Gerard Spinks as The Underground Millionaire

Serena Williams is promoting her new book available at all fine book retailers across the USA called “On The Line”. I read parts of the book and just bought it. It’s very good. Serena reveals things about herself that you would never know just watching her play tennis. Good read.

Gerard Spinks is the CEO of Spinks Industries; a web content producer and online marketing agency based in Atlanta, GA USA.

The Cleveland Show is a bonafide hit on network television tonight. Cleveland was a regular in Family Guy and the character has now spun off to have his own African American themed animated show. This is awesome and I anticipate this show being off the chain just like Family Guy.

The Cleveland Show starts September 27, 2009 on FOX TV

It has a great cast of voice over actors and actresses including: Mike Henry, Sanaa Lathan, Reagan Gomez-Preston, Kevin Michael Richardson, creator Seth MacFarlane, and Jamie Kennedy. According to Wikipedia, The Cleveland Show was picked up to air for 22 episodes for the first season and 13 episodes for the second season by FOX TV.

From the pages of my book…..

Despite any obstacles, keep your dreams alive. There will be setbacks that are a natural course of wealth building. You cannot reach wealth without setbacks. It is literally impossible to do. A natural part of the wealth building process is character testing. You will be confronted with countless things that will test your character from relationship breakups, court proceedings, bankruptcy bullshyt, family issues and so on. Regardless of all of these things that will happen, the wealth builder will keep fighting on and will not stop. You may hit pause temporarily due to some hiccup encountered, but do not ever stop doing your thing.

Gerard Spinks encourages you to dig deeper

You may decide that a certain project is not successful to pursue, but change up and be flexible. A lot of people loathe change and some people don’t like to see you change. If something doesn’t work that you’re doing, put something else in your arsenal. Don’t listen to anybody if they don’t like you’re change unless the change that you’re doing is negative and you are trying to now push bricks and sell rocks on the avenue. Change is the only real thing that you can count on in this world so if you don’t change, you might as well fold the cards and consider yourself done.

Real cats will change up, grow their stacks, and make some dollars. I’ve known people that had to move across the country, uproot their families, and completely change industries in order to make it. Sometimes, we have to swallow our pride and even do a job for way less money that we’re used to. I read once where Bishop T.D. Jakes was once digging ditches in Dallas, Texas before he started preaching and started Potters House. The thing that he did was keep his dream alive even while digging ditches for the highway department.

If you have to dig a ditch but you really have skills as a small business entrepreneur, just dig the ditch and keep your eyes on how to be successful. Let the storm pass. During times of intense storming, we have to be able to let the storm take its course as long as it doesn’t kill us and render us helpless and homeless. You can still build wealth and make your dream a reality. Perseverance will be your key to survival and overcoming this part of your character test. Just make sure the ditch that you’re digging is not your own grave!

Gerard Spinks is the CEO of Spinks Industries, a black owned web content development, content aggregator, and marketing company based in Atlanta, GA.

If y’all can’t tell what’s happening in America, you’re lost. There is a witch hunt against the black male in America. America is tired of seeing us prosper, succeed, and grow financially. While I’m definitely proud of President Obama, his election has caused America to go into a witch hunt for all wealthy and prosperous black men. Time to hide your money and stop being so out there, Kanye West and you rappers.

Barry Bonds for Athlete of the Decade

If y’all cannot open your eyes and see what’s happening right in front of you, you’re deaf, dumb, and blind as much as Bernard Bernanke claiming the recession is fully over. I haven’t said anything about Kanye West debacle because it was total ignorance but seeing the latest headlines of Barry Bonds makes me fly out of my chair. In fact, I need to go on this run in the mountains in California just so I can stop thinking about this mess. Why are Kanye West and Serena Williams making us look bad? Don’t they realize they are black people and we are held to a GREATER standard than our white counterparts? Does Kanye West actually think white people and brands will embrace him and love him for grabbing the microphone from a young Taylor Swift? What?

You better ask somebody. Now, the feds are on Barry Bonds like a beast. Just like they wanted Michael Vick in front of the world on his knees crying and apologizing for days while the cops who killed Sean Bell are still eating hot dogs at Coney Island with their families. You’ve got Plaxico Burress in jail for two years for shooting himself. Racist cops are free. The feds are coming after Barry Bonds with a vengeance. The prosecutor is hell bent on making him out to be a liar and stripping him of his records and his entire career. If he were white, he’d be pat on the back with a “atta boy” mentality. Trust me. I know.

