Graves, Earl G. 1935—

Earl G. Graves 1935—

Publisher, corporate executive officer

At a Glance…

Sources

A highly respected and nationally known authority on black business development, Earl G. Graves is the founder and publisher of Black Enterprise, a magazine that focuses on issues and news relating to black-owned businesses in the United States. Celebrating its 20th anniversary in 1990, Black Enterprise —to which Graves contributes a monthly publisher’s column— boasts a circulation of over 230,000 and annual revenues of more than $15 million. A key communicator and spokesman within his field, Graves was once described by the Reverend Jesse Jackson in the Washington Post as the “primary educator in the country on black business—on trends and opportunities and the like.”

Graves himself is a prosperous businessman; as Margaret K. Webb noted in the Washington Post, “Graves’s success extends beyond the pages of his magazine.” Black Enterprise is published by the Earl G. Graves Publishing Company, the parent corporation of which, Earl G. Graves, Ltd., is directed by Graves in his capacities as president and chief executive officer. In addition to these responsibilities Graves serves on the board of directors of several corporations, including the Chrysler Corporation, and is chairman of the Black Business Council. In 1990 Graves made national business headlines when he purchased the rights for Pepsi-Cola’s Washington, D.C., distribution operations. Graves’s partner in the venture is Los Angeles Lakers basketball star Earvin “Magic” Johnson, who serves as the partnership’s executive vice-president and spokesperson, while Graves acts as chief executive officer. The franchise, which distributes over four million cases of Pepsi annually in the District of Columbia and parts of Maryland, has been estimated to be worth about $60 million and makes Graves and Johnson Pepsi’s largest minority franchisees.

Although the Pepsi deal has consumed much of Graves’s energy, he remains committed to the concerns of Black Enterprise. In his monthly publisher’s column Graves often comments on matters important to greater economic power for blacks. In a 1990 essay for the magazine he expressed a stern warning that the publication’s annual survey of the top 100 black-owned businesses in the United States showed virtually no growth occurring in the year 1989. As Webb quoted, Graves wrote that black business was threatened not only by a slow economy

At a Glance…

Full name, Earl Gilbert Graves; born in 1935 in Brooklyn, NY; son of Earl Godwin (a shipping clerk) and Winifred (Sealy) Graves; married Barbara Kydd, July 2, 1960; children: Earl Gilbert, John, Michael. Education: Morgan State College, B.A. (economics), 1958. Religion: Episcopalian. Politics: Democrat.

Worked in real estate and as national commissioner of scouting for Boy Scouts of America, New York City, early 1960s; administrative assistant to Senator Robert F. Kennedy, 1965-68; owned management consulting firm, 1968-70; publisher of Black Enterprise, New York City, 1970—; co-owner of Pepsi-Cola distributorship, Washington, D.C., 1990—; president and chief executive officer, Earl G. Graves., Ltd.,; president, Earl G. Graves Publishing Co., Inc., Earl G. Graves Marketing and Research Co., Earl G. Graves Development Co., and EGG Dallas Broadcasting Co. Member of board of directors, Rohm & Haas Corp., New York State Urban Development Corp., Chrysler Corp., National Supplier Development Council, and Magazine Publishers Association. Chairman, Black Business Council. Military service: U.S. Army, 1958-60; became captain.

Awards: National Award of Excellence, U.S. Department of Commerce, 1972; Black Achiever Award, Talk (magazine), 1972; presidential citation, “One of [the] Ten Most Outstanding Minority Businessmen in the United States,” 1973; “Outstanding Citizen of the Year,” Omega Psi Phi, 1974; one of 200 “Future Leaders of the Country,” Time; “Outstanding Black Businessman,” National Business League; one of 100 “Influential Blacks,” Ebony; Poynter fellow, Yale University, 1978; numerous awards from the Boy Scouts of America.

Addresses: Home —Scarsdale, NY. Office — Black Enterprise, 130 Fifth Ave., New York, NY 10011.

but “the Reagan administration’s legacy of exclusion … realized with the subsequent retrenchment of affirmative action plans and minority business set-aside programs.” Graves noted that black businesses will survive if they get “leaner, stronger, better,” and urged his readers to “be selective where we spend our money and do business with companies that do business with us.”

Graves has always been vocal on the subject of racial discrimination in business. In 1990 he praised the United Way of his hometown, Scarsdale, New York, for moving their kick-off dinner from a club that traditionally excluded blacks from membership. In a speech quoted by James Ferron in the New York Times Graves stated that the United Way’s action sent “an important signal of equal opportunity,” and that a primary cause of human suffering was the “lack of equal economic opportunity in our minority communities.” He later commented to Ferron on racial bias: “It is a national problem … and the point I was making in this speech is that if there were jobs, people would not have some of the problems they have. If they had equal opportunity, quality schools, all of the above, then people would not have time to get sidetracked by those things that are detrimental to their well-being.”

Sources

Business Week, August 13, 1990.

Fortune, August 27, 1990.

Jet, April 2, 1990.

Los Angeles Times, July 1, 1990.

New York Times, September 30, 1989.

Washington Post, July 25, 1990.

—Michael E. Mueller