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Known by his stage name, “Master P”, Percy Miller is one of the most famous musical entrepreneurs who built his empire from very humble beginnings. Miller’s plans of becoming a college basketball star at the University of Houston were brought to a halt due to a knee injury. He then moved to California and opened a record store called No Limit Records using $10,000 in money received from a lawsuit following the death of his grandfather.
During the early 1990s, Miller noticed that the growing hip-hop market was dominated by east coast and west coast artists. In an attempt to provide customers with music that represented popular styles from the south, he spent $1,000 to produce his first CD titled “The Ghetto’s Tryin to Kill Me.” The No Limit Records retail store transformed into a record label as Miller drove through inner-city neighborhoods, selling CDs out of the trunk of his car. As popularity grew, he released another album and sold over 250,000 copies of his CDs without a record deal.
Miller’s entrepreneurial skills let to a distribution contract with a major record company that allowed him to retain ownership of his master recordings. He expanded No Limit Records to include other hip-hop artists and grew the company to an estimated worth of $661 million by the late 1990s. Miller has since launched other ventures including a film production company, prepaid phone service and sports management company. He was the first rapper to make Fortune Magazine’s “40 richest under 40” list and was included in Forbes Magazine’s list of highest paid entertainers.
