to take the meeting,” Mycroft says. “He said, ‘As a property manager, I’m always looking for ways to amenitize my property.’”
"It's not rocket science to pump gas into a car. I get to say that because I used to be a rocket scientist."
– Frank Mycroft, Booster Fuels
“We’re family owned and operated; we can cut back when we need to cut back; we can expand when we need to expand,” he says. “We have 30 years of customers who continue to use us.”
Kalil also said Entrees On-Trays has a reliable network of drivers who transport food in insulated containers, which he views as a differentiator. He also questioned whether the other services have enough drivers. He pointed to Favor’s notice to customers late this summer that lasted for a short period, warning of double delivery charges to entice more drivers on to the road. That’s akin to Uber’s “surge” fees that occur during peak demand or when there are few drivers on the road.
Heileman, however, said such an occasional extra charge is not unusual. “We will turn on PrimeTime, usually for a short period of time, if a particular market is busy,” she said. “We have been using this feature for over a year.”
Haulin’ Gas The Fort Worth area now has at least two on-demand gasoline refueling services.
Booster Fuels, a Seattle startup that’s raised $9 million from backers like Ross Perot Jr. and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, is focusing on North Texas and Silicon Valley. In Alliance, it has partnerships with developer Hillwood, Galderma Labs, and DynCorp to fill up cars on the corporate campuses.
CEO and co-founder Frank Mycroft came up with the idea two years ago when his wife was expecting their first
Booster Fuels is now into the “double digits” on its number of vehicles in North Texas, Mycroft says. The vehicles carry 800 gallons of regular unleaded and 400 gallons of premium. On pricing, “we strive to be the same or better as the closest three gas stations,” he says. “The beauty of our model is we don’t have expensive real estate costs and costs of a gas station, we use mobile technology, and we buy the highest-quality fuels in wholesale.”
He adds, “It’s not rocket science to pump gas into a car. I get to say that because I used to be a rocket scientist.”
The small new entrant into the market is Gas Cab, which launched in Fort Worth, June 24, with one truck. Co-owner Clint Bookover, one of two partners, is a former landscape company owner.
Gas Cab is targeting firms like landscapers and construction companies that have vehicle fleets and either bring fuel transfer trucks onto their properties or have all drivers take their vehicles to the gas station each morning. “You’ll have one guy with a credit card,” Bookover says. “You’re losing a ton of money and labor.”
The first vehicle is a GMC 3500 flatbed that carries 440 gallons total and that Bookover and his partner outfitted for $70,000. They’re building a second truck, Bookover said.
Gas Cab charges the cost of the fuel it’s pumping, plus an extra charge ($2.25 for unleaded, $2.75 for premium, or $2.25 per diesel), and a $20 annual membership fee to cover its cost of fuel for the trip. The total fuel tab is “about average,” he said. “It’s not the highest. It’s not the lowest.”
Gas Cab will roll out a mobile app in September that will cost the company about $30,000. The company has been receiving calls about interest in franchises from other markets. “We would like to start franchising,” he said. He and his partner want to focus on the Dallas-Fort Worth market first; ideally, it would be corporate-owned, not franchised, he said. “We want to take over DFW,” which would take 10-15 trucks, he said. He and his partner also want to buy a distributorship to serve their trucks. The company has one investor besides the two founding partners, he said.
Demand has been strong since inception, Bookover said. Commercial will probably make up 60 percent of sales, while in-
dividual fill-ups account for 40, he said. A Nissan dealership in Fort Worth hired Gas Cab to put five gallons in each car on the lot over two days. “They don’t have gas on site,” Bookover said.
“It’s a really cool business if you know how to market it.”
Carry On On-demand delivery and hauling service is creeping out across North Texas.
Pickup Now operates in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Its independent drivers are off-duty firemen and military and veterans who put their pickups into service. Minimum charge is $45. The drivers, which Pickup calls “Good Guys,” will help with loading and unloading. But if the item to be hauled is too large or heavy,
the customer must either have his own help or hire an extra Good Guy. Pickup Now insures its items at a maximum $20,000; it won’t carry anything that’s worth more than that.
Taskrabbit, another national company, operates in Dallas, which the company considers a small market. Taskrabbit, which offers delivery, handyman, moving, and cleaning service through its network of independent contractors, does not offer its services in Tarrant County. A company spokeswoman declined a request for an interview for this story.
Gozova, a Fort Worth startup founded by three entrepreneurs, is launching Sept. 25, with pickup available in the 76126, 76116, 76132, and 76133 zip codes in southwest Fort Worth and Ridglea. “We just really want to learn from these zip codes” before expanding, Goran Krndija, the CEO, says. Krndija, a Bosnian whose family came to the United States in 1998 as refugees, has gone into partnership with software engineer James Staud, to whom he was introduced through the Tech Fort Worth incubator, and engineer Cameron Moreau to launch the company and mobile app. Their app, which they plan to launch Sept. 25, will link customers to people with pickups. Drivers will pick up items and drop them off but not participate in the loading and unloading. That’s because the company doesn’t want the extra liability, Krndija says.
Customers will set up their pickup location via the mobile app and shoot and send pictures of the item through the app, which will calculate a price based on distance, time and the gasoline mileage of the driver’s truck. The app will also allow tipping. The driver will get 70 percent of the delivery fee, plus 100 percent of the tip, Krndija said.
Gozova wants to recruit 30-50 drivers for consistency. While competing services are trying to go national, Gozova wants to stay local, the partners say. “Companies that have completely covered one market, I think that’s where companies are going to succeed,” Staud said.
Sherrod says conventional delivery services blew the opportunity that’s now being taken over by these new entrants. “Delivery companies should have figured this out a long time ago, and they didn’t,” Sherrod says. “They were already in this business.”
Honey-Do Handymen Paintzen, an on-demand home and office painting service, is launching in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, Sept 15. The full-service online platform will allow customers to book, customize, and pay for paint jobs. The company now oper-
Gas Cab partners James McCormick and Clint Bookover. Photography by James Lacerte
Booster Fuels has the backing of Ross Perot Jr. and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen. Photography by Alex Lepe
ates in San Francisco, New York, Chicago, Boston, and Washington, D.C. “The company will be providing on-demand painting services in a more convenient manner than before,” Jocelyn Kahn said.
In Flight Entertainment Even helicopter service has gone the way of ondemand technology. In Fort Worth, Epic Helicopters has teamed with UberChopper to provide charter service to as many as five major events since the National Basketball Association All-Star Game at AT&T Stadium in Arlington.
Game-goers fly from various airports in the area to the event at about $400 per head and receive an Uber credit for their ride home.
Some events, such as the All- Star Game, have been a success, Brian Dunaway, CEO of Epic, based at Fort Worth’s Meacham Airport, says. Others, such as WrestleMania, have been a dud. “To us, we’re not out anything” in those cases, Dunaway says. “It’s worth losing a little bit of money. The impact of messaging is beyond anything you could pay for.”
What’s Up Next Sherrod, the TCU Entrepreneur in Residence, sees numerous ways entrepreneurs can take advantage of the on-demand economy. “Companies that connect you with your neighbors to borrow tools, toys, etc.,” he says. “You could literally put together a bunch of people who had extra couches or extra TVs and put together an Uber business.”
Barriers to entry: “If there’s an incumbent, it’s going to take a lot of cash,” Sherrod says. “You’ve got to have great developers, and they’re in short supply.”
If there’s no incumbent, software and developers are the chief barriers, he says. “Scaling is the hard part,” Sherrod says. “When you’re doing that kind of sophisticated stuff, and your business depends on them, they have to be employees.”
Investors hunting for opportunities seek companies with strong technology teams first, he said. “If you don’t have the technology people, you’re dead.” .
EPIC AIR SHOW
Fort Worth’s Epic Helicopters, born out of founder’s boredom, looks at potentially “gamechanging” deeper move into training.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
BRIAN DUNAWAY, A HELICOPTER PILOT SINCE AGE 18, WAS IN MARKETING AT A SMALL AD AGENCY AFTER COLLEGE WHEN HE STARTED WRITING THE BUSINESS PLAN FOR A HELICOPTER COMPANY THAT WOULD SPECIALIZE IN AERIAL PHOTOGRAPHY.
One thing led to the next, and Dunaway launched his Epic Helicopters 10 years ago in Fort Worth. His first helicopter was a two-seater Robinson R22 he bought in Wisconsin on a loan and flew with a buddy back to Fort Worth, landing it in an Oklahoma field ahead of a storm, pushing it into a shed, and knocking on a family’s door to ask for use of their Internet connection.
The business has changed substantially since those days. Aerial photography, while fun, makes up only about 10 percent of sales today, and Dunaway quickly shifted to training and charters and tours, which comprise two roughly equal parts of the business.
“The business just wasn’t there,” Dunaway, 36, says of photography. “The phone wasn’t ringing on that. But the phone was ringing on training. People wanted to learn how to fly.”
Dunaway, who grew up in Fort Worth and graduated from Elon University in North Carolina with a business degree, learned some entrepreneurial chops early on, watching his father, Jim Dunaway, build the Dunaway
Associates civil engineering he founded in Fort Worth. On weekends, Dunaway - at the urging of his son - would open the firm’s parking lot near Mayfest and charge $5 or $10. In college, Brian Dunaway bought a townhome his freshman year, helped by a loan his father helped him obtain.
Today, Epic, based at Fort Worth’s Meacham Airport, has six helicopters – all Robinsons – and 12 employees, including seven pilots. It’s pushing further into international training, already regularly hosting students from China, Brazil and Mexico. “You sign up one customer, the volume of hours is there,” Dunaway says. “Most customers are going to need at least 50 hours of training.”
Epic trains three kinds of students: Ones who are paying out of their
pocket or are sponsored to be trained for careers in commercial, charters, tours, aerial photography, oil and gas, medical, or heavy lift; ones who are buying a Robinson helicopter from Epic and training in it; and international. Epic has recently rewritten its training content.
In the meantime, Dunaway says he’s working on strategic partnerships that could significantly change the company by the end of next year.
Earlier this summer, Epic celebrated the grand opening of a 30,000-squarefoot headquarters and training center at Meacham, having been forced out of the airport’s main terminal because of the city’s ongoing renovation plan there.
“We are much more of an educational institution than ever before,” Dunaway says.
Epic Helicopters' Brian Dunaway, with two of his aircraft at Fort Worth's Meacham Airport. Photography by Scott Nishimura
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POWERS’ TRIP
Chris Powers pulled off his first real estate deal at age 18. Now 29, he’s helping redevelop a forgotten part of West Fort Worth.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA / PHOTOGRAPHY BY ALEX LEPE
It was, as Chris Powers acknowledges, “the epitome of what was wrong with the economy.” Only, “I didn’t know it back then.”
A freshman at TCU interested in business, Powers befriended Adam Blake, a TCU student who was already buying houses around the university and later hit the headlines when he bought the Electric Building downtown as a 24-year-old.
The strategy Powers learned from Blake during that era of loose money: “You could go downtown to Countrywide Financial and get a loan with 3 percent down and 6 percent cash back at closing.” Buy the home, lease it to a tenant, take the deal back to the bank for a refi. “Now I can start borrowing against that,” Powers recalls.
By the time Powers graduated early from TCU at age 21, using that strategy, he owned eight single-family homes around TCU. And he’d launched a real estate management business with a web site, running 40-50 units and earning bonuses if he got higher rents than the property owners had been making.