This witch hunt is on black men. If you are thinking and planning of shooting a video and throwing tons of diamond studded chains, mixed with a little swag and some strippers, I suggest highly that you do not do this. You and I have become America’s target thanks to President Obama. I watch my back constantly even running in the hills because I know that if I even seem successful to the world, there is a huge bulls eye target sitting on my back and someone has a scope pointed directly at my head.

Black men beware. They want us in prison WAY more than people want us to succeed. Lay low. Lay low. Lay low. The time is to lay low and not cause attention to yourself. Good luck Barry Bonds! You are a Hall of Fame candidate in my book. What a hall of fame career. Wish you were still playing, big dawg!

Gerard Spinks is the CEO of Spinks Industries; a web content developer and marketing company in Atlanta, GA. He is also a writer, publisher, and radio host of Beyond the Bling radio.

Back in the day, before all this new thought and The Secret was out, I read several great books from Shambala books in Berkeley, California. I read “As a Man Thinketh So Shall He Be” in 1991. I also read “The Art of War”, “The Art of Peace”, “Message to the Blackman”, “Metu Neter”, and “The Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey”. All of these books that I read in 1991 made me know that you are what you think about. Action is tied to thought. Thoughts are tied to action.

The Honorable Marcus Garvey, my thought leader

Adisa Banjoko and I were voracious readers and subscribed to this mentality. People ask me, “Why The Underground Millionaire?” I am what I think about it and I am who I thought I was. My thoughts reverberate out into the universe. My thoughts synaptically connect to my like minded friends in Beijing, China, Israel, Brazil, Curacao, Oakland, Atlanta, New Jersey, New York, and Peoria, Illinois. Right now, people are reading this and come visit my site from Australia, Israel, Indonesia, Beijing, and Tokyo. I’m not kidding. I look at my stats every day and each morning at 5 am.

I wake up every day around 5 a.m. to start my wealth building and my millionaire mindset. Each day, I get a cup of hazelnut coffee, read the Harvard Business Review blogs, comment on the blogs, and check my Internet stats and start my business day. I work from 5 am – 9 am and then go for a 6 mile run. I am developing an application that I will sell for $3.8 – $15 million soon. Am I a millionaire? Most definitely. Am I successful? Most definitely. You are what you constantly think about and act upon. You can’t just think and not act. Action is the key piece to this thought process.

In the movie “The Secret”, the people magically thought about stuff but the film makers never tied the action into the thoughts. Thought without action is a dead man’s garden. I think, I do, I create, I put it out there. I risk. I persevere. I have patience. I wait. I act. I think. I do. I respond. I pitch. I measure. I sell. I think. I do. I put it out there. I risk. I have patience. I wait. I look. I see. I respond. I do. I love.

This action is the key to how to be successful in a forever turbulent world. A world where there is nothing left solid to believe in. A world where everyone is scared of losing a job and you can’t count on the recruiter to ever call you back. Ask me how I know. I live this world. Do I wait on this? No. I respond. I create. I do not sit idle waiting on my turn to be called. I am a quarterback. We wait for no man or woman for our success. You can bank on that.

Gerard Spinks, CEO, Spinks Industries

When I was a youngster getting out of high school and going to college, my mother didn’t know much about college. She was a stickler though about education even though she herself didn’t have one. I went to high school one day and came home with no books in my book bag. I had the type of mother that sent me back to the high school to go get my books out of the locker and bring them home to read to her. She said even though I told her I had no homework, according to her laws; I had homework every night of the week.

My brova, Jeronimo Spinx, Hollywood's best black actor

My mother never slacked on us and on me. She never let me fall through the cracks and take time off. When I played football in high school and college the coaches were always amazed at how disciplined I was. Each of my coaches always thought it was because I was well coached and they would always make mention of that. Little did they know, this discipline and standard of excellence was developed by a small, uneducated, black woman from the south.

My mother is old school. Her standards are unlike any black parent I have ever seen on her own without a man there. She had the standards of both a mother and a father. She never accepted any type of slacking and any type of poor grades. She handed out beat downs for bringing home average grades. Ask me how I know or ask Jeronimo Spinx. Ask Jeronimo Spinx how he has made it in Hollywood to be a star on CBS Criminal Minded and on the hit series 24 on FOX TV. This is because of a strong, solid as an oak, black woman who can’t read or write who came from the dirty south of Little Rock, Arkansas.

