For automotive mogul Gregory Jackson, the long and winding road to success has been challenging but rewarding. As chairman, president, and CEO of Prestige Automotive Group, Jackson leads one of the nation’s most prosperous auto sales conglomerations ever started, owned, and operated by an African American. The company will celebrate its 30th anniversary on Thursday, August 31 (3- 5 p.m.) with a guest appreciation event at Prestige Automotive Group’s St. Clair Shores headquarters.
“We are really excited about our 30th anniversary,” said Jackson in an exclusive interview with the Michigan Chronicle. “Owning a business for that long is significant in itself, but continually being profitable is remarkable. Over the years, thousands of staff members, managers, directors, vice presidents, and others have made valuable contributions to our growth and success. And we couldn’t have reached this milestone without satisfied and loyal customers.”
Jackson said he is proud that his business has been an equal-opportunity employer for African Americans.
“We have sought out African Americans because we are an African American-owned company, and we want to work with our people,” Jackson said emphatically. “And women have played a significant role in the growth of our company from day one. Having this diversity of gender and a broad range of ethnicities, we believe we have the best of all worlds.”
Having the best of all worlds is an understatement when describing the success achieved by Prestige Automotive Group for three decades. Black Enterprise magazine, the long-time standard-bearer for spotlighting Black entrepreneurship and achievements, reports that Prestige Automotive Group grossed $1.7 billion in sales in 2005 and reached or exceeded a billion dollars in sales for more than a decade, dating back when the auto group owned and operated 18 dealerships and 26 franchises.
Jackson told the Chronicle that Prestige Automotive Group currently owns two dealerships: Prestige Cadillac in Warren and Prestige Mercedes-Benz of St. Clair Shores in Macomb County, with annual sales of around $400 million.
Born and raised on Detroit’s west side – Linwood Avenue and Taylor Street – Jackson showed early signs of entrepreneurship in the 1960s.
“I have been on an entrepreneurial track since I was 10 years old,” Jackson said. “I was the kid in the neighborhood who was always working. Whatever odd job was out there, I was that kid to do it.”
Jackson was an award-winning Detroit News paperboy in the late 1960s, legendary for his newspaper-selling hustle. Jackson said his prowess with selling the Detroit News won him trips as a 12-year-old to London, England, and later Disney World, Washington, D.C., and Toronto.
“The people who were my heroes in my neighborhood were the people who owned businesses,” he said. “They were the ones I idolized growing up. They talked a different talk, one of independence, and I was attracted to that type of talk.”
After graduating from Central High School, Jackson went to Morris Brown College in Atlanta, where he pledged Kappa Alpha Psi before earning a bachelor’s degree in accounting. He subsequently received a master’s degree in finance and marketing from nearby Atlanta University, now Clark Atlanta University.
Although Jackson dreamed of becoming an entrepreneur straight out of college, his professional career began as an accountant for Arthur Anderson & Company before working at Stroh’s Brewery as its youngest controller. While at Stroh’s, Jackson decided to dip his toes into the waters of entrepreneurship by launching a gourmet cookie venture.
“My business partner and I started the Kastellton Company and grew it to go into eight cookie stores inside of malls and department stores in and around Detroit,” Jackson said. “We had a factory where we manufactured cookie dough for J.L. Hudson’s Department Stores. And the fresh cookies that Hudson used to sell in its stores were our cookies.”
Jackson closed Kastellton in the early 1990s. A few years earlier – in 1988 – Jackson had entered the General Motors Minority Training Leadership Academy based on the advice of a former client. Jackson completed the Academy the following year and in 1993, started Prestige Automotive Group. The same year, after attaining the $1.5 million required to purchase his first dealership, Jackson bought Prestige Pontiac Oldsmobile in Mt. Morris, Michigan. And as the old adage goes: The rest is history.
Nevertheless, Gregory Jackson’s entrepreneurial journey has been more than selling cars. Internationally, he has joint business ventures in Beijing and Wuhu, China, independently producing tea-based beverages and organic milk. Jackson has also established Michigan-based Jackson Asset Management (JAM), the umbrella company for Prestige Automotive Group, Jackson Land Holding LLC, and Wink Entertainment.
Through Jackson Asset Management, Jackson and Richard Hosey of Hosey Development have partnered to rehabilitate the 600,000-square foot, 104-year-old crumbling Fisher Body Plant 21 on Hasting Street in Detroit. Jackson and Hosey are moving forward on what will become a mixed-use complex featuring apartments, commercial space, and retail development. The price tag, expected to be more than $134 million, is being touted as the largest African- American-led redevelopment project in Detroit’s history, with a projected completion date in 2025.
Under Jackson Land Holding LLC, its team oversees the construction, development, and ongoing maintenance of real estate and apartment and commercial complexes in Detroit and Florida. In downtown Detroit, the storied Lafayette Towers is the largest apartment complex owned and managed by Jackson Land Holding.
Jackson’s Wink Entertainment owns and manages The Copper Ridge Golf Course in Davison, Michigan, one of only a handful of golf courses in America owned and operated by African Americans. Jackson’s team has also produced “Jazz on the River,” a series of free summer concerts offered to the public for eight years before the pandemic.
For Gregory Jackson, giving back to empower underserved people is paramount. The man of God is a member and trustee of Fellowship Chapel on Detroit’s west side. He was proactively engaged in the recertification of Morris Brown College, a private liberal arts HBCU. In addition, Jackson is heavily involved with advocacy organizations such as Children of Incarcerated Parents and Generation with Promise.
Over the years, Jackson has received hundreds of awards and honors for excellence in corporate leadership, achievements of his companies, and personal philanthropic endeavors. Among his awards are the Michigan Chronicle “Men of Excellence Award” and its “Man of the Year.” Jackson was recently presented with the prestigious “Laurel Wreath,” the highest honor a Kappa can receive from the Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc.
“I’m always humbled when anyone thinks I have achieved anything noteworthy of getting an award,” Jackson said. “But this one, the Laurel Wreath, is very, very special because it was given by Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc, which I have been a member of for 40-plus-years. Since the fraternity started 112 years ago, there have been only 81 awardees of the Laurel Wreath. I am honored to be the 79th recipient.”
While Jackson is enjoying the celebratory air surrounding the 30th anniversary of Prestige Automotive Group, he is happy to announce that “ownership and leadership” of all portfolio companies are now shared with a second generation of Jacksons: daughter Anika Odegbo, vice president, Jackson Asset Management, and son Jordon Jackson, general manager, Prestige Automotive Group.
“It was one of my greatest dreams to have a second generation come into the business, and now it has come to fruition,” Jackson said. “The beautiful thing is Anika and Jordon have the common goal of extending the family legacy and hopefully passing it on to my grandchildren one day.”
“I congratulate my long-time friend and frat brother Greg Jackson, not only for reaching an incredible business milestone, but also for his wise decision to share ownership and leadership with a second generation,” said Prof. James C. Mays, a legacy executive of the 77-year-old Mays Multimedia (Mays Printing), headed by Elizabeth Mays, the granddaughter of its founder. “Greg is an incredible visionary and super businessman, and nobody will outwork him, ever!”
To learn more about Gregory Jackson’s automotive milestone and portfolios of companies, log on to www.jamasset.com.
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