From there, Powers quickly moved on bigger real estate deals. Today, he’s taken the lead among several developers in rebranding 275 acres overlooking the Trinity River off of White Settlement Road in west Fort Worth, with a goal of redeveloping it into a luxury mixed-use hub for residents of Westover Hills, Westworth Village, and Arlington Heights. Powers, who does business today under his Fort Capital banner, says the firm has done $78 million in projects in six years and has $55$60 million in assets under management. That’s a long resume and expansive portfolio for a 29-year-old.
“You only live one life, and you ought to spend it pursuing something you're passionate about,” Powers likes to say, quoting his dad, who died in 2012 from injuries suffered in a cycling accident.
“Tell the truth and be nice, and you’ll be surprised how many doors continue to open to you.”
– Chris Powers
Killer Bees and a Lifelong
Mentor The seeds of entrepreneurship were sown early for Powers, who found a mentor in the El Paso developer Meyer Marcus, whose Mimco Inc. today holds an estimated 7.5 million square feet of space in 320 projects in Texas and New Mexico and has more than 1,600 tenants. The Powers and Marcus families have been friends for several decades, and Powers is close friends of, and plays golf with, Marcus’ son. Powers worked as an intern for Marcus. As teenagers, the boys would convene regularly for all-night parties at the Marcus home, Marcus recalled in an interview. “Then, Chris would wake up at 6 in the morning and come with me” to look at real estate projects, Marcus says.
It wasn’t difficult then for Powers to figure out that
Marcus knew real estate. “You drive around El Paso, you see his signs everywhere,” Powers says. “I knew he owns every great building in El Paso.”
Marcus says Powers’ dad “was always so grateful” that his son had a business mentor at such a young age. “It was not my intention to teach Chris everything I know, but it was his intention to grab onto everything I know,” Marcus says. “It’s just very rare to see a guy like that.”
Today, Marcus and Powers invest in each others’ deals. Marcus, in an interview, said he couldn’t immediately recall the details of his investments in Powers’ deals. “I’ll be honest with you,” Marcus, 63, says. “I don’t even know what they are. But the fact that it’s Chris Powers, I’m not investing in a project, I’m investing with him.”
Their first deal together – the first deal Powers raised money for - was a $35,000 duplex that Powers, then 22, found in foreclosure in south Fort Worth. Powers had noticed some bees flying around the porch, but wasn’t concerned. Then the contractors Powers hired to work on the house disturbed a huge bee’s nest. “The contractors got stung; the bees killed a neighbor’s dog; I thought the world was ending,” Powers says. Worried, among other things, that the bee discovery was going to change the project’s financial pro forma (it didn’t), “I called Meyer.” Marcus chuckles at the memory. Years earlier, his family owned a 30-unit apartment complex. Fire broke out, killing six people. “Chris, this is just the beginning; one day, you’ll laugh at this,” Marcus remembers counseling Powers. “I’ll never laugh at mine. I was 22 or 23. There’s nothing like seeing six
Chris Powers in his River District development, overlooking the Trinity River to the south.
body bags lying in the street.”
First Deal: A Westcliff House Powers graduated a year early from high school and headed for Fort Worth and TCU, where he quickly found another mentor and future partner in Adam Blake, one year ahead and “already the poster boy at TCU of entrepreneurship,” Powers says. “He taught me the ropes.”
Powers looked for his own rental houses to buy, setting up a limited liability company to buy under in 2005. His first deal: a three-bedroom, one-bath home in Westcliff that he converted to a four-bedroom, two-bath house. He lived in it his sophomore year, recruited friends to rent rooms, and learned the basics of property management.
Powers made the 3 percent down payment from money he saved in high school. He had no problems qualifying for the loan, he says. His dad had put him down as a joint holder on a credit card, so Powers – by virtue of his father’s good standing - had strong credit. “It’s one of the best life hacks you can do” for your child, Powers says. “In real estate especially, your credit score is as good as your Social Security number.”
Powers bought the house for $100,000 and, once leased, refinanced the loan at a $140,000 valuation, taking money out to buy more homes that he rented out. “We did that over and over again, until the economy crashed,” he says, using the word “we” to refer to himself. He also obtained a $250,000 line of credit that allowed him to make cash offers for property.
CHRIS POWERS: ON GROWING UP
BORN: 1987, El Paso
GREW UP: El Paso and Lubbock
PARENTS: Christopher and Peggy Powers. Father a Harvard and University of Virginia-educated lawyer who practiced labor law in El Paso until age 38, then decided to become a physician, moving his family to Lubbock, where he graduated from the Texas Tech medical school.
BEING THE 7-YEAR-OLD SON OF A RESIDENT PHYSICIAN: “When you’re 7 and a half, you don’t really know what’s going on. We lived on the nicest street in El Paso; in Lubbock, we lived in a 1,000-square-foot home. Going out to Rosa’s Café was a big deal. But life was still really good when Rosa’s was a big deal.”
HIGH SCHOOL: Coronado High School, El Paso
HOBBY: Golf. Started age 8, played high school varsity, plus-2 handicap. “I wasn’t a superstar, but I was good enough to be dangerous.” Today a 1 handicap, plays once or twice a week, usually at Shady Oaks Country Club in Fort Worth, where he’s a member.
MAKING MONEY AS A TEENAGER: Sold golf clubs on eBay, washed cars, mowed lawns. “If I wanted to buy a golf club that was $100, I’d have to wash (my dad’s) car five times.”
MENTORS: Meyer Marcus, father of a buddy and CEO of Mimco, a shopping center owner with properties across Texas and New Mexico; Adam Blake, TCU whizkid entrepreneur who took down the Electric Building in downtown Fort Worth at age 24.
FIRST DEAL: Single-family home he bought in Fort Worth at age 18, while a student at TCU.
When Powers graduated TCU in December 2008 with a double major in finance and marketing, he already had the full portfolio. He also had earned his real estate broker’s license, having been sponsored by Blake. “I didn’t believe there was a risk,” he says. “There was always demand for stable housing. I wondered why isn’t everyone else doing this? Some of the best ideas were started by people who were super-naïve.”
Still, he says he was afraid of missing payments on his loans and aggressively managed the houses to ensure tenants paid on time and took care of the houses. He hired a firm and started offering monthly cleaning service, which allowed him to check
regularly on his properties, he says. “By the end of the year, we knew what kind of property we were getting back.”
For a year and a half after he graduated, Powers flipped houses with Blake, who liked Powers’ ambition and understanding of the power of leverage in doing real estate deals. They focused on properties in foreclosure, using tricks – Blake says - like using student loan money for down payments. The market crash in 2009 put an end to the speculation in housing flips.
“The banks back then would give almost anybody a loan,” says Blake, who today runs an energy company called Brightergy that he founded in Kansas City. “It was easier to get a loan back then than it is today.”
The market crash meant Powers had to change his financing model. “That’s when I really had to learn how to raise money,” he says. “It went from being ‘we’ll lend money to everybody’ to now they wanted to know everything about you.”
Big Step Up Powers took an even bigger step up with his next partnership, with the builder Andrew Curtis, who was erecting speculative homes on Fort Worth’s West Side. Teaming with Curtis from 2010 to 2012, the partners built speculative luxury homes around TCU. And in partnership with Blake, they also built the Cantey Townhomes, a 12-unit, 36-bed project near the university.
Then, in what turned out to be their biggest deal in 2011, they took an acre under option in the old Linwood neighborhood west of Montgomery Plaza in the West 7th corridor. “During our due diligence, we were told to contact the owner of 6 acres nearby,” Powers says. “We knew our own capabilities,” but he and Curtis decided to have the conversation anyway.
“The whole time we’re meeting with him, he’s selling us on why we need to buy his 6 acres,” Powers says. “And all we wanted was an acre to build 12 townhomes.”
He and Curtis decided to pursue the 6 acres, which were dominated by small 1950s-era single-family homes that were leased to tenants. They closed on the deal in a week, figuring “it was going to be in demand one way or another,” Powers says.
A month later, Powers took a call from a broker in Dal-
las representing Greystar, the national apartment developer. It took 18 months to close the sale of the property to Greystar, during which Powers and Curtis had to reroute a water line, take a street out of the grid, replat lots, do a land swap with another property owner, navigate through a contentious zoning case, and learn how to work with institutional developers.
Powers declines to disclose what the partnership received for the property. “That was my MBA. It was a gamechanger.” Greystar, which developed the site into the Elan West 7th apartments, would pop up again soon in Powers’ Rolodex.
Curtis moved to Pampa to join a family business, and Powers rebranded the Powers and Curtis holding company as Fort Capital in 2012. In 2015, he brought Jake Proctor, who’d been an investor in other deals with Powers, on board as a partner in the firm.
Proctor had assembled six singlefamily properties near TCU in 2012 and pitched that deal to Powers, who went in on it. The two demolished those houses and built new large homes aimed at students, subsequently getting sucked into a protracted debate between neighborhoods and developers and investors about the integrity of the old neighborhoods around TCU.
“I probably spent more than 100 hours on that,” says Powers, who was named to a city task force that came up with new rules designed to limit the growth of socalled “stealth dorms” in the neighborhoods around TCU. “I was surprised the city let it go to the point it went to.”
NEW HUB: FORT WORTH’S RIVER DISTRICT
SEVERAL DEVELOPERS, BROUGHT TOGETHER BY CHRIS POWERS, plan the mixed-use River District on the Trinity River off of White Settlement Road in west Fort Worth. The first phase:
CRYSTAL SPRINGS ON THE RIVER, LVG INVESTMENTS. Named to commemorate the birthplace of Texas Swing, will combine food, healthy living, shopping and recreation. Includes 46,000 square feet of retail/office and 265 apartment units. LVG is working on plans now. crystalspringsontheriver.com
ELAN AT THE RIVER DISTRICT, GREYSTAR. Four-story, 328-unit Class-A “highly amenitized” apartment building that will resemble Greystar’s successful Elan at West 7th in Fort Worth. Under construction, with first units to be completed in summer 2017. elanwest7th.com
FORT CAPITAL, Powers’ firm. Building 16,500-square-foot Class A office building. Fort Capital taking 25 percent for its new offices. Under construction, 97 percent leased, January move-in.
RIVERCREST BLUFFS AND RIVER HEIGHTS, VILLAGE HOMES, JAMES R. HARRIS, AND OTHER BUILDERS. Two luxury housing communities on the Trinity will feature homes ranging from $400,000-$4 million. Model homes under construction or already built. riverheightsfw.com and rivercrestbluffs.com
THE RIVER DISTRICT GARDEN HOMES, FORT CAPITAL AND VILLAGE HOMES. 16 luxury 1,800-2,000-square-foot units starting at $450,000.
CONFIRMED FORT CAPITAL TENANTS: The Truck Yard, Mi Camino, The River House, Nourish at Crystal Springs, relocated Salsa Limon. Tenants in other River District developments: Lettuce Cook Gourmet, Abundio’s Fitness Studio, Flowers on the Square. HGC, the homebuilder, is renovating a building for its new headquarters.
Proctor, who played football for Navy, honed his skills as a door-to-door salesman in high school, setting appointments for a window company. At Fort, he brought a system for property assemblage. Boiled down to a 50-page manual for new hires that the company refers to as its “Fort Capital Bible,” it lays out a system for approaching property owners, including multiple contacts, and a promise of fair all-cash deals with two weeks to closing.
