Arkansas is home to a number of outstanding companies that have been passed down through generations. It’s an impressive feat to launch a business and be able to pass it to the next generation, much less successive generations.
John Ward, co-director of The Center for Family Enterprises at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and co-founder of The Family Business Consulting Group, has found that just 30 percent of family businesses survive through second generation management and only 13 percent survive through a third generation.
In this special section, AY Magazine is recognizing and celebrating the leadership and unique contributions that legacy businesses have made to improving the business climate in and around Arkansas. In the following pages, we’ll introduce you to fellow Arkansans, some of whom followed their entrepreneurial dreams to unimaginable heights and some who forge ahead while shouldering the responsibility of keeping the business with the family name successful. From medical rehabilitation to residential construction to recreation management, their legacies help to make the Natural State great. It’s time to let them shine.
We hope you enjoy reading about these wonderful 15 local, homegrown Arkansas companies and the personalities of the leading men and women who are directing them, how they got their start, persevered through the years, and are helping their communities thrive.

Bank of England

Bathhouse Soapery

Blackmon Auctions

Buffalo River Outfitters

Cecil’s Fine Jewelry

EngageMED

Hoots BBQ

Horton’s Orthotics & Prosthetics

Kerry McCoy Enterprises

Molly Maid

Rood Heating, Cooling and Geothermal

Russell Chevrolet/Honda

Triple-S Alarm

Wright Lindsey Jennings

Yellow Rocket Concepts