Minority businesses' advocate: African-American Chamber of Commerce founder Gene Hale sparks minority entrepreneurship.

Gene Hale was introduced to the business world at age 8 as a shoeshine boy in his hometown of Birmingham, Ala. He knew how to reap profits by buying polish wholesale and selling it for a higher price to the local stores. He also knew how to treat his customers.

"I knew one thing. You treat your customers right, you get a bigger tip," he says.

Today Hale, 44, is not only a successful businessman but also an influential community leader dedicated to bettering the situation of minority businesses. He is chairman of the fledgling African-American Chamber of Commerce in Los Angeles, sits on innumerable advisory boards, gives pep talks to school kids and even donates turkeys to the underprivileged during the holidays.

"Gene Hale is perhaps one of the most dedicated advocates of minority business of anyone in the community," says Barry Baszile, owner and president of Vernon-based Baszile Metal Service.

Based in South Central, the African-American Chamber of Commerce in Los Angeles has more than 100 members, most of whom represent medium-sized black-owned businesses. It was formed a year and a half ago and is primarily used as a networking organization. "We help each other. I make a call for them. They make a call for me," says Hale, who is married and has two children.

The chamber was essentially Hale's idea, his peers say. "He's the backbone, the spark, the one who keeps it going," says Elbert Hudson, chairman of South Central-based Broadway Federal Savings & Loan.

Hale was interested in forming an African-American chamber because he felt the Black Business Association focuses too much on day-to-day activities and not enough on the long-term needs of the black community, Hudson says.

A chamber is the vehicle used to network and to develop links with the business community at large, Hale explains. It sets a political agenda, educates, and basically "people gravitate to it," he says.

The chamber doesn't have monthly meetings, just networking events.

"Our thing is to bring people together to network and you generate your own business," he says. "You want to bring them (people) together with people that you think they have a good chance of doing business with, to establish a long-term relationship."

Hale makes an earnest effort to ensure that he conducts business for his own company and in his personal life with other chamber members, says Larkin Teasley, president and chief executive of Los Angeles-based Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Co.

Hale is always making sure things at the chamber get done, and often uses his own time and money to accomplish that goal, Hudson says.

Most recently Hale spearheaded a recognition dinner for Mayor Tom Bradley. Members of the Latin Business Association, Black Business Association, Asian Business Association, Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce, Filipino Chamber of Commerce and other minority organizations attended. "He (Hale) is a good leader," Teasley says.

The chamber has two paid staff members who work out of the Founders National Bank building in South Central, but the members want to eventually move into their own building, Hale says. He is the primary party involved in securing a new location, Teasley says.

Hale also has the goal of making the African-American Chamber of Commerce into an umbrella organization for other minority groups. "Let's bottle up this energy and put it in one place," he says.

To create an umbrella organization, Hale says, the chamber first needs to build coalitions. This is done by hosting events such as the dinner for Bradley, he says.

Hale founded his own company, Gardena-based G & C Equipment Corp., which sells and leases heavy construction equipment. G & C had $12 million in revenues during 1992 and has nine employees.

"This is what I wanted to do," Hale says. "I wanted a good job, which I have. I wanted to be my own boss, which I am, and I wanted to make some money."

He moved from Alabama to California when he was 19 and earned a bachelor's degree in business administration from California State/Dominguez Hills. Then he went to work for downtown Los Angeles-based CIT Financial Corp., where he got the training he needed to eventually go into business for himself, he says.

Five years later he left CIT Financial to work for an equipment distributor so he could become more familiar with construction equipment. After that he was ready to venture out on his own.

"I had an edge," he says, because he now knew equipment dealers and what they wanted to sell. Businesses extended credit to him and he was good about paying his bills, so he was able to get started without substantial capital, Hale says. At this point Hale had three employees.

A few years later he was able to secure a $200,000 line of credit from Broadway Federal Savings & Loan. The loan gave Hale the opportunity to hire more employees, buy more modern computer equipment and expand in general.

"Gene had a strong background in commercial lending and his package made sense to us," says Broadway Fed chairman Hudson.

"At the time, his loan was one of the few that resulted in success," adds Teasley, who was on the Broadway's board of directors at the time.

"I paid it back and I'm still banking with them," Hale says. "That was the turning point in terms of the growth of the company."

Hale sits on more advisory boards than can be counted on one hand. For instance, he was recently appointed to the NASA Minority Business Resource Advisory Committee, where he helps NASA meet guidelines established by Congress for determining how much contracting is awarded to minority businesses, Baszile says.

And as a member of the California Department of Transportation Advisory Board, Hale addresses problems minority contractors have on Caltrans projects.

The projects' prime contractors are supposed to pay their subcontractors within 10 days of being paid themselves. But until last year there was no enforcement of this rule and some subcontractors weren't paid for 60 to 90 days, Hale says.

Hale helped push a bill through the Legislature last year that hits prime contractors with punitive damages if they don't pay their subcontractors on time.

Hale also spends time in the community, talking to schoolchildren "about growing up, about taking life one step at a time, how to stay away from drugs, and how to stay away from peer pressure," he says.

He says he always relates his shoeshining story to them and tells them to do the best they can. "You can be a shoeshine boy like myself and say, 'I'm going to work hard and be the best I can be and let the chips fall where they may.' But the most important thing is education," he says to them.

Each Thanksgiving and Christmas, Hale gives more than 100 turkeys to Sweet Alice Harris, director of a community center in Watts called Parents of Watts, who gives them to underprivileged people in the community. "I don't even like turkey," Hale says, "but I know someone does."

Snapshot 

Gene Hale

Age: 44

Native of: Birmingham, Ala.

Resident of: Gardena

Education: Business administration degree from Cal State Dominguez Hills