MBCC May News & Notes Vol. 2

The unofficial beginning of summer begins on Memorial Day. This month, we remember one of the most successful black entrepreneurs of our time. Listed on the Forbes Best 400 in 1992, Reginal F. Lewis was considered the richest African-American man in the 1980s. A graduate of Harvard Law School, He founded the TLC Group L.P., a venture capital firm in 1983. Through the firm, he bought the home sewing pattern business McCall Pattern Company for $22.5 million and then sold it three years later for $65 million. In 1987, Mr. Lewis bought Beatrice International Foods for $985 million and renamed it TLC Beatrice International; the snack food, beverage, and grocery store conglomerate became the largest, black-owned, and managed business in the country. In that same year, the company reported a revenue of $1.8 billion, making it the first black-owned company to have more than $1 billion in annual sales.