My mother can teach all of these young sisters who are misguided several things. She’s not as fiery as she was back in the day and is quite a beautiful softy now. She did her part though. She handled her business with her kids on her own. She didn’t come up with excuses for herself or her kids to be half rate, half baked success stories. She’s the fuel behind me and my famous brother Jeronimo Spinx. Without Mrs. Spinks, I dare to even be half the cat that I am today. It pays so much to have a rock solid parent like this. You don’t always need both. It’s nice if you do have both but I was blessed with the greatest gift of all: a solid black woman. Success lies in this accountability that she taught me. It lies in the responsibility that she taught me. It lies in the stick-to-it-tiveness that she drilled into us as kids. She didn’t let us skate through life. She helped me become The Underground Millionaire.

Gerard Spinks is the CEO of Spinks Industries.

It truly amazes me how this is ingrained in white folks and how Black Americans and/or African Americans never get this. For some reason, we believe that just raising kids and getting them through high school is enough. I have heard countless black parents say that their only mission is to get their kid to 18 years of age and they’re done with parenting. It’s like a ritual in the black community. People start doing the happy dance as soon as high school graduation comes around.

Invest in the Black Middle class now

This is far from what our white counterparts do in America. I grew up with white kids. I know this for fact. I went to a predominantly white elementary school, high school, and college and didn’t see a ton of black kids at college until I went to a public college at the University of Texas Arlington. My friends’ parents always had a plan for them to go to college, get a profession, and succeed.

They think it’s crazy to just get their kid out of high school and they are highly disappointed in their kid if their kid settles for simply getting out of high school and going to get a job. They count this as failure. The kids I grew up with and their parents count a success as them going to Purdue University, Ohio State University, Notre Dame, getting an advanced degree, getting a Master’s Degree and possibly a PhD.

I’m not kidding. Look at my Facebook friends if you think I’m not telling the truth. Their standard of success and how they measure that success is much different from ours. How do we change this? What do we do to put our kids in a better position for success and growth? First of all, you must create a success plan for your child at the age of 5. This success plan is about education. You must hold a very high standard of education for your child at the elementary school level. You must create and demand excellence from your child at school at an early age. You must then ensure that your child has a great education at the high school level and that they become indoctrinated with a college mentality.

Your kid will learn from you whether or not college and education is important. If you just speak about it and don’t do actionable things about it, they will not care either. This is how our young black youth fall through the cracks and ended up doing nothing as an adult. And do not expect someone to care more about your child’s education than you do. You MUST care. You MUST show concern. You MUST ensure that they are going to a good college or university and that they are equipped with the right tools to do so. Your business plan is to create a winner out of your kid. You must create a strategic thought leader out of your child for your child’s sake. Not yours. You must ensure that your kid gets to college, gets out of college, and has a chance at being in the upper middle class. The future of the black middle class depends upon this.

Gerard Spinks is the CEO of Spinks Industries, a black enterprise and web content developer and marketing company based in Atlanta, GA.

A long, long, time ago in a galaxy far, far away, small business in America was the backbone of our civilization. Not so much today. According to the United States census bureau, there are approximately 307 million Americans. With an unemployment rate hovering around 10%, this puts about 30 million people out of work. Small business enterprise makes up the bulk of all American economy. Many small business owners provide services to major corporations as 1099 workers or corp to corp workers.

Spinks Small business tips for economic survival

As workers and small businesses head to the unemployment lines to find help after ending a project, many are dismayed and find out that they are rejected from pursuing and receiving unemployment benefits. Why? States paying unemployment insurance benefits are being weighed down and are spending billions in payouts. If they can stop you from receiving benefits they will. Here’s how they do it from a small business perspective.

Years ago, your small business was banging. It was doing great. You provided services corp to corp to major United States corporations and charged them $100 per hour. Banks loved you. People loved you. Life was good. You serviced a niche and you could get financing on everything. Not anymore. Corporations are getting over on you by setting you up as a corp to corp employee. In this way, the temp agency that they go through does not have to pay you a dime in insurance benefits and the most important thing is that they don’t have to pay you unemployment benefits when the contract ends.

Let me say it again. If you provide services as a contractor to a major corporation, the new American hustle is to set you up as a corp to corp contractor. When you head into the unemployment office wanting to claim benefits, you are denied because you were not a W2 contractor. Also, if you did not work the previous two quarters for that firm, you will be denied as well. So companies are getting over on you by hiring for 4-5 month contracts and then letting you go. It seems great and you are happy as a lark because you got the contract but there’s a hidden death trap in there for you and your personal economy.

You will not get health insurance, you will not be able to claim unemployment insurance, you will not get any income after the project ends and you may just be out of the project for 12 months following that. Do NOT let them hire you corp to corp. You are being tricked as part of an elaborate scheme to not pay you any benefits whatsoever. You will leave the unemployment line looking silly and feeling a true sense of let down. Watch how you work.

