Bronner, founder and publisher of UPSCALE magazine and the CEO of the immensely successful Bronner Bros. International Hair Show, was clocking serious miles on the red carpet of the Ritz Carlton Miami Beach hotel in promotion of his embryonic movie company, Make It Rain Films, and the debut film, Laughing to the Bank, a landmark film because it was 100 percent black-owned, black produced and black distributed. Bronner is also co-owner of Rainforest Films, which released the near-$100 million movie, Think Like a Man.
The business nuggets that Bronner’s father, the legendary founder of the company, Nathaniel Bronner Sr., instilled in his six sons, still apply to this day.
“Our father trained us in being entrepreneurs. Each one of the sons went out and started their own business. We worked in the family hair care business and practiced what we were taught and then we went out on our own and started our own businesses.
“We learned how to run businesses and understand people — what they think, what they want to buy, what makes them happy.”
Today, the company that patriarch Nathaniel Bronner founded 67 years ago is the largest hair care convention in the world. But as is Bronner’s nature; he is far from satisfied from resting on his laurels.
“This year, we are introducing 30 new products. We have learned from 25 years of what to do and what not to do. We started small, tested it, got it right and now we are expanding.”
Not only did Bronner take what his father started and helped expand it exponentially; he also started other businesses to help the main business. He discerned the synergy of starting UPSCALE magazine 23 years ago to complement Bronner Bros. Hair Show. “I was advertising in other publications for our hair care products and I knew that we needed new outlets to do that. It just wasn’t enough; not effective enough.”
Thus, Bronner founded his own magazine where he would be free to advertise his own products without constraints or worries about advertising costs.
In addition to the hair care business, the magazine and his real estates holdings, Bronner turned his hobbies into extremely profitable business enterprises. Bronner talks about joining Rainforest Films, the movie production company founded by Will Packer and Rob Hardy, as a partner because of his affinity for films.
“I love movies and I invested in Rainforest Films and we’re fortunate enough to have [had] the biggest movie of the year come out,” he said of Think Like a Man, starring Steve Harvey, Kevin Hart, Gabrielle Union, Michael Ealy, Meagan Good, Taraji P. Henson and others.
As for the future, Bronner Bros. International Hair Show is primed for the next level, Bronner said. “We’re going global now. The Hair Show is in five cities instead of one, from Baltimore, Md., all the way to Oakland, Calif., going coast- to-coast, stopping in Dallas, Texas; just coast-to-coast.”
Bronner also strives for goals that, to others, may seem outlandish or unfathomable. “My goal is to have 100 multimillion dollar companies,” he said. “I’m not talking about my family; I’m talking about me. I’ve got six now, so I’m about to really step it up.”
Bronner also aspires to have his products become a household name in mainstream America. “I’m going to do a chain of stores. Right now I’m in The Mall West End [in Atlanta]. But I want to have my hair care products in stores across the country and in the malls in every major city in the country.”