That’s paid off, Powers says, in the River District play, where
Fort Capital has purchased more than 70 properties in 18 months, Powers says. Including the neighboring Westworth Village, Fort Capital has accumulated more than 110 properties, and it now has three people who work on property acquisitions. “It was all door-knocking, cold-calling,” Powers says. “Most people will not walk up to someone’s front door.”
Ideas from the 19th Hole The River District investment began similarly to the Linwood investment: with different intentions.
Powers, who is a member and plays golf at Shady Oaks Country Club, and eats lunch there regularly, likes to go the “scenic route” down White Settlement Road from the company’s offices in the West 7th corridor. Powers was looking for a site for a new office building for the company when he spotted a 2-acre site on White Settlement Road for sale. “We bought it,” he says. Then he saw the 5.5acre RV park next door and bought that. “We bought it for the value of the land, but were able to cash-flow on it” with the RV leases while Fort Capital figured out what to do with it.
“The light went off,” Powers says. He contacted his friends at Greystar, who took the entire 7.5 acres under contract, forming the company’s piece of the River District.
Other developers – Village Homes, builder Jim Harris, LVG Investments, and Greystar – are also launching projects in the area, which borders the Trinity River on the north and is bisected by White Settlement and Roberts Cut-Off roads. Powers brought the groups together, and they worked with the Balcom Agency in Fort Worth on a branding of a 276-acre zone including the developers’ property as the River District. Half of the district is owned by the developers, Powers estimates.
Powers believes 500 single-family homes, 1,500 apartments, and 2,500-3,000 new residents are likely for the River District over the next five years. Salsa Limon, the popular Fort Worth restaurant, is moving its Cultural District restaurant building to the River District, joining several tenants that have already been announced (see box).
“Over the next 24 months, the transformation you’ll see will be significant,” says Powers, who sees the area as a restaurant, entertainment, retail, and office hub for affluent West Side neighborhoods and Westover Hills.
“There’s really no central area for them,” he says. “West 7th is for the younger millennial. The scene has become more about nightlife and bar scenes, which aren't as attractive to those affluent neighborhoods. If it works the way we think, it changes the lifestyles of the west side of Fort Worth.”
Fort Capital owns 40 acres in the River District, half commercial, half residential, Powers says. Fort Capital plans a 16,500-square-foot building and is in master-planning its holdings for restaurant, retail, entertainment, and office, Powers says. “We hope to be done with that by November.” He believes Fort Capital could invest $150 million-$200 million in the River District in the next five years. The firm has
raised about $24 million to buy its property, he said. Powers, who lives in Tanglewood with his wife Mikal, who he married in 2014, are already soaking up the district’s various access points to the river levees, often walking their dogs along the waterfront. Powers says the couple, expecting their first child in March, has no current plan to move to the River District, “but would love to one day.”
Chris Powers, Mentor Powers has also become increasingly active in the entrepreneurship programs at his alma mater TCU, speaking to real estate classes and judging business plan competitions. “I want to wake people up to the opportunities that are available to them,” he says. “Everybody’s got their cause. That’s what gets me out of bed.”
He gets questions these days from would-be real estate investors. The sort of financing he used early on isn’t available any more. But Powers advises these students to focus on projected rents, principal, interest, taxes, maintenance, and fix-up expenses. “Be able to tell a story about the submarket it’s in,” he says. Visit three banks for their perspectives and the possibility “maybe you can get a loan,” he says. Look for potential investors, he says. “The easiest is a family member.”
Most of all, he advises projection of self-confidence. Today’s technology and flow of information helps drive “super-cheap” costs to start businesses, he says. “Some of the biggest companies in the last 10 years were all started by people who were under 25 years old. It’s the perfect time in life to fail. It’s also the perfect time in life to get started.” .
The truth about Pavers.
Today homeowners have a vast amount of choices when it comes to patio products, walkway materials, and types of pool decking. It can be an overwhelming process to research various materials, installation techniques, costs, and value comparisons. It is important to lean on the guidance of professionals in the industry and feel comfortable with the products you choose.
The most typical form of atwork is concrete due to its upfront affordability and simply not knowing your options. However the long-term costs of repair and replacement and lack of elegance or style does not have the ability to add value to your home. We have all too often seen the cracked driveway and walkway, or fell on the slippery concrete decking.
Due to their versatility, aesthetic and Lifetime Product Guarantee, pavers are quickly becoming the preferred hardscape solution among homeowners.
Pavers have a variety of patterns and colors that enable each home to have personal style and touch of character to add to the homes curb appeal. With the driveway and front approach walkway typically the rst thing guests see when arriving at your home, Pavers add elegance that concrete simply cannot. Pavers are designed and installed to last a lifetime when professionally installed and add beauty to any area of your home. It has been recorded through various sources that patio additions with pavers yield a higher return on investment than concrete slabs.
products is to work with a qualified professional with proper certification and education.
How are pavers installed at my home?
After excavation, paver installation occurs on a 4” inch bed of compacted crushed stone to stabilize the base which prevents the movement of the clay soils in our area. They are then laid on a level bed of sand to provide consistent height and proper slope for drainage. After installation, polymeric sand is vibrated into the interlocking joints to provide additional stability and prevent weed growth and ant colonization.
I am ready to move forward, how do I design my new paver area?
Pavers are a versatile product with many different colors and textures to choose that allow them to be a great accent to any home and add style and elegance to your outdoor living space. The best approach when choosing paver
How durable are pavers?
Pavers will last a lifetime when properly installed by a professional installer. Most manufactures guarantee their paving products for life. All Blooms Landcare installations come with 5 year workmanship warranty that you cannot get with concrete.
What if I need my pavers repaired or another patio added?
Another great aspect of pavers is the ability to remove and re-install the product quickly and easily. This is important if you need to install irrigation or utilities under existing walkways and patios. Also because paver products are manmade and produced in a high quality facility we can add on and match any previously installed patio, walkway, or driveway when needed which cannot be done with concrete.
Blooms Landcare continues to provide fine landscape services to Fort Worth residential and commercial clientele. Our reputation has proven our ability to design, develop, manage, and enhance landscapes in our area.
The Transformation Experts
Join us as our professional designers provide insight, share innovations and walk you through the process of dream worthy kitchen design and home remodeling. View our showrooms and enjoy coffee and a lite breakfast with our award winning design team.
Space is limited and fills quickly. Reserve your seat at rsvp@tkstx.com
Saturday- 9 to 11 a.m.
September 24 - Dallas & FW
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Dallas Showroom 1544 Slocum St. Dallas, Texas
Fort Worth Showroom
3116 W. 6th St., Ste. 101 Fort Worth, Texas info@tkstx.com
DARLENE’S KIDS
After 30 years of breaking glass ceilings and launching an Inc. 500 pharmaceuticals manufacturer, Fort Worth’s Darlene Boudreaux is comfortable helping other entrepreneurs reach for their dreams.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA / PHOTOGRAPHY
BY JOSEPH LACERTE
IT WAS A WIDE-OPEN QUESTION FROM AN INTERVIEWER, ONE THAT COULD HAVE ELICITED ANY NUMBER OF ANSWERS, GIVEN DARLENE BOUDREAUX’S LENGTHY RESUME THAT’S TAKEN HER FROM SHATTERING GLASS CEILINGS AT ONE OF THE WORLD’S LARGEST CONSULTANCIES, TO BUILDING A PHARMACEUTICALS’ MAKER IN FORT WORTH THAT MADE THE INC. 500 LIST OF FASTEST-GROWING COMPANIES THREE STRAIGHT YEARS. “DARLENE, WHERE DID YOUR ENTREPRENEURIAL JOURNEY BEGIN?”
Boudreaux could have led with growing up in Seymour, Ind., site of the first robbery of a moving train in the United States, and shadowing her dad, a career pharma chemist. Or getting her MBA at the University of Chicago on a full boat through a program designed to nurture future business leaders (Boudreaux says she’s still uncertain how the committee got the idea she was a future business leader). Or becoming a worldwide partner at the male-dominated Arthur Andersen consulting firm.
According to Boudreaux, her entrepreneurial journey began after she, weary of extensive travel at Andersen and not being able to spend time with her son, joined her father and brother in launching the pharmaceuticals firm in the winter of 1994. It was second nature to her; her dad had worked for a company that made cough syrup and acne meds.
“If I got sick, we could go down and find out what flavors they were running,” Boudreaux said during a recent interview.
Her story has been a lengthy one, and Boudreaux keeps adding chapters, even though it’s been 10 years since she left the helm of the family company, PharmaFab, and stepped back to recharge after her father died and brother decided to exit. Boudreaux, only 52, might have chosen any number of paths, but she took the call from Tech Fort Worth, the small business incubator for tech firms, which was looking for an executive director. In the 10 years since, Boudreaux has been content to help other entrepreneurs reach for their dreams, aggressively expanding the center’s programs for startups. Aiming to fill the gap in early-stage funding for startups, she launched the Cowtown Angels network of angel investors, which made its first investment in 2013. Darlene’s kids, her roster of startups Tech Fort Worth has helped in that time, is famously headed by ZS Pharma, the pharmaceuticals company that recently sold for $2.7 billion.
“I am,” Lea says. “I think she likes working with small companies. She loves the entrepreneurial process. It’s intellectually and emotionally invigorating for her. The (potential from the) number of ideas that come through Tech Fort Worth is exponential. It’s difficult to put a dollar value on that.”
“She has a heart for this,” says Bill Burns, CEO of Encore Vision, a Fort Worth ophthalmic products startup that’s in clinical trials for what promises to be a groundbreaking eye drop treatment for presbyopia, the common blurry vision condition that results from aging. Encore Vision, the Cowtown Angels’ first investment, operates out of offices at Tech Fort Worth, housed in the historic Guinn school complex at South Freeway and Rosedale Street on Fort Worth’s South Side.
“No business school can teach this,” Burns adds, of the credibility Boudreaux brings with her background. “They really try. If you’re doing it, it’s a learning experience all the way around. Until you do that, it’s hard to envision it.”
“You Don’t Have Enough Talent” Boudreaux, a chemistry and math whiz from high school in Indiana, also played clarinet. She had ideas of pursuing a music major in college, but her father told her “you’re going to have to choose something other than music. You don’t have enough talent.” Fourth out of 467 in her high school class, she chose to major in math and German, at DePauw University in Indiana.
“I’m a big believer in bootstrapping for as long as you can do it.”
– Darlene Boudreaux
Next, she moved on to the University of Chicago for her MBA. Serendipity had intervened when she learned about a program that awarded scholarships based on intuition about future business leadership potential. The scholarship paid for her last two years at DePauw, and it paid for her MBA anywhere she could get in. Boudreaux was one of the early women awarded the scholarship.
Andersen had also hired Boudreaux as an intern in Chicago, recruiting at DePauw. “They asked me if I wanted to go into audit, tax or consulting,” she says. “The (recruiter) I went to lunch with was in tax, so I said tax. This was how decisions got made in the early part of my career.”
These days, Boudreaux, now 62, is noodling on whether it’s feasible to add another piece – an independently managed investment fund – to Fort Worth’s early-stage funding sources.
Count Maxwell Lea, chair of Tech Fort Worth and vice president of corporate development and corporate finance at DFB Pharmaceuticals, a Fort Worth healthcare concern, as one of those surprised that Boudreaux has stuck around to enter her 10th year in September at Tech Fort Worth.