Gerard Spinks is the CEO of Spinks Industries, a black enterprise, and web content development and marketing company based in Atlanta, GA.

As a part of my quest to build wealth as a black business in Atlanta, I decided to plunge head first and experience wealth creation from a world leader in this field. I reached out to Trump University and decided to sign up, register, and go to the next level. I wanted to link and learn from America’s finest leader and was frustrated with some of my real estate investments in Atlanta that weren’t cash flowing positively and making me money the way I wanted.

I had a big dream that was for sure. My dream is still the same: I want to buy one apartment building this year with a minimum of 44 units with each unit making profits of a minimum of $250 per unit. If purchased right, I should make at least $11,000 per month in profit and then go do another building. My main goal is to create $100,000 per month in profits from apartment buildings and real estate.

Trump University

I would tell people this in Atlanta and their eyes would just glaze over and look at me like I was crazy and silly. I knew that I couldn’t keep these same people around me and tell them this type of goal. I needed people around me who thought and had way more than me and who wouldn’t be afraid of me saying something like this. I needed to build a team of people who would hear that, not flinch, and know what to do to help me achieve this dream realistically and create a strategic plan to do so. I had always known of Donald Trump and even read most of his books. I wanted more. I wanted to get help.

The first thing I did was register at Trump University. Within 2 hours of registering, I received a call from a representative who wanted me to go through an assessment test to determine if I was someone that Mr. Trump would work with. I was excited at the fact that they actually cared. They didn’t think about me being a black american and didn’t think anything else. They simply wanted to find out if I had the right mentality to do the work necessary to succeed.

After taking the assessment test, they assigned me a personal wealth coach designed to help me along the way. He asked me about my goals. He wanted me to tell him exactly what I mentioned above with my cash flow goals and wanted me to explain how I planned to get there. He wanted to know if I had cash flow forecasts and plans in writing which I did have.

I decided to continue to take courses through Trump University and become a master student and accept this personal coaching that they had offered me. Trump University wanted to know how serious I was to commit to the program and learn to make money. What? I was so humbled to be around him and happy to be a student. I just wanted to see myself as an African American succeed with his program so that I could teach others.

Gerard Spinks is the CEO of Spinks Industries, a web content developer and marketing company based in Atlanta, GA.

Most black Americans and African-Americans have never heard of The Jack and Jill organization that has been around for 100 years. I went to a Jack and Jill event in the highly exclusive Blackhawk country club in the San Francisco Bay area several years ago and was blown away. I was invited by a friend of mine who owned a carpet cleaning business in Concord, CA and was the head of The Black Families organization that I was a member of. He said “G, you’ve got to come to this event. You belong at it.” I said sure. I had been looking at houses in Blackhawk and dreamed of possibly living in the exclusive gated community in Danville, CA one day next to E-40, Gary Payton, and several other prominent Bay Area African-Americans.

BlackHawk Country Club Bay Area, CA

We went to the black tie affair excited and ready to meet some really good and interesting folks and have a great time. I walk into the Country Club and everyone was hopping out of Limousines, high end Mercedes Benz’s, BMW’s, Bentley’s, Rolls Royce’s, etc. I knew I would fit right in! As I’m walking in, I see some friends of mine in the doorway who were the talent for the night. For this party, they had my friend Dwayne Wiggins of Toni, Tone, Tony and some ballet dancer friends of my ex-wife. We stopped, had a drink with them and kept it moving to enjoy the party.

This was awesome to see and a sight truly to bear witness to. It was a group of executive black business men and women. Hire powered business people who ran businesses in both Northern California, Southern California, and nationwide. I met executives from Black Enterprise Magazine, American Express, and other top level CEO’s.

A couple of gentlemen asked me what I was drinking while I was in this little lounge area of the country club. I said “Henny with a splash of coke”. These dudes were the truth. We sat and talked about the Jack and Jill Organization and how they belonged to a “secret society” of African Americans who are highly successful and who believe in building that success in their kids.

They believe in ensuring their children have a high level of education and mingling with other children who also belong to the Jack and Jill Foundation. They believed that I was the caliber of individual who belonged in their inner circle.

Talk about a compliment. I’ve never had a more potent compliment in my life to this day. The Jack and Jill Foundation is a great organization and has roots in Strivers Row in the Washington DC area. Everything about Jack and Jill is good. They are committed to the improvement of black america life and they are committed to building success within the young black youth. I will definitely have my daughter be in this highly esteemed African American organization.