Owners: Lynda and Stewart Resnick
Leaving her successful advertising career behind, Lynda Resnick and her husband, Stewart, decided to buy farmland in California and sell their own agricultural products. They gradually expanded their lineup of brands to include the likes of Wonderful Pistachios, Wonderful Halos, POM Wonderful, and FIJI Water. As co-owner of the company, which has an estimated $5 billion in annual revenue, Lynda leads its worldwide marketing and product development.
Owners: Peggy and Andrew Cherng
The remarkable growth of the Asian food chains Panda Express, Panda Inn, and Hibachi-San is the result of the husband-and-wife team of Peggy and Andrew Cherng. Both share the titles of co-chair and co-chief executive officer (CEO), with Peggy, a former engineering student, primarily leading the development of logistical systems, according to the company’s website. She was also pivotal in launching the company’s training program, University of Panda.
Owners: Janice Bryant Howroyd
Janice Bryant Howroyd created her human resource management company in 1978 with just $1,500 to her name—and that included a $900 loan from her mom. What she has managed to do with the meager investment over the past four decades is stunning. ActOne Group now serves more than 17,000 clients in 19 countries and brings in annual receipts of about $2.3 billion, according to the Los Angeles Business Journal.
Owners: Christine Liang
Christine Liang’s initial ambitions were modest enough. Looking for a source of income after moving to the United States from Taiwan in the 1980s, she decided to buy computer components from Asia and resell them to companies in her new country. The $16,000 in savings that she put into the company proved to be a good investment.
While Liang keeps a low profile, ASI has since become one of North America’s largest distributors of IT products to value-added resellers, with sales of roughly $1.57 billion in 2020.
Owners: Cheung Yan (aka Zhang Yin) and Liu Ming Chung
Like many successful companies, the beginnings of America Chung Nam were humble—very humble. In the late 1990s, Cheung Yan and her husband, Liu Ming Chung, would drive around to garbage dumps in their minivan, trying to convince the operators to give them paper scraps that they could recycle and send overseas to China, according to The New York Times.
Fast forward a couple of decades, and their scrap paper venture brings in around $1.5 billion a year. The couple, who also operate Nine Dragons Paper, the largest containerboard manufacturer in China, is worth more than $3 billion, according to a Forbes analysis.
Owners: Alaina Maciá
Peg and Lynn Griswold started MTM in 1995 with the goal of ensuring that people without easy access to transportation would be able to get the medical care they need. Today, the St. Louis–based company, which is now owned and run by their daughter, CEO Alaina Maciá, schedules more than 13 million nonemergency trips every year.
Owners: Kathy Britton
For Kathy Britton, home building isn’t just a way of life—it’s in her blood. When she was still in high school, she worked as a model homes greeter for her father’s company, Houston-based Perry Homes. And when she graduated from law school, her first job was working in the company’s land acquisition department. That background knowledge paid enormous dividends when her dad, Bob Perry, passed away in 2013 and Britton took over as CEO.
Since then, the company has expanded into the Austin, Dallas, and Fort Worth markets. And it has created a new line of upscale properties called Britton Homes.
Owners: Hanna family
What’s now the largest family-owned real estate broker in the country began as a small startup founded by Howard and Anne Freyvogel Hanna in the 1950s. Decades later, their children—Hoddy Hanna, Helen Hanna Casey, and Annie Hanna Cestra—and grandchildren are continuing to grow the family business. The Pittsburgh-based company operates in a number of states along the East Coast and in the Midwest, generating an estimated $898 million in sales in 2020.
Owners: Jayne Millard and family
Jayne Millard leads the electrical and industry distribution company that her great-grandfather started nearly a century ago.
Since taking the helm, Millard—once a marketing consultant for famed choreographer Martha Graham—has overseen remarkable growth at the Linden, N.J.-based firm. When she joined the business in 1999, it had annual revenues of about $90 million; by 2020, it was bringing in more than $758 million, according to a Dun & Bradstreet estimate.
Owners: Marcia Taylor
What does it take to turn a small, five-truck shipping company into a supply chain juggernaut with around $700 million in annual revenue? For owner and CEO Marcia Taylor, finding new opportunities has always been a key part. Bennett has gradually expanded since its inception in 1974, now offering everything from project logistics to oil field support to cold chain solutions.
Taylor has managed to grow the company while keeping a family-friendly culture. In 2021, Bennett was again named a “Top Transportation Company for Women to Work For” by the Women In Trucking Association.
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