Berry Gordy is well known to be one of the most successful Black Americans in History mostly for his record company Motown Records which produced great artists of all time, like Stevie Wonder, Diana Ross, The Temptation, and many more artists.

Motown started its operation in the 1960s and was one of the biggest places to have an artist signed on.  Motown Records is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group and was founded by Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on June 7, 1958, and incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960.

Berry Gordy III the founder is an American retired record executive, record producer, songwriter, film producer, and television producer. He is best known as the founder of the Motown record label and its subsidiaries, which was the highest-earning African-American business for decades. He was born on November 28, 1929 (age 93 years), in Detroit, Michigan, United States

Why did Berry Gordy sell Motown?

Motown was in fact one of the best recording deals ever found. Motown Records was doing great with their artist but had lost many of mostly to Drugs, poverty, suicide, and murder. With Motown losing most of its artists, it was also losing money as well which almost made them go bankrupt.

Most people blamed Motown Records, mostly because they failed to come up with new stars to replace those who moved on to other labels or passed their prime.

Gordy decided to sell his interests in Motown Records to MCA and Boston Ventures on June 28, 1988, for $61 million. MCA Records began a North American distribution deal with the label in 1983. He later sold most of his interests in Jobete publishing to EMI Publishing. 

In 2021 Motown separated from the Capitol Music Group to become a standalone label once again. In recent news, Motown Records is currently laying off its staff as the label gets reintegrated under the Capitol Music Group.