When Boudreaux decided to pursue her MBA, Andersen kept her on as a fulltime employee, letting her work for six months and go to school for six months, over two years.
At Andersen, she went into tax, becoming a CPA and winning promotions regularly and moving to the Denver office. “Always, I was the only woman in the room,” Boudreaux says. She decided “I am going to be different, but I don’t focus on that.” Passed over for a promotion to partner, she opted to move to Andersen’s Los Angeles office.
There, in September 1987, Boudreaux says she had a conversation one day with the office’s managing partner, who said he liked all of
his partners to have a specialty. That was Boudreaux’s word she had won a promotion, and she took over the office’s Japanese practice. One of her clients agreed to buy the Pebble Beach golf and resort property in California, and Boudreaux structured the deal.
She then moved to the San Diego office, where the job quickly encroached on time with her son, born in 1990. “I was travelling all the time,” while her husband – Dick Ryan, a planner who had been instrumental in the planning of Vail, Colo., in the 1970s and ‘80s –served as stay-at-home dad, she says.
“Entrepreneur Myth”: Freedom In December 1993, Boudreaux, who estimates she was making $600,000-$700,000 per year at Andersen, left the firm to join her father and brother in a pharmaceuticals manufacturing firm in Fort Worth that her father, Ken Montgomery, had formed. “They needed somebody in finance,” she says. “I made a deal with my husband. We would move here and work for dad two years. Then we’d move back to Denver.”
Then her father and his partner had a falling out. And the day after Thanksgiving in 1994, Boudreaux and her father and brother left and formed PharmaFab as a contract manufacturer to produce capsules, tablets, and liquids. “I went to Barnes & Noble and got a book” on how to incorporate, she says. “PharmaFab was born that day. We sent the forms to the state.”
loan until we got an order,” she says.
The company finally got an order from one of Montgomery’s friends, but it just as soon vanished. Other orders came along. “From then, our customers paid 50 percent at the front and 50 percent on delivery,” Boudreaux says.
Montgomery died in January 1997. Boudreaux and her brother –he, president, and she, treasurer – grew the company to more than 20 employees and approaching $10 million in annual sales by December 1999, when it moved to a 12,000-square-foot Grand Prairie location. From there, it expanded to 50,000 square feet. Boudreaux’s brother had always said he didn’t want to manage a company with more than five employees. “He said, ‘That’s it, I’m out of here,’” Boudreaux says.
“I think she likes working with small companies. She loves the entrepreneurial process. It’s intellectually and emotionally invigorating for her.”
– Maxwell Lea, Tech Fort Worth chair, on Darlene Boudreaux
The three didn’t have non-compete agreements, Boudreaux says. “I now know a lot of the things that can be done very wrong and what the consequences can be,” she says. “I’m a big fan of having your attorney close by.”
Montgomery was diagnosed with lung cancer four weeks after they started the company and told there was a two-year survival rate of 2 percent. “Dad said somebody’s got to be in the 2 percent,” Boudreaux says. “He made it two years and one day. I have always thought I should have told him 10 years.”
With his illness, the family had decided from the start against pursuing investors, Boudreaux says. Ultimately, that allowed the family to go years without bringing on an outside investor. Friends kicked in $100,000, their starting capital. “I’m a big believer in bootstrapping for as long as you can do it,” she says.
The three took six months to come up with a plan, working out of small offices in a bank building. They came up with a five-year revenue pro forma, what Boudreaux calls a “normal hockeystick” forecasting $10 million in revenue after five years. “Everybody has those plans,” she says. “We met that.”
They leased their first space, a 2,400-square-foot spot in the Riverbend Business Park in east Fort Worth, and secured a lease from GE Capital for equipment. “We didn’t buy the credit and trigger the
An appraiser put a $6.5 million valuation on the company. “We had orders for $6.5 million in sales for that fall,” Boudreaux says. “It just made no sense to sell.”
Their attorney recommended finding a way to buy her brother out. Summit Bank agreed to the loan, and Boudreaux became the sole owner in early 2000.
“Then we really started growing,” she says. The company made the Inc. 500 list of fastest-growing companies in 2001, 2002, and 2003, based on five years’ revenue growth. Three percent of those companies were in manufacturing, and 9 percent were founded by women, she estimates.
In 2003, Boudreaux, who won an Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award in life sciences that year, brought in a capital partner to facilitate growth, selling 22 percent of the company for $5.5 million. The day of closing, her husband was diagnosed with a rare form of dementia. Their son, 13, subsequently was diagnosed with a heart condition. “I had to rethink life,” Boudreaux says.
It's at PharmaFab where she learned what she calls the "entrepreneurial myth" of freedom. "Now, you're working 24/7," she says. "The company is in my head all the time."
Taking a Break, then Tech Fort Worth Calls In 2006,
with the company at $28 million in sales and 300 employees, she started working with the venture capital partner to sell. She left in April 2006, and the company sold later that year. “I took a break,” Boudreaux says.
She bought a fixer-upper home in Arlington and spent six months working on it.
Then she took the call from a friend who was looking for an executive director at Tech Fort Worth, which had been in a sleepy existence for eight years incubating technology-based startups. “I really was going to just help them out and find a new executive director,” she says. “I’ll figure out where it is, where it can go, and then start putting the stuff together to get it there.”
Today, Tech Fort Worth has a range of programs, helping university researchers communicate business opportunity for their inventions, entrepreneurs formulate feasible business models for their technology, startups execute their plans, create an entrepreneurial community, and foster student entrepreneurship.
Tech Fort Worth also has nurtured a partnership with the University of North Texas Health Science Center, under which clients can use laboratories. Tech Fort Worth also has partnerships with the University of Texas at Arlington, TCU, the city, and various businesses.
It hosts weekly working lunches on various topics and quarterly networking events. Tech Fort Worth also launched the annual Impact Awards for entrepreneurs. Tech Fort Worth clients move through three core programs. The first, ThinkLab, helps founders and entrepreneurs determine whether there’s sufficient value to pursue a product or service. The second, SmartStart, assists the founders in formalizing the business framework necessary to go to market. The third, FastForward, helps companies that have sales with coaching in growth funding, hiring, increasing sales, and implementing processes. Small office space is available in Tech Fort Worth’s complex, allowing entrepreneurs to move their businesses off of their dining room tables.
break-evens, he said.
Still, the Cowtown Angels are conservative in their picks, having raised more than $58 million. They’ve invested $13 million in 18 companies, with no exits yet. “We’re 18 for 18,” Lee Rogers, owner of a Fort Worth marketing agency and a founding member of the Angels, said during the breakfast. “No exits, no belly-ups.”
Cowtown Angels’ investments include companies in health, technology, pet care, and healthy snacks. The Angels aim to triple or quadruple their money on one of five or six companies. “We ask about exit strategy,” Rogers said. “If they can’t be bought, we really don’t want to invest in them.”
Burns, the Encore Vision CEO, said his company has raised several million dollars so far through equity investments. The Angels’ investment “happened at a crucial time,” he says.
He views Tech Fort Worth is a no-brainer for tech entrepreneurs. “It gives you a place to be and a community where ideas can be shared and approaches to challenges can be shared,” he says. “You could lose a lot if you weren’t part of this network.”
“This is just therapy I get paid for.”
– Darlene Boudreaux, on directing Tech Fort Worth
Tech Fort Worth helped ZS Pharma, which became a client in 2009, simplify its presentations, taking founder Al Guillem to TCU and having him practice before a green wall. ZS’s presentations “were so bad,” Boudreaux jokes. “Complicated drawings, big long words.”
All of Tech Fort Worth’s programs are focused on ensuring founders – and not just their money partners – make money, Boudreaux says.
“We’re focused on the early stage and how the founder makes money from it,” Boudreaux says. “We’re not here to help you file a patent. We’re here to help you build and grow a company based on that. If the entrepreneurs haven’t defined that first, it’s probable the money partner may end up making a lot of money on it, and the founder will not earn a dime.”
Mind the Gap: Early Stage Funding Gap funding has been a big focus, although Boudreaux advises against putting money worries at the head of their to-do lists. Cowtown Angels, which Boudreaux launched as a unit of Tech Fort Worth in September 2012, today has 42 members and has a goal of 60.
Texas, estimated to be the second largest state for angel investing in a nation with 10 million angel investors, is fertile ground for angels. Angel investing is a province of high net worth people, with 85 percent of a typical investment expected to disappear, Jorge Varela, Tech Fort Worth’s director, estimated at a recent Cowtown Angels recruiting breakfast. “Ten percent (of the investment) gives you 2730 percent ROI on your portfolio, and 5 percent are ‘zombies,’” or
Boudreaux says Fort Worth’s toolbox for entrepreneurs is still missing a seed capital fund.
“It seems to me that there are other people (besides angels) who would be interested in some sort of fund,” she said. “I don’t think it’s something we would manage. I think we may be the catalyst. But there would have to be somebody else to make the decisions.”
Lea, Tech Fort Worth’s chairman, isn’t familiar with Boudreaux’s thinking on a seed fund, but said the gap in early stage funding is greatest among life science and technology that’s not related to oil and gas. “There’s a lot of expertise and dollars invested in oil and gas because of the industry that’s located here,” he said.
Tech Fort Worth’s board is amid conversations on planning for the future. “There are opportunities for deeper engagement with universities, cities, local economic development organizations,” he said. “Tech Fort Worth is well-positioned to be an integral part of the Fort Worth innovation ecosystem.”
Boudreaux seems content to continue what she’s doing. Her first husband died seven years after he went into memory care, and Boudreaux remarried three years ago to Stormy Boudreaux, a veteran Air Force pilot who flew missions over Vietnam, Lebanon, Grenada, and Desert Storm and now works for Lockheed Martin. The couple married after they met on match.com.
Having obtained a certification in genealogy from Boston University, she’s contemplated writing. “I have some novels in my head,” she says.
Boudreaux says she could have retired after selling her pharma company. “I didn’t have to work for a living,” Boudreaux says. “I would have been fine.” She had contemplated returning to school. “But Tech Fort Worth came along at the right time before I figured that out. This is just therapy I get paid for.” .
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in a Name:
Means More Money
Fort Worth startup strikes rich ground with software for mineral rights owners.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
Startups aren’t supposed to go this well right out of the gates. But two entrepreneursex-TCU Energy Institute associate director John Baum and ex-oil and gas adviser Ryan Vinson - have hit fertile ground with their software that helps mineral owners manage their holdings and keep track of “mailbox money.”
5 M’s Mineral Management - Managed Minerals Means More Money - was throwing off positive cash flow within its first month of being launched in 2014, says Vinson, the 32-year-old former head of oil and gas advisory at Bessemer Trust, who quit his job to help launch the Fort Worth company. The first version of the software manages interests. In April this year, the firm added a revenue module for clients that tracks “how much money they’re making,” Baum says, including identifying missing payments, suspended funds, and deductions that most clients have previously ignored in figuring their taxes.
5 M’s picked up more momentum this spring when Larry Brogdon, a partner in the Four Sevens Oil Co. in Fort Worth, which scored big in the Barnett Shale, came aboard as the company’s first outside investor, bringing his expertise and array of contacts. 5 M’s doesn’t disclose sales, but says it’s grown rapidly in the last year and half, today approaching 100 clients that range from small and medium-sized royalty owners to institutions like hospitals that own interests. The introduction of the revenue module doubled the company’s recurring revenue within three months, Vinson says.
