York Builders Inc.
Reggie York Sr.
If you’ve ever met Reggie York — even once — you know that even a serious stroke wouldn’t stand a chance of curbing the contagious, positive energy of this can-do 59-year-old.
That’s sure what it seems like, certainly when you consider all the miles he has walked and the barriers he has crashed through with an uncommon enthusiasm and persistence on the way to building a successful construction company over the past 30 years, York Builders Inc.
However, there he sat in a wheelchair two years ago, before anyone had ever heard the term “Covid-19.”
“I couldn’t even walk to that door,” he says, pointing at an entryway at TJ’s Catfish and Wings in Arlington not 10 feet away. “I couldn’t put together a three-piece puzzle. I went through rehab, and I know God put this in my spirit, we were sitting in a circle [at rehab] all in wheelchairs, and I said to myself, ‘I can’t be sitting here in this wheelchair.’”
He wasn't there long, even if it took him a year to get back to work full time. A succession plan is in place for son Reggie York Jr. to step in when York retires. And though the son stepped in to help fill the void while York was on the sideline, no one was ready for a permanent handing off at that time.
Especially, York, who seemingly has as much life left in him as a 20-something, and definitely more building to do. Making things with his own two hands is what has driven him since as long as he can remember.
We sat in TJ’s — me and both Yorks — because the restaurant was one of York Builders’ more recent jobs, an expansion of a small restaurant in south Arlington into a bigger establishment with a fuller menu that includes some very tasty barbecue, if an amateur taste tester can be trusted.
“He’s quality,” says Gwen Johnson, whose husband opened TJ’s, but passed away several months later, of York. Her son Travis now owns and operates the restaurant. “Case in point, when we got ready to pick out some of our tile, he’s very selective, very particular. He just doesn’t cut back. If he sees something is not right, he fixes it.”
The Johnsons met York through their oldest son, who met York in Bible study.
“My son fell in love with him,” Gwen Johnson says. “God has a reason for sending people into your life. My husband had never been in the restaurant business before, but Reggie had, so he was able to give him insight into the business, too.”
Also completed in the past year was a new, from-the-ground-up 34,000-square foot church for more-than-2,000-member Word of Truth Family Church, an $11 million project in Arlington. The new sanctuary can hold 1,180 believers at a time.
“His underlying passion is helping churches build,” says Reggie Jr., whose father calls him “Jay.”
Everything, York says, he does with a “spirit of excellence,” but “nothing should look better than the church because people come to worship. It’s something you build and dedicate back to the Lord. So, it should be sacred. I take it very seriously. I love seeing how we can help churches. Faith is everything to me.”
Faith is an integral component of the York business and family.
“We open and close every [work] meeting in prayer,” says Reggie Jr., who led our meeting off by blessing the lunch meal.
York Builders is very much a family in every way. In addition to his son, York’s wife, Millicent York, is also with the company as the finance manager. The job is a detour of sorts from a long career in education as a teacher in the Fort Worth, Burleson, and Crowley school districts. Millicent has her master’s degree in counseling.
Being able to work with his wife and son is the ultimate satisfaction, York says. York and Millicent met while they were students at Southern Miss in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Millicent is a native of Fort Worth — the Como neighborhood, to be exact.
She finished her studies there, but York did not. He discovered that his aptitude, like his father’s, was working with his hands. Building things made him happy, and, to that end, he pursued instruction in carpentry and cabinetry. He flourished in the trade, so much so that his instructor hired him to help build cabinets and houses while still in school.
“God just gave me the gift,” York says humbly. “I didn’t set out to be a contractor, but whatever I was doing, I did it 100%. That was what my father taught me. And do it right the first time.”
Life took a different turn when York and Millicent decided to move back to her hometown, Fort Worth.
While she taught school, York built cabinets. He also saw an opportunity in a sandwich franchise, Subway, in the early 1990s. There was a shop he had seen on Vickery. However, everywhere he turned for a bank loan to buy the franchise, he was rebuffed.
“I applied for a loan 10 times,” he remembers. “I had no assets.” One bank turned him down three times. To that loan officer, he offered to buy her lunch.
“She told me, ‘Reggie, we are not going to give you a loan,’” he says. She went to lunch anyway at the Subway he wanted. There was a line out the door, he says.
“I told her what I would do if I owned it,” he says, “and she tells me, ‘I tell you what, I’ve never met anyone as persistent as you. If you can come up with 25% down, I’ll convince the bank to make the loan.’ They did.”
York worked day and night, literally. During most of the day, he ran his Subway restaurant. Late afternoon and evenings, he did his carpentry or odd jobs, like hanging a ceiling fan perhaps. He worked as late as his clients were comfortable having him there.
York says he made that Subway franchise successful because of the relationships he built. He remembered people’s names and what they ordered. If lunch was slow, he’d take a plate of food to an office building to give away.
“People would remember me and come to the store,” he says. “Before you knew it that place was booming.”
By his count, York worked four years straight with no days off.
“My wife said something has to give.”
It was the Subway store, which became the seed money — after selling — for a housing project York envisioned for Como. York saw an emerging market of young Black couples wanting to move back into Como. He eventually built four houses there, the first a 1,100-square-foot, three-bedroom residence in the 5900 block of Kilpatrick Ave.
York’s first commercial enterprise was a TECQ buildout on East Loop 820. He had finally gotten a commercial job after falling short of several bids. He got lucky because every other company said they could not meet the tight timeframe.
“They needed it done in four weeks. I said, ‘I can do it!” York says. “We completed it in less than four weeks. We got it done in three weeks. Basically, I ran the day crew, and my brother worked the night crew. We worked 24/7.”
That job essentially got the commercial arm of York Builders off the ground. Office buildings, a Burlington Coat Factory, more than one Cold Stone Creamery, and Barse Jewelry Store in downtown Fort Worth are among the firm’s works.
On York Builders’ agenda in 2022 is another church, an RV park, a food truck park, and a parking garage. The jobs range in distance from Dallas to the east to Burleson in the south.
Seventy-five percent of business, both Yorks say, are return clients.
With that kind of backstory, it’s easy to see why it’ll take more than a stroke to slow down York, who was felled because of a birth defect in his heart that was never discovered until his mid-50s.
“I couldn’t even stand up,” he says, adding that he never was completely discouraged, through he admits he had some tough days. "I remember the day my wife let me walk to the mailbox. I was so happy.”
Today, he’s a CrossFit regular Tuesdays and Thursdays, and walks 4 miles a day in between.
And he still works like Reggie York always has.