The Making of a Blockbuster: How Wayne Huizenga Built a Sports and Entertainment Empire from Trash, Grit, and Videotape (Paperback)

by Gail DeGeorge (Author) "Wayne Huizenga waited patiently in front of Wilbur Porter's wood-frame house, the only one for miles around in the fields of palmetto scrub that stretched..." (more)
Key Phrases: garbage business, video rental industry, garbage industry, Waste Management, Wayne Huizenga, Fort Lauderdale (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal
DeGeorge, the Miami bureau manager for BusinessWeek, has written an entertaining, sometimes sympathetic account of the rise of H. Wayne Huizenga. Covering his entire life and background from the arrival of his grandfather from the Netherlands to Chicago in 1893 to the present, the author documents a strong entrepreneurial streak that led the family to the refuse collecting business. Huizenga took two businesses public?first Waste Management and then Blockbuster?and emerged hugely successful. His merger with Viacom was designed with shareholders' best interests in mind. His art of dealmaking is legendary, his formula simple: Choose the business carefully, get to know it thoroughly, then expand, expand, expand. DeGeorge has provided a readable portrait of one of the foremost entrepreneurs of our time, comparing Huizenga's rise to the rise of the United States over the same period. Although the absence of an index is a drawback, DeGeorge's book is recommended for public and academic collections.?Littleton M. Maxwell, Business Information Ctr., Univ. of Richmond, Va.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist
The many media accounts profiling Huizenga have dubbed him "Midas." Everything he touches seems to turn to gold, and he has made (and never lost) three separate fortunes. He cofounded what is now WMX Technologies, the world's largest waste-management service company. After leaving there, he took control of Blockbuster Entertainment, overseeing its phenomenal growth. Last year he sold the video retailing giant to Viacom. In the meantime, he purchased three Florida professional sports teams and built a 2,500-acre theme park on the edge of the Everglades. Since stepping down last year as Blockbuster's CEO, he had been out of the news, but he resurfaced late this summer with the purchase of Republic Waste, another waste-management firm. That company's stock soared 766 percent on the news that Huizenga had taken over. DeGeorge, Business Week's Miami bureau manager, has covered Blockbuster and Huizenga for nearly 10 years, and recounts all this with prodigious detail. Her book will certainly appeal to those who are fascinated by entrepreneurial success stories. David Rouse --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 354 pages
• Publisher: Wiley (January 31, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471159034
• ISBN-13: 978-0471159032
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #274,647 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Kirkus Is Right On This One, October 30, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: The Making of a Blockbuster: How Wayne Huizenga Built a Sports and Entertainment Empire from Trash, Grit and Videotape (Audio Cassette)

It's not that the effort wasn't there or that the subject wasn't interesting but the style was rough. It does seem gushy at points and is a jumble of facts. I love Huizenga's story and do think the book is a worthwhile read, but the lack of smooth flow in the storytelling is distracting.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 6 Stars, $25k to $1 million in 7 years or 4,000%, June 24, 2006

By	Kevin Kingston (ny) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Making of a Blockbuster: How Wayne Huizenga Built a Sports and Entertainment Empire from Trash, Grit, and Videotape (Hardcover)

That's the return an investor in Blockbuster in Jan. 1987 would have had. And for Wayne's investment, $17.5 million, that grew to $600 million in 7 years.

This is a truly intriguing story of how Wayne (and team) built TWO multi billion dollar companies, Blockbuster Entertainment and Waste Management. The author, Gail does a great job of taking you through Wayne's early days when all of his garbage company's credit lines were exhausted and meeting the day to day expenses were a struggle, up to the point that he realized that the best bet was to go public so he could use the stock as currency for rapid expansion. And rapidly expand he did. In the 10 months between March and December 1972, Waste Management bought 133 different businesses.

During his forays in the water business Wayne and his right hand man Steve Berrard scooped up 16 water companies in eight months, going from zero to the thirteenth largest bottled water company in the nation, which was sold to Clorox for a profit of $16 million within 3 years.

Berrard's deal making skills:
-Don't paint yourself into a corner
-Never say anything that won't let you come back in the front door
-Don't say something is a deal breaker
-A deal is never dead if you don't let it die
-Always let the other side set the initial price
-Always leave room to back up
-Recognize what the other side really wants out of a deal
-Know when to walk
-Don't take no for an answer

Talking about Blockbuster Wayne would point out that the stores were paying for themselves in roughly 3 years from the cash flow. (mental not for business buyers)

As anyone who reads my other reviews or my blog knows, I zero in on the structure of the deals mentioned in the book. Interestingly you get a good idea of how the whole Blockbuster - Virgin deal was structured. Blockbuster was to be an even partner in Virgin's 15 stores in Europe and have 75% ownership of the US stores (other than the LA store which they had 1/3). Virgin would retain managing control along with its 25%. Blockbuster would fund the expansion.

Great Quotes:

"The biggest lesson I learned is that when you say you're going to do something, be darn sure you do it."

"Huizenga held fast to two rules: Don't loose a deal because you're not paying attention to it and never talk about it until its done and in writing."

"His father says, Wayne is still driven by the same force that's driven him since the purchase of that first garbage truck in 1962. (The Deal) The excitement of making the deal. I think that's what drives him"

By Kevin Kingston, author of: A 20,000% Gain in Real Estate: A True Story About the Ups and Downs From Wall Street to Real Estate Leading to Phenomenal Returns

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A real life course in entrepreneurship, June 9, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: The Making of a Blockbuster: How Wayne Huizenga Built a Sports and Entertainment Empire from Trash, Grit, and Videotape (Hardcover)

Wayne Huizenga's life is a real life course in entrepreneurship, and business owners should make this book a must read. He has been a master at dealing with people, setting and achieving goals, and growing a business. This book is not one of the typical "vanity biographies." The author interviewed a wide variety of individuals in writing a rather balanced portrait of a dynamic individual