5 M's, based in small, austere offices in downtown's Oil & Gas Building, has just signed a lease to move into the nearby Fort Worth Club building, tripling the company's office space.
“Normally, you don’t get a software product that’s saleable in that period of time,” says Baum, who left his post as associate director of the TCU Energy Institute to launch 5 M’s, an idea he conceived
A 5 M's account holder's site is built around an interactive map that locates the client's oil and gas interests.
The site shows clients their oil and gas revenue and deductions, and comps for volumes and prices.
while running classes for mineral rights owners at TCU.
Easy Market The 5 M’s partners see a clear market for the software in the 12 million mineral owners in the United States, including 1.5 million in Texas. And those numbers are rising, as owners die and their heirs inherit. Mineral owners – not big companies – control about half the $240 billion U.S. oil and gas production in 2015, 5 M’s estimates. Trust companies can require millions of dollars of assets on account, and charge 6-8 percent to manage.
The only software in the market has been aimed toward oil and gas generating companies, and reporting by oil and gas companies is arcane. The result: mineral owners typically sign off on the lease offers they get in the mail and cash the checks that arrive, without questioning the numbers, the 5 M’s principals say. They cite industry estimates that figure mineral and royalty owners typically are underpaid by 15 percent on average.
Enter Baum, 74, a longtime business academic, consultant, and executive. In his latest turn, as associate director of the TCU Energy Institute, Baum, in 2012, created a royalty owner program that has put 1,500 people through so far. Baum, who owns three ranches handed down from family interests, raises cattle and has oil and gas interests on the properties. At TCU, he was hearing from small and medium-sized owners who wanted software that would help them manage their holdings.
But there was none. Small owners have no idea where to begin in getting organized, he says. “Many of these folks don’t even have documents.”
Baum put the papers together to incorporate outside the Energy Institute, but “we needed somebody who had background in land management and software,” he says. That’s when Vinson attended one of the Energy Institute’s programs.
Top of the Market Startup Selfdescribed “fourth-generation oilfield trash,” Vinson was born and reared in Midland. As a child, he remembers asking his father what the pumpjacks were as they drove through the oil patch. “Son, they’re making money,” his dad replied.
Hooked, Vinson worked on a rig, studied petroleum management at Texas Tech, and took a job as an in-house landman for a company in Denver, where he obtained a master’s degree in oil and gas policy studies at the University of Denver. He moved on to Houston and later Los Angeles before moving back to Texas, where he landed at Bessemer Trust.
There, Vinson met the kinds of clients he says needed a more efficient solution to managing their oil and gas assets. “It shocked me there wasn’t a solution,” says Vinson, who attended the TCU program in search of one and met Baum.
Baum, who spent 20 years as an executive at Texas Instruments before he moved to the TCU Energy Institute, wasn’t looking to retire.
In April 2014, Vinson decided to jump fulltime from Bessemer to launch 5 M’s with Baum. “I knew it was a big risk,” he says. As it turned out, it was the top of the market. “I quit Bessemer at $100 a barrel,” he recalls. “$104 and 87 cents to be exact.” By the end of the year, crude was trading about $53 a barrel.
Baum put in $40,000 in startup capital, with no debt, a position the company retains today. Vinson focused on creating the business plan and assembling the team.
when it went out to hire a landman. In November 2014, they launched their MineralWare Management software.
One Big Goal: Simplicity The goals were simple: to create an easy-to-use platform that continuously updates itself with new information.
Open it up, and the first thing you see is a map connected to your account.
“Being a landman, I really believe in the power of the map,” Vinson says. “You can visually see your assets.” That includes acreage, interests, wells, and well data, all mapped. Inventory is organized by state and county. Documents are organized by asset. Properties are colorcoded – one color for leased, another color for ones that aren’t leased.
“You’re not having to jump through multiple sources,” Vinson says. The inventory feature has been a revelation for clients, he says. “None of our clients ever had an inventory. They just got a lease and signed it. We’ve had clients come in with boxes on a dolly.”
The customer’s map also shows wells that are paid and not paid on, and the customer can see why a well isn’t being paid. Reasons can vary, from title issues, to change of address, probate issues, failure to sign a division order setting forth proportional ownership, and data dropped in a sale. Mineral owners, Brogdon says, in many cases “don’t even know what they own.”
“Go to a CPA, and you’re going to spend a fortune. They don’t want to fool with it.”
– Larry Brogdon, 5 M’s investor
Baum helped feed clients. His son, Ken Baum, came on board in April 2014 as chief information officer and another colleague, Josh Ellinghaus, came on as IT director. In October that year, the company got 500 resumes
The software also identifies and organizes deductions, churning out simple documents mineral owners can take to their CPAs. Mineral owners and CPAs typically ignore the costs, focusing only on the revenue, Brogdon says.
“You have all these costs,” says Brogdon, who – along with the company – declines to say how much ownership he’s taken in 5 M’s or what he invested in it. Mineral owners often dump boxes of
check stubs on their CPAs, driving up their costs.
“It’s hard to capture those deductions, because every check stub is different,” Brogdon says. “Go to a CPA, and you’re going to spend a fortune.”
Publicly available data, dumped into the company’s information system, regularly updates customers’ accounts.
The site also has features that make it the oil and gas version of the real estate Multiple Listing Service, containing broad well data including production, average prices paid, formation, and dates of drilling and completion. It collects information on lease terms, including bonuses, and royalty range. Mineral owners can draw on that to determine whether the terms on their deals are fair.
“Behind this, there’s thousands and thousands of pages and documents, and copious amounts of data,” Vinson says. “We’re close to some analytics that can be very valuable.”
5 M’s charges a minimum $100 per month for the service, based on the number of counties that a client needs mapped. For the whole state, the minimum cost is $500 per month. Clients can add other services. 5 M’s can help a client find documents, going online first and, as a last resort, sending people into the courthouse. It’ll review leases on an hourly rate and can help negotiate better terms on a lease.
“We’ve been in the oil and gas business, so usually, we know somebody on the other end of a phone call,” Vinson, whose family has interests in 41 counties, says. His own family’s management of its oil and gas interests illustrates the problem 5 M’s is confronting, he says. “As leases come in, they sign them. There’s
not a whole lot of due diligence.”
5 M’s originally set out to pursue management for big mineral owners but pivoted to focus on small to large mineral owners and institutions such as banks.
“Most of our royalty owners are not oil and gas professionals,” Baum says. “Our software had to be easy to use.” His father was “pretty good” at managing the family’s interests, Baum says, but “it was mostly mailbox money.” Vinson: “The more assets you have, the harder it is.”
Brogdon himself has become a client. The record-keeping on his interests is simple, he jokes: “I had a filing cabinet. And I was not paying any attention to the deductions. It was mailbox money. It’s embarrassing.”
“Most of our royalty owners are not oil and gas professionals. Our software had to be easy to use.”
– John Baum, 5 M’s
Growing Fast 5 M’s in August hired another programmer and recently brought on two more landmen. It’s also getting the word out through advertising and attendance at trade shows. The company, so far, has retained 100 percent of its clients, its principals say. It’s in “pretty heavy conversations” with more institutions about managing their holdings, Baum says. The company isn’t looking to raise more money, Vinson says. When Brogdon came along, “we weren’t out actively trying to raise money. We knew we had to raise money. We were growing so fast, we needed an influx of capital to fund our growth. But for us, it had to be the right guy.”
“God has really blessed us,” Baum says. “The typical startup goes through a period where it’s under water a long time. The biggest concern is running out of money. We’ve been able to pay our own way from the beginning.”
5 M'S founders Ryan Vinson and John Baum, with investor Larry Brogdon
Photo by Julien & Lambert
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Kim Booker
Sold on entrepreneurship, serial saleswoman Kim Booker moves from telecom to insurance, restaurants, T-shirts and training, and finds the time to squeeze in a book and an executive MBA.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA / PHOTOGRAPHY BY ALEX LEPE
Booker, 51, got grounded in sales at a small telecom company, became a multi-office owner in Fort Worth at Nationwide Insurance, sold that business, and, lately, has taken over the Fort Worth office of Sandler Training, the 40-yearold global training company. She invested in an ill-fated, two-store Fuzzy’s Taco Shop venture in Arizona (its eventual sale was portended when Booker’s local operating partner decided to move away), opened the downtown San Antonio location of the Del Sol retailer of T-shirts that change colors, and obtained her executive MBA from the University of Texas at Arlington in her 40s. And at Sandler, Booker, a member of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization, has co-written a book called “Selling to Homeowners the Sandler Way,” a manual for selling products and services to consumers in their homes.
“Best Sales Training I Ever Got” It was at that little company called Lanier. We sold phone systems. Every day, you had to go out and make cold calls, and you didn’t come back until you had 50 cards. At the end of the day, managers would debrief you, and everybody would get up, and they might say, 'Scott, tell us how you overcame that objection today.’
Biggest Mistake
Salespeople Make
In the Sandler world, we find that people will meet with you if you talk about a problem that you solved, not a feature. You let them talk about what’s important to them, then you come back with a solution. That's not
how most salespeople work. Most salespeople are filled with product knowledge. When they go out, they talk about features 80 percent of the time. They spend a lot of time going back and doing quotes and, unfortunately, they send them via email. And, of course, purchasing doesn’t have any problem taking all these quotes. They don’t have any problem sending it to your competitors. And, then, salespeople spend a lot of time with what they say is ‘follow up.’
Insurance: One Office to a Bunch They started letting the top agents open satellites. Over the next few years, I opened six different offices and also had some strategic partner-
ships. I had an office in a CarMax and strategic alliances with a real estate and mortgage brokerage. That was way before people could buy insurance online. We had an office in a Fiesta. We opened some satellites in Granbury, Roanoke, Wylie.
Selling Her Agency
After 15 Years It was a great business, but the tradtional home/auto insurance was moving more online and away from the relationship business, and I wanted to go out on top.
Getting an MBA in Her Mid-40s I kind of felt like I’m in an insurance bubble (in her later years with Nationwide). I knew I wasn’t doing it so I could go work for corporate
America. In the back of my mind, I’m trying to think ahead of my arc. I don’t see myself at 65 retiring, but it might be interesting in the latter years to teach sales or entrepreneurship at a college. I also thought, if I’m going to get into this consulting business (she was about to write all of her own sales training content before she found Sandler), I don’t want people to see me as an insurance person.
Becoming a Retailer While I was doing that (getting her MBA), my husband and I had gone on a cruise to Alaska and we’d seen something called Del Sol. They have T-shirts, nail polish. I thought that would be a cool thing to own. The model is you
open it, you own it, it’s a wholesale agreement, not a franchise. You can contract with them to provide all the interns that run it. It was awesome. We would take our kids down there during the breaks, and they would work in it. Eventually, I had to sell it, because I had too many businesses.
Lessons Learned From Restaurants
I can’t even tell you the lessons we learned. But one of them was pick the right partners. Sometimes, businesses aren’t successful and there are things beyond your control. Don’t get emotionally connected to it, cut your losses. It made me more aware that if I’m going to invest, I want to be in control.
Due for a Win?
Failing at business? Either you’re not cut out for it, or your turn is up.
