Jim McIngvale
Jim “Mack” McIngvale, founder and owner of Houston-area retailer Gallery Furniture, personally greets customers at the front door and is known for delighting them with a fun-filled shopping experience, which includes a monkey habitat, a tropical bird aviary and a 30,000-gallon aquarium.
Mr. McIngvale and his wife, Linda, founded Gallery Furniture in 1981 with $5,000. Today, their three stores sell more furnishings per square foot than any other U.S. independent retailer. Customers, he believes, want three things: good prices, to be treated well and same-day delivery. In the face of online retailing, his stores focus on ever greater convenience as being all important in today’s business environment.
For 30 years, Mr. McIngvale has starred in his own TV commercials becoming known as Mattress Mack and promising, “Gallery Furniture saves you money!” The Stores also participate in numerous sports promotions in order to relate to the community. In 1990, he attended a seminar by Dr. W. Edwards Deming and adopted the mantra that working together as a team is more important than individualism and that we all have a responsibility for the well-being of our communities. As a result, he regularly asks, as the litmus test for any business, “If we were to go out of business tomorrow, would our customers miss us?”
Committed to being ingrained in the community, he has become a legend in philanthropy, calling himself half capitalist and half social worker. With a heart for children, neighborhoods, healthcare and disaster relief, the McIngvales began their annual Christmas giveaway of 30 households of furniture just two years after opening their first store. After Hurricane Harvey, Gallery Furniture housed and fed 500 people for several weeks, donating 10,000 mattresses and 20,000 pairs of shoes. The McIngvales have cofounded the Peace of Mind Foundation for those affected by Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, funded St. Luke’s Mobile Stroke Unit, and a wide-range of other philanthropic efforts throughout the great Houston area for over 38 years. They furnish USO facilities around the world and teacher’s lounges in Houston, and have helped raise more than $12 million for victims of natural disasters.