Music Merchant

Co-owning grocery stores in metro Detroit is his day job, but Mark Kassa’s guitar has taken him to the Grammys.

BY R.J. KING

Attending business classes at Wayne State University in Detroit during the late 1980s, Mark Kassa found his business-related coursework was a breeze.

Having grown up in a family of grocers — his grandfather arrived in Detroit from Iraq in 1929 and opened a small food market on the city’s east side in 1936 — Kassa was familiar with payroll, accounting, inventory, and other management skills. So it wasn’t a stretch to say he wasn’t being challenged in the classroom.

“I was running a business already, but my real passion was to go to music school. Without telling my parents, I took the entrance exam at the Musicians Institute in Los Angeles in 1990 and got accepted,” Kassa says. “Then I had to tell my folks, and coming from the Chaldean community, which is all about running businesses, they were, shall we say, surprised.

“My mom even asked if I was all right, and I told her that I had never gotten in trouble before, so why would I start now? I stayed for one year — they teach you four years of curriculum during that time — and came home and went back to work at the grocery stores.”

At the same time, he formed a five-piece band called Tower, which played gigs around the region. But Kassa, who played lead guitar, soon left the band he founded and formed a new group called Slight Return, named after “Voodoo Child (Slight Return)”

by guitarist Jimi Hendrix.

His new trio recorded an album that included a

Culinary Notes

Mark Kassa, right, jamming on stage with P-Funk All-Star George Clinton, left, was recently named “Guitar Player of the Year” as part of the Midwest USA Prestige Awards.

version of “Make A Move” by Cypress Hill. “The song got the attention of the record companies, and we were offered a two-year deal to go on tour, but I told them no,” Kassa says. “With three young daughters at home, I didn’t want to miss their childhoods.”

Still, he never stopped playing, producing albums, and performing, while at the same time running, along with four relatives, independent grocery stores that today include Saturn Market Place in Dearborn Heights, Saturn Super Foods in Detroit, and Hartland Market Place locations in Farmington Hills and Westland. Overall, the four stores have around 230 employees.

Kassa’s grocery partners include his brother, David,

PDA Q&A: THE E-INTERVIEW

DB: WHERE ARE YOU?

MA: In Miami. I’m here for a number of reasons, one being it’s our midyear strategic planning session with peers in our industry. We do business planning in April, to prepare for midyear, and also in October, as our end-of-year preparation.

DB: WHO DO YOU SERVE?

MA: We work closely with high-profile people in professional sports and entertainment, along with business owners and C-suite executives. Right now it’s the offseason for NFL athletes, who are training, and that’s another reason why we’re here.

DB: WHAT SERVICES DO YOU OFFER?

MA: We deliver financial planning, wealth management, and high-end insurance services, plus there’s a lot of specialized risk management planning we do for our clients. Our Podium Group, which has been in place for 10 years, has a team of former athletes who competed at a high level and are now financial professionals who work very closely with our clients.

DB: ARE YOU HIRING?

MA: Most definitely. While along with three cousins: Paul, Phil, and Chris. “The grocery business has its ups and downs due to supply chain problems, but we have a loyal group of customers we appreciate in many ways,” Kassa says.

The same up-and-down rhythm extends to the music business.

“One time I went into Fifth Avenue Billiards in Royal Oak and they said we weren’t good enough to play there, after not even seeing us perform. Two weeks later, we opened for Creedence Clearwater Revival at Pine Knob Music Theatre (in Clarkston). We also recorded with George Clinton, and now we’re in a movie project with Folktellers Studios in Royal Oak.”

To date, Kassa has 17 songs that have been selected for the first round of the Grammy awards. The recognition means he can nominate and vote for recording artists, as well as attend the annual show. “My wife and I travel to the Grammys every year,” Kassa says. “It’s always fun, and if you win something, it’s a surprise.” our competitors have frozen hiring, we added 54 new advisers and adviser candidates over the last year. In recent years, we combined and enhanced our Farmington Hills and Grand Rapids offices, so we have one unified firm serving the Great Lakes region.

DB: ANY OTHER UPDATES?

MA: We took 8,000 square feet in our Southfield office and made it a state-of-theart executive business suite and training center for our clients. It’s like a Four Seasons luxury hotel business center, but at our space you arrive, receive first-class treatment, sit in on learning sessions as they relate to building your wealth, and learn more about present and future economic and financial trends. — R.J. King

Eo Magic

FORMER MICHIGAN STATE University and Los Angeles Lakers basketball star Earvin “Magic” Johnson will be the keynote speaker at the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) Detroit XCentric 2023, which will take place at the Westin Book Cadillac in downtown Detroit Oct. 2-4.