BY JASON FORREST Forrest Performance Group
With a dozen and a half failed business ventures in a row, you have a choice in how you look at things:
1) You can decide you’re just not cut out for entrepreneurship.
2) You can assume you’re due for a win.
It’s a good thing Walter Monk chose the latter, because the 19th pursuit after that long string of failures made it big. If you can dream it, Walter Monk has probably pursued it. He’s done every-
thing from lobster catching (though he didn’t catch any) to matchmaking. Monk has established himself as an authority through at least a dozen highly successful pursuits, including Pollmakers, which conducts online polls and is doing particularly well during this election season. With his next endeavor, called You May Play, he seeks to do nothing less than revolutionize the way we experience the internet.
The only thing Walter Monk has man-
aged to do more than to fail is to succeed. Here are my top five takeaways from my very inspiring interview with Monk:
1) Fail fast. Being willing to fail drives people to give their very best in every endeavor, without a nagging voice holding them back. Fear drives people, too, just in the other direction. It motivates people to pull back and disengage. It’s not wrong to desire success and greatness, but it’s unwise to embrace only suc-
Pollster Walter Monk, in his offices
Concerns
cess. Success tastes so sweet because of the failures before. Walter Monk has had more businesses fail than succeed, but the ones that have done well have done very well. If you want to succeed, be okay with failing and failing fast.
2) Sometimes people who tell you it won’t work are wrong. In 1977, Ken Olsen, founder of Digital Equipment Corporation (later acquired by Compaq) famously said, “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” People always say new ideas won’t work. Monk advises entrepreneurs to just
go at it and test and see if people want what you’re putting out there because, sometimes, the things that seem the most out there are the ones that do the best. Monk has had 12-15 businesses that have reached at least a million dollars in sales. If you have the right amount of “I can do this,” sometimes you can.
3) But sometimes, they’re right. Monk spent over a million dollars of his own money on a company with upscale survival gear marketed to women. People told him it wouldn’t work, but Monk felt there was a market for his idea. “It got tons of press,” Monk says, “but almost no sales.” It was a failure of epic proportions, and he is still paying for it. This time (and a lot of others) the naysayers were right. When this is the case, refer again to point one.
Whether it’s a business venture or a relationship, sometimes you have to walk away even when you’ve invested deeply.
4) Pursue who you want to be, not what you want to be. Every person can contribute something. After 63 years and a mountain of business success, Monk is driven by a desire common to most people. “I want to help a lot more people,” he says. If you pursue who you want to be, the what falls into place. If you don’t, you don’t find joy in either. Monk says nothing compares to seeing people get to the point where they know
“I can do this” and knowing he’s played a part in it.
5) Build the right team. Having the right team who do their roles very well makes entrepreneurship less scary. “The team makes the trains run on time so I can do what I do,” Monk says.
Sometimes, the safest place to be is the one that feels the scariest. Lions—with their intimidating teeth and deafening roars—are designed to provoke fear. But the real danger lies with the smaller, quieter lionesses. In the animal kingdom, the lion’s job is to roar and send prey scattering away from the startling noise—right into the path of the waiting lionesses, the true hunters. If gazelles knew to run toward the frightening sound, they would have a better chance of survival. The roar doesn’t represent the real danger.
Likewise, humans sometimes have an instinctive desire to shy away from pursuits that look and sound scary. But often, running toward those challenges and conflicts is the best (or only) way to grow and meet our goals. In business, those who run from the deafening noise never reach their full potential, while those who turn and face the fear thrive.
Monk’s whole life has been about running toward the roar. With each failure, he picks himself up and gets back in the saddle. In business and in life, it’s good to be persistent, courageous, and maybe even a little reckless.
Jason
Forrest is CEO of Forrest Performance Group, a global leader and designer of sales, management, and corporate training programs. He grew up “under the influence” of his father, a business owner and professional salesman, and his mother, a persuasive speaking professor. Jason is a regular contributor to FW Inc.
Monk: "Pursue who you want to be."
Private Investment Bolsters Economic Success
BY BILL THORNTON President and Chief Executive Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce
In most U.S. cities, economic development is handled by a government agency or its designated public sector partner. From recruitment to incentive negotiations to final site selection, these organizations are working to bring new business opportunities to their communities. However, Fort Worth has adopted a different way of doing things. We learned long ago that augmenting government initiatives with public-private partnerships is effective for economic vitality.
Public-private partnerships at the grassroots level are at the heart of Fort Worth’s success. One of the earliest examples involves the expansion of the
Texas & Pacific Railway (T&P) in 1873. Fort Worth’s survival depended on the completion of a T&P Railway extension that would bring the line into the city, but the project seemed to have stalled. A group of Fort Worth community leaders including John Peter Smith decided to take up the cause by organizing the Tarrant County Construction Co. to provide capital investment, labor, materials and supplies. Major K.M. Van Zandt further supported the cause by leading a group of business leaders to donate 320 acres of land to the railroad for the line extension.
The investment paid off handsomely. When the rail line was completed in 1876, Fort Worth became a major market center along the historic Chisholm Trail, and the Fort Worth Stockyards was the premier center for cattle trade. More than a century later, the Fort Worth Stockyards continues to serve as
a significant source of economic revenue for the city, drawing millions of visitors annually.
Fast forward several decades, and private investment once again played a key role in Fort Worth’s long-term economic growth. This time, it spurred the evolution of Sundance Square, a mixed-use development that is one of the most successful downtown revitalization projects in the nation.
By the 1970s, decades of urban decay had taken its toll on downtown Fort Worth. Sid and Perry Bass decided to invest hundreds of millions of dollars to buy land and renovate historic buildings in downtown Fort Worth to attract office users, restaurants and retailers. Today, Sundance Square is a premier destination for companies that want to be in the heart of downtown. It also attracts major events that place a national spotlight on Fort Worth, such as serving as the production center for ESPN during NFL Super Bowl Week in 2011 and the NCAA Final Four in 2014.
With the Bass family heavily involved in downtown revitalization, another prominent local investor focused his attention on north Fort Worth. Through Hillwood Properties, Ross Perot, Jr. and his development team created AllianceTexas, an 18,000-acre, master-planned community that is home to more than 425 companies. The community also includes over 1.2 million square feet of retail, restaurant, medical and entertainment components integrated with a variety of single-family and luxury apartment home options.
Since its inception in 1989, it is estimated that AllianceTexas has generated approximately $60 billion in economic impact for the North Texas region. The development is anchored by the Alliance Global Logistics Hub, which offers strategic intermodal transportation access through Fort Worth Alliance Airport, the BNSF Intermodal Facility, BNSF and Union Pacific rail lines and the FedEx Southwest Regional Sorting Hub.
AllianceTexas continues to expand and increase its economic influence. Most recently, Facebook selected the development as the site for its fifth, and largest, data processing center.
The economic development efforts of Fort Worth’s private investors are supported by close partnerships with community organizations and publicsector entities, especially when it comes to creating a highly skilled workforce. For instance, Tarrant County College (TCC) works directly with business leaders to create customized certification programs and classes to train current and future employees with specific skill sets. As well, the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce, Workforce Solutions of Tarrant County and the Fort Worth Independent School District all work together to identify workforce trends
and ensure that residents of all ages are being prepared for the jobs of today and tomorrow.
A recent partnership established between Texas Christian University and the University of North Texas Health Science Center to offer an M.D. program is another great example of a publicprivate partnership that benefits the local economy. The program is funded by a group of private donors who understand that enhancing the city’s medical workforce is vital to the growth of Fort Worth’s life sciences sector. By getting private donations instead of public funds, the program will be available to students sooner than it would if going through the normal processes because it did not require the approval of the Texas State Legislature.
Without a doubt, the pioneering spirit
that got a major railroad extended to Fort Worth, and changed the city’s course of history, has evolved into the entrepreneurial spirit that is constantly feeding Fort Worth’s robust economy with even more opportunities. With the ongoing involvement and support of today’s local business leaders, we have every reason to believe that public-private partnerships will continue to be the key to Fort Worth’s long-term economic vitality.
Bill Thornton is president of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber provides an economic development update in each issue of FW Inc.
The FW Inc.
ENTREPRENEUR OF EXCELLENCE AWARDS
FW Inc. magazine has created Greater Fort Worth’s first and only Entrepreneur of Excellence (EOE) awards competition to showcase and honor the contributions of 30 exceptional entrepreneurs in the area. Nominees in 10 categories will compete for 10 top EOE Awards.
This program will evaluate each entrepreneur’s financial performance, integrity, growth, risk, leadership, strategic direction, innovation, company values, key employee initiatives and community involvement. The FW Inc.
EOE awards will identify high-growth, privately owned companies that will benefit from the award’s recognition and future business services provided by our sponsor partners. Three finalists from each category will be featured in a future issue of FW Inc. Anyone can nominate an exceptional entrepreneur – you can even nominate yourself. All applications must be received no later than Sept. 15 to be eligible. For more details on the award and to nominate an outstanding entrepreneur today, go to fwtx.com/fwinc/eoe.
APPLICATION PERIOD ENDS September 16
It’s OT, and We’re Not Talking Football
Employers
move to contain costs from government’s updated overtime rules.
BY SCOTT NISHIMURA
larly vulnerable, he said. “Lots of hours, no overtime,” particularly for frontline managers, he said.
Employers can increase pay to exempt level to avoid paying overtime, Cawyer said. They can also convert employees’ status to non-exempt and track their hours, he said.
The administration may not have considered the actions employers might take to minimize overtime, Cawyer said in an interview. “The government overestimated the benefit,” he said.
Some employees may end up losing benefits, Cawyer said. “I don’t think the government took that into account, either,” he said. For one, exempt managers and supervisors eligible for profit-sharing plans may lose that eligibility if their employers move them to non-exempt status, Cawyer said. “You could have a loss of benefits,” he said.
OVERTIME RULES
Employers are aggressively moving to contain compensation costs ahead of the Dec. 1 federal deadline to begin paying overtime to more workers, under President Obama’s update of overtime regs earlier this year.
The update raises the annual compensation levels needed for executive, administrative and professional workers to be exempt to $913 per week from the current $455, or $47,476 annually from
$23,660. The administration projected more than 4 million workers in the first year alone would see pay increases.
“Employers are going to do whatever they can to get the same amount of work from employees without increasing labor costs,” Russell Cawyer, a lawyer in Kelly Hart & Hallman’s Labor and Employment Practice Group in Fort Worth, says. “Employers are going to take steps to minimize the impact.”
Retailers and restaurants are particu-
For employees who are close to the new threshold, but under it, companies may just raise their salaries, Cawyer said. “I’m probably just going to gross them up and maintain the status quo,” he said.
The equation gets more complicated for affected employees who are underneath the new threshold by a long shot. Employers could choose to make them non-exempt, pay overtime, hire parttime workers to fill the gap, and reassess the hourly rate, Cawyer said. “Hourly plus overtime matches what I was paying them,” he said.
The updated regs could create a workplace morale problem for some employers, Cawyer said. He cites the example of a workplace that has managers making $45,000 and $55,000. The employer could legally maintain separate treatments for those groups of employees. “That could decrease employee morale and make them feel less valuable to the organization,” Cawyer said.
The upside of the publicity surrounding the regulatory update, Cawyer said: “It will be a rare employer that comes up to December not having had the opportunity to deal with this.”
I read FW Inc. because…
“There’s an entrepreneurial spirit unique to Fort Worth, and FW Inc. captures that perfectly. It’s become a ‘go-to’ read for me.”
