By David Sher

What would you do if you sold your company and suddenly had enough money to never work again?

Buy a yacht? Travel the world? Move to a tropical island?

I recently listened to the How I Built This podcast featuring Chuck Surack of Fort Wayne, Indiana. His story brought two Birmingham entrepreneurs to mind that made me proud: Bill Smith and Shegun Otulana. All three built successful businesses and chose to invest in their hometowns.

A condition that mattered in Fort Wayne

Chuck Surack built Sweetwater, a musical-instrument and audio-equipment business, from a Volkswagen van into a national powerhouse. When he sold a controlling interest in 2021, price was not his only consideration.

Surack made clear that finding the right buyer mattered as much as the financial transaction. He wanted Sweetwater to remain rooted in Fort Wayne and preserve the culture, leadership and community commitments that helped make it successful.

He personally scrutinized potential buyers. The company that helped make him successful would not simply be uprooted from the city that helped build it.

Nor did Surack retreat into retirement. He and his wife, Lisa, have backed Fort Wayne ventures in real estate, hospitality, aviation and other industries, supported music education and participated in downtown revitalization. Think about the ripple effect: one successful company helps generate more opportunities for an entire community. The Suracks’ Pearl development alone represents nearly $82 million in private investment.

Bill Smith made the same hometown choice

Birmingham’s Bill Smith confronted a similar decision when he sold Shipt to Target for $550 million in 2017. There were other interested buyers. Smith has explained that he chose Target partly because the retailer wanted to keep Shipt’s headquarters in Birmingham. Target publicly said Shipt would keep its Birmingham offices.

That is an extraordinary distinction. Smith did not merely promise to give something back after becoming wealthy. He considered Birmingham’s future while he still had a say in who would own his company.

And he did not stop there. Smith created Landing, brought its headquarters to Birmingham and was among the founders of CommerceOne Bank. He later announced that the bank would make the historic John Hand Building its headquarters—the same downtown building where Shipt was born and Landing operated.

This is more than a collection of business investments. It is one entrepreneur repeatedly choosing to build in Birmingham.

Shegun Otulana is multiplying the opportunity

Shegun Otulana came from Nigeria to study at UAB. He built Therapy Brands into a major software business, then completed the sale of Therapy Brands in 2021 in a transaction valued at approximately $1.2 billion.

Otulana could have taken his success anywhere. Instead, he founded Birmingham-based Harmony Venture Labs and announced a goal of creating 40 new startups in Birmingham over ten years, with a combined value potentially reaching billions. That could bring high-paying jobs, keep talented graduates here and attract outside investment.

This is not just a promise on paper. An Innovate Alabama partnership announced in 2025 called for a venture studio to build companies around problems faced by Alabama businesses. In September 2026, its first two companies, PackPay and DealTree, were launched with backing from established Alabama firms. It is an early step, not proof that all 40 startups will succeed—but it gives Birmingham a concrete reason to pay attention now.

The real question for Birmingham

We talk endlessly about recruiting companies from elsewhere. We should. But what if one of our greatest economic-development opportunities is already here—in the entrepreneurs who have built companies, accumulated capital, learned difficult lessons and chosen to stay?

Not every founder can control a buyer’s decisions, and headquarters commitments are not permanent guarantees. Nor can we expect every wealthy entrepreneur to launch dozens of businesses. But Surack, Smith and Otulana are showing what becomes possible when hometown loyalty is expressed in business decisions, not just speeches or charitable checks.

Birmingham needs more than a few individual success stories. We need a culture in which one success seeds the next, talented people see a future here, and our civic leaders remove barriers rather than create them.

Surack is demonstrating what those choices can mean for Fort Wayne. Smith and Otulana are making their own commitments here. Imagine a Birmingham where more successful founders keep headquarters here, reinvest their wealth and help launch the next generation of businesses. One great sale could create dozens of successes—and change Birmingham’s future.

Editor’s note: I ran into Bill Smith recently at the Mountain Brook YMCA. I was there working out. He was donating blood. (The man keeps giving)

David Sher is the founder and publisher of ComebackTown.  He’s past Chairman of the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce (BBA), Operation New Birmingham (REV Birmingham), and the City Action Partnership (CAP).

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