Ken Schaefer President – Schaefer Advertising
Mentoring the Millennials
Real Estate Council reaches out to millennials with mentoring and professional development.
BY KAREN VERMAIRE FOX
Real Estate Council of Greater Fort Worth
"We are committed to mentoring our millennials. Their input into our growth and development is vital to the future of Fort Worth."
- Michael Bennett
You’re 25 and just starting your career in commercial real estate. Where do you find the additional skills and mentoring you need to enhance your career? From the Real Estate Council, of course.
What does REC have for the millennials that is different from everyone else?
The Real Estate Council is all about mentoring – so much so they offer an annual mentoring series each fall. This four-lunch series is offered to a class of 30 young leaders who attend one lunch a month to learn from leaders in the community.
Not only does the class get to hear from real estate professionals and community leaders during the lunches, each attendee also has the opportunity for one-on-one mentoring and professional development.
Of course, REC mentors say they get just as much from these mentoring op-
portunities as the young leaders do. This is a win-win for all involved.
Leadership and networking are also key components available to young real estate professionals. Young leaders can serve on the Steering Committee and help lead and direct the focus of the organization.
Leaders plan everything from the mentor series, to professional development classes, to community service and networking events.
Want to roll up your sleeves and learn more about how the industry works? The YLC Steering Committee might be just the place for you to do that.
With over 100 young professionals as members, young leaders also have chances to give back and actually put their skills into action.
Each fall, YLC members plan a little bit of fun as a means for giving back with their work on the annual Dodgeball Tournament.
Teams of real estate professionals play dodgeball not only for the glory of winning the top trophy, but also as means for supporting public education.
In the past, they have donated money to local Fort Worth ISD elementary schools. This year, funds raised from the September 22 tournament will benefit the new library at the Presbyterian Night Shelter and fund YLC participation in Leadership ISD.
To further put their skills into action and learn about all aspects of the development, the young leaders developed a new program they tested in the spring of 2016. Think “Shark Tank” meets the Fort Worth Panther, and you will understand the Panther Den event.
Groups of young real estate professionals from various aspects of the industry were teamed together to plan and present a development project to a set of judges.
The group with the best project presentation won glory and recognition from the judges.
“The Panther Den was a great learning experience for all involved,” reports Casey Tounget, YLC Steering Committee Chair.
“Many of us only know one segment of the market. Working on a team to present before judges taught us how others think when they are looking to develop something. It was an excellent learning experience, and we are already starting to plan next year’s Panther Den.”
The mission of the Real Estate Council is to serve as a unified voice for the commercial real estate industry, influencing action and supporting change to accomplish long-term job growth and enhance the quality of life in Fort Worth and Tarrant County.
“We are committed to mentoring our millennials,” says Michael Bennett, chair of the Real Estate Council. “Their input into our growth and development is vital to the future of Fort Worth.
Karen Vermaire Fox represents the Real Estate Council of Greater Fort Worth. The council is a unified voice for the commercial real estate industry. The Council is a regular contributor to FW Inc.
Navigating Obamacare
Twenty million more covered since Obamacare, but the law’s economic impact on individuals, companies and the marketplace is still taking shape.
BY SARAH CALDWELL Tax manager JTaylor & Associates
The
Affordable Care
Act: What Has Happened and What Is to Come
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, ‘ACA,’ or “Obamacare” as it is known to supporters and critics alike, was supposed to reduce the number of uninsured in America and improve access to healthcare services. Since the law’s passage in 2010, an estimated 20 million people have gained health coverage. However, due to the structure of the law, with many provisions delayed or not taking effect until years after its passage, the economic impact on individuals, companies, and the marketplace is still taking shape.
The law, which is as expansive as it is controversial, will continue to affect healthcare costs, employer hiring decisions, and tax policy for years to come. This article will focus on three areas that should be on the minds of CEOs and managers as they make plans for the future.
Impact on Healthcare Cost According to the Kaiser/HRET Survey of EmployerSponsored Health Benefits covering years 1999 to 2015, employer-sponsored plans have seen an average increase in premiums of 4 percent a year since the ACA was passed. Premium increases averaged 5.5 percent a year prior to the ACA.
The Urban Institute published a comparison of 2015 and 2016 exchange premiums (for individuals not covered under an employer plan) for the lowest-cost silver plans indicating that the change in premiums was vastly different depending
on location. Although the national average was an 8.3 percent increase, Texas saw a statewide increase of only 1.2 percent, and Fort Worth-Dallas saw a 6.7 percent decrease. Austin experienced a 15.7 percent increase attributed to a third of the insurers leaving the market.
Beyond the impact on premiums, the ACA’s regulatory burdens have increased other employer expenses. In a survey by the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans (IFEBP), employers noted the primary increase in non-premium cost for 2016 relates to reporting, disclosures, notifications, and general administration of the ACA. The majority cited gathering data, interpreting forms, determining reportable individuals, and meeting deadlines for IRS forms as the most challenging aspects of the law.
number of covered employees. Attracting and retaining employees was the primary reason for maintaining coverage.
However, to contain costs, employees are being asked to bear more of the expense. Employee premium increases have averaged 5.5 percent (single coverage) to 5.9 percent (family coverage) from 2010 to 2015 with employers absorbing an average of 4.2 percent over the period. Other common strategies include increasing out of pocket limits, in-network deductibles, copayment and coinsurance, prescription drug costs and dependent coverage.
Most companies in the IFEBP survey did not feel positively about the ACA, but conceded there were aspects they would like to keep if the law were repealed, such as elimination of pre-existing conditions exclusions, coverage of children until age 26, and no cost sharing for preventative care.
"It's still too early to tell the net financial impact of ACA. With the November elections coming up, the electorate may further weigh in on the direction the country should go."
Excise Tax Increases for 2016
There are two tiers of employer-shared responsibility payments imposed for noncompliance. In the first, a payment is assessed for applicable employers who (1) do not offer minimum essential coverage as required and (2) have at least one full-time employee who received a premium tax credit to enroll in coverage. This payment will rise to $2,160 annually for 2016.
Company Reactions Despite predictions that employers would drop healthcare coverage en masse from employee benefit plans, employer-sponsored coverage levels have remained consistent. According to the IFEBP, only a small number of employers have taken action to reduce employee coverage by decreasing their workforce, hours, or hiring. In contrast, some employers have increased the
If an employer offers coverage as required but (1) it is not affordable (as defined by regulators), does not provide minimum value, or fails to meet other requirements, and (2) a least one employee obtains a premium tax credit, they will be subject to a second tier payment, which will increase to $3,240 annually in 2016.
For individuals, the penalty in 2016 for failing to maintain coverage increases to
to the greater of 2.5 percent of the excess of household income over the personal exemption for the tax year or a flat dollar amount of $695 for each taxpayer and dependent, generally.
Employers are also taking action to avoid triggering the 40 percent excise tax on high-cost plans, referred to as the Cadillac Tax, effective in 2020. The Cadillac Tax is expected to be the greatest cost driver for employers in the implementation of the ACA. Employers will be responsible for calculating the excess benefit subject to the tax and must notify the IRS and each coverage provider. The tax itself is paid by the coverage provider, which may or may not be the employer. Although not necessarily liable for the tax, it’s expected that the cost will be passed through to employers and their employees. The IFEBP found the most popular method to avoid Cadillac Tax was use of highdeductible plans.
Conclusion Although the law has added layers of compliance and administrative burdens, more Americans are now enrolled in healthcare coverage and positive changes such as the elimination of pre-existing condition clauses have taken place. It’s still too early to tell the net financial impact of the ACA. With the November presidential and congressional elections coming up, the American electorate may further weigh-in on the direction the country should go regarding required health insurance coverage, and because of that, the ultimate future of the ACA remains to be seen. Company leadership should seek guidance from their legal, financial, and accounting advisors to help navigate this uncertainty.
Sarah Caldwell, CPA, is a Tax Manager with JTaylor & Associates and is writing this column on behalf of the Fort Worth Chapter of the Texas Society of Certified Public Accountants. The Fort Worth CPAs are a regular contributor to FW Inc.
JTaylor is a full-service Accounting and Business Consulting firm based in Fort Worth.
Coming in November
The applications have been submitted.
The employers’ policies, practices, be nefits, demographics, and employees’ engagement and satisfaction have been reviewed.
The November 2016 issue of FW Inc. will reveal the 20 top-rated companies. These winning companies will be recognized, and the top five will be revealed live at the Best Companies to Work for in Fort Worth awards luncheon on Thursday, Nov. 10th.
Blue Zones Gaining Momentum
Community well-being initiative designed to lower healthcare costs, improve productivity in Fort Worth.
BY LAURA MCWHORTER Vice President Texas Health Resources Foundation
Healthy cities make for engaged, vibrant communities that attract businesses and families. That’s what Blue Zones Project -- a community-led well-being improvement initiative designed to make healthy choices easier by encouraging sustainable changes in our built environment and social networks – is all about.
Blue Zones Project is gaining momentum in its efforts to make Fort Worth one of the healthiest cities in the country since officially kicking off in February 2015.
Brought here by Texas Health Resources with help from the City of Fort Worth and the Fort Worth Chamber, Blue Zones Project is supported by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas, Bell Helicopter, BNSF Railway, Cook Children’s Healthcare System, Lockheed Martin, The Ryan Foundation and the Sid Richardson Foundation. Blue Zones Project fosters sustainable well-being through simple changes to the environment and daily routines. Principles are based on lifestyles in the world’s Blue Zones areas, regions whose inhabitants have more happiness, less disease, and longer life expectancy.
Studies show improving workforce well-being by 10 percent led to 5 percent fewer unscheduled absences and 5 percent higher reported job performance.
Simply put, by helping people live longer and better through behavior change, communities can lower healthcare costs, improve productivity and boost national recognition as a great place to live, work and play.
For businesses that provide employee insurance coverage, the wellness component in corporate health care is indispensable to manage costs, maintain high productivity and improve employee morale. As the city builds a healthier workforce, this attracts both business and top talent to our area and further improves our quality of life.
Studies show that improving workforce well-being by 10 percent led to 5 percent fewer unscheduled absences, 5 percent higher reported job performance, and 6 percent more days of ‘best work’ in a 28-day period.
That’s why a growing network of local businesses and organizations have joined this initiative. Today, Fort Worth counts
48 Blue Zones Project Approved worksites, 25 restaurants, four grocery stores, three schools, and one church, plus 11 participating organizations—all of which have made changes or continued programs that make well-being a priority.
More than 15,000 people who live or work in Fort Worth have also taken the Blue Zones Personal Pledge, a commitment to improve individual well-being. That includes adopting habits of the world’s longest living people, outlined in Blue Zones Power 9 principles. They include things like knowing your purpose, putting family first, eating more fruits and vegetables, and finding time to downshift.
Fort Worth is among 26 communities across seven states that are part of the Blue Zones Project, and we are starting to get noticed. Earlier this year, the Healthcare Leadership Council, a coalition of chief executives from the nation’s leading healthcare companies and organizations, named Blue Zones Project - Fort Worth as the recipient of the organization’s Wellness Frontiers Award for innovation contributing to the transformation and improvement of American healthcare.
Blue Zones Project is about making Fort Worth a healthier, more vibrant city. As business leaders, we can support that effort by getting our companies – and even our own families – involved. After all, it’s good for business, and good for each of us individually, as we strive to live longer, healthier lives.
For more information or to get involved, visit www.LiveLongFortWorth. com.
A
Laura McWhorter is vice president of Texas Health Resources.
TCU graduate, McWhorter works in the Texas Health Resources Foundation and with Blue Zones Project Fort Worth.
Inspiring a Shared Vision
How best to do this in your workplace? Fort Worth’s GE Manufacturing Solutions has ideas.
BY HARRIET HARRAL Executive Director Leadership Fort Worth
Abook by James Kouzes and Barry Posner,
called The Leadership Challenge, outlines five practices of exemplary leadership:
• Model the way
• Inspire a shared vision
• Challenge the process
• Enable others to act
• Encourage the heart
My previous column in the July issue of FW Inc. demonstrated how Fidelity Investments models the way for employees to live out their value of good corporate citizenship.
The second leadership practice is “Inspire a shared vision”:
• Leaders have a desire to make something happen, to change how things are, to create something that no one else has ever created before.
• Leaders cannot command commit-
ment; they can only inspire it.
• To enlist others in a common vision, leaders must know their constituents and be able to relate to them in ways that energize and uplift them.
An excellent example of inspiring a shared vision can be found at GE Manufacturing Solutions, the 1 million-squarefoot locomotive manufacturing plant built in North Fort Worth in 2012.
“At GE Manufacturing Solutions, we tell all our employees, ‘You run this place,’” Walter Amaya, the plant manager says. “Our employees understand they are responsible for the environment we work in, the culture we create, and they are empowered to make changes and drive impact for the business.”
Starting a brand new facility provided a perfect opportunity to foster this vision of inclusion as well as allowing employees to grow in their skills and their careers while growing the business.
Amaya maintains this shared vision has positioned the facility as one of the most competitive and productive sites supporting GE Transportation’s Global Supply Chain. In the first year, the plant ramped up to build three locomotives per week. With the involvement of team members, the production rate at the plant has grown to 10 locomotives per week. This past July, within just three years of opening the plant, they celebrated the completion of their 1000th locomotive.
The plant is intentional about assuring all employees are engaged. Two strategies to foster a shared vision include:
• The Star Points Program, which facilitates regular meetings of team members and leadership regarding business and potential improvements, and
• The Moonshine Shop where team members provide ideas that are tested and validated to improve efficiency and/or safety. This year to date, they have identified 120 ideas that have provided more than $550,000 in savings.
When asked his advice for others on inspiring a shared vision, Amaya said:
• Maintain open lines of communications with employees regarding business goals and challenges. Involve them in identifying and implementing solutions to achieve/exceed goals and overcome challenges.
• Most important, developing shared leadership is an ongoing process. It is a journey, not a destination. The cooperation among the leadership and team members must be continuously cultivated as business goals, challenges and employees change.
As Kouzes and Posner say, inspiring a shared vision is the practice that sets some leaders apart from others. This practice engages team members to tie their personal dreams to the goals of the group; it creates the incentive for the team to commit their energy and expertise to the shared effort to achieve greatness.
GE Manufacturing Solutions provides an excellent demonstration of this leadership skill.
empowers and connects diverse leaders to serve as catalysts to strengthen and improve the Fort
Harriet Briscoe Harral, PhD, is executive director of Leadership Fort Worth, an organization that
Worth community. She is a regular contributor to FW Inc
We Don’t Have to Be “Our Own Worst Enemy.”
BY TONY FORD
Ford Leadership Solutions
Ingenuity, originality, boldness, ambition, aggressiveness, overachievement. These are just a few of the character traits we entrepreneurs tend to embrace and appreciate in others. I wonder why?
Could it be that these are the traits that come naturally to us, but not to others? Even so, it only partially explains why we sometimes struggle to get our people on board with our ideas and goals. So what else could be missing that makes our day-to-day business operations such a struggle?
In a word: CONSISTENCY - or, to be more accurate and helpful, the lack of it. Before I get too far into this issue, allow me to confess my guilt as a business owner who has failed consistently (no pun intended) in this area. My own history and the fact that I find this situation in almost every company I mentor lead me to the conclusion that owner inconsistency is a primary cause for:
• Lack of trust – When pressed for time, options or answers, we often throw our own company rules out the window by failing to explain why the situation called for an “exception” to our employees.
• Employee turnover – We promise new hires one thing and give them something less, driving up training costs and damaging our reputation.
• Bad attitudes – We demand positive, cooperative attitudes from our employees but model impatience, anger and
What's the magic recipe for walking through your hectic business day with the focus required to be a consistent role model and get people on board with your goals? Let me share four solutions I have used personally and with my clients.
immaturity when problems arise.
• Inferior profit margins – We set margin standards for our sales force and then make “special deals” with particular customers that break the rules.
• Poor sales growth – We convince ourselves that we have figured out how to keep growing our sales without ongoing, real-world input from our employees and customers.
• Decreasing market share – We achieve just enough success to think we can just casually check-in on what our competitors are doing instead of executing a disciplined plan for keeping up with their activities.
If you are like me, none of these issues come as any great surprise to you as a business owner or leader. In fact, our bookshelves are filled with volumes dedicated to solving these exact problems.
Titles like:
• The One Minute Manager
• Management by Objectives
• Seven Habits of Highly Effective People
• Good to Great
• The Rockefeller Habits
• Traction
If you were to read them all, you would find a central admonition that sounds something like this:
Owner – You are the primary example for consistent conduct and rule-following in your company. No matter what your employee manual, vendor contracts, mission statement or advertising copy says, YOU are the singular common denominator that determines how your employees, vendors and customers will engage with your business. If you make building/maintaining trusted relationships and providing high quality service your consistent practice, they will follow your lead and protect your reputation in the marketplace.
But how? What is the magic recipe for walking through your hectic, chaotic business day with the focus required to be a rock-solid, consistent role model?
Allow me to share four solutions that I have used personally and with my clients that seem to produce consistent results:
• Regain your perspective – Pull up the calendar and plan some time away from your business to think through what you are really trying to accomplish. A lot has changed since you first chose the path you are on, and periodic course-corrections are mandatory in reaching your goals. Do not allow the winds of change to convince you that your original goals are no longer at-
tainable. Situations come and go, but you are the one who chooses where to put your efforts. It’s YOUR business -remember that.
•Reaffirm your people – Believe it or not, your employees and vendors want to please you. They are continually solving problems that you will never know about in order to “protect” you. Honor their concern for you by demonstrating your appreciation for them. Recognitions, words of affirmation, contests, trips, and other incentives keep people inside your affirmation bubble.
•Rely on professionals – Stop trying to be good at everything. Talk to other business owners you respect and surround yourself with a small group of trusted professionals. Then leverage the wisdom, experience and best practices they bring when facing strategy, financial and legal obstacles or opportunities.
•Relax and enjoy – Try hard to always remember why you started your business in the first place. You saw an opportunity to use your skills to build something the world needed and would pay for. Turns out, they still will – but it means nothing if you are not enjoying the experience. Lighten up and enjoy the cool things that come with sitting in the big chair!
When we learn to lead our people as a confident, consistent business owner every day, we open the doors of opportunity for them and satisfaction for ourselves.
That’s how I see it – how about you?
Tony Ford is an awardwinning Fort Worth entrepreneur with a history of starting and growing industry-leading companies. He now helps other businesses grow and sell their companies. He is also program director for the 2017 FW Inc. Entrepreneur of Excellence Awards program. Tony writes this column in each issue of FW Inc. Contact Tony at tony.ford@fwtx.com
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INSURING ENGAGEMENT
From
Johnny Campbell
From Pokemon zombies to sudden storms, there’s no way to tell what’s in store for Johnny Campbell, Sundance Square’s chief. But his day always starts with Scripture.
5:30 a.m. Begin the day reading Scripture, followed by a spin through my five favorite newspapers in their electronic formats.
6:30 a.m. By this time, I will have
posted a Scripture on social media. This is something I began doing sparingly, but when friends began sending me notes if I missed, I realized it was going to be a regular thing.
9 a.m. Start day with department updates from Sundance Square directors; this is typically incredibly energizing as I am fortunate to work with an elite team of executives who stay on the cutting edge. We spread out biweekly updates with the directors from each department including marketing, security, operations, accounting, leasing and parking. One of the unique features of Sundance Square is that you never know what the day will hold.
10:30 a.m.
Leasing and operations impromptu discussions, a wide-open mix of fast-paced and totally unpredictable ideas and opportunities. With 42 buildings spread over 35 blocks, the issues and questions can be quite interesting.
11:30 a.m. Lunch meetings and walking Sundance Square to observe and look for ways to improve the experience in any way possible.
and the “white-water rafting” has begun. Sudden windstorm, we’re ready. Pokémon attack, we’re ready. Runaway horse, we’re ready. Apocalyptic ice storm on top of the Super Bowl event, no problem.
3 p.m. Community boards and outreach meetings. One of the great features of Fort Worth is that the community is very engaged and there are ample opportunities to be involved in the development of our great city.
4:30 p.m. Out to the street fronts and plaza, more unpredictability. Satisfying an incredible urge to free the downtown area of orange cones (it appears that these things breed and multiply in the night).
6 p.m. Watching the Sundance Square Plaza programming, and posting a few Instagram photos of the surprises that can always be found in the Plaza.
7 a.m. Work out at the City Club or alternatively (more often) sit outside and drink coffee. The weather seems to be the No. 1 decision variable on this one.
1:30 p.m. Back to the energy of the Sundance Square offices with more leasing and operational activities. Promotional ideas and leasing prospects are in constant discussion within the offices of Sundance Square. By this time, downtown is awake,
7:30 p.m. Back to Aledo to spend time with my wife, Sherri, and these days hoping for a special treat when our boys are back home for a visit. If they are especially lucky, they might get to hear a selection on the piano from a mixed bag of my favorites, which can range from hymns to ‘80s pop.
“The multiple offer scenario is having a big impact on the way buyers write offers. The savvy buyer has already interviewed a lender and received a prequalification letter to submit with an offer. Also if a buyer locates a desirable property he must be decisive and ready to pull the trigger. Many younger buyers rely on the advice of friends or family when it comes time to make a big decision. The savvy buyer will have his ‘committee’ ready to go. ”
Clay Brants | 817.980.9500
cbrants@briggsfreeman.com
“Social media selling is of the utmost importance in today’s quick-paced real estate market. Often times with limited inventory, top agents post ‘coming soon’ properties and it can make all the difference in finding the ‘needle in the haystack.’ Make sure your agent has professional social media pages to post live videos, produced videos and marketing pieces for the quickest sale.”
Michael Hoover | 817.458.1431 mhoover@briggsfreeman.com
“Clients researching their real estate needs online is a continued trend. They search for available properties and property values on various real estate websites. It is a great tool for the consumer; however, it can be inaccurate and unreliable and cannot replace an experienced Realtor. Realtors use a multiple listings service (MLS) that provides its members with up-todate and accurate information. MLS provides important information not available to the syndicated websites.”
Jerri Pedro | 817.925.9462 jpedro@briggsfreeman.com
“As the DFW area experiences growth at a rate of one new buyer every five minutes, inventory remains low. This expansion increases pricing and lowers days on market, creating greater opportunities for those wishing to list their home. With interest rates remaining low, many homeowners are trading up and several are choosing to build new.”
