Charles Clarence Butt (born February 3, 1938) is an American heir and billionaire. He inherited his family's

San Antonio ("Cradle of Freedom") , image_map = , mapsize = 220px , map_caption = Interactive map of San Antonio , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = United States , subdivision_type1= State , subdivision_name1 = Texas , subdivision_t ...

–based

H-E-B H-E-B Grocery Company, LP, is an American privately held supermarket chain based in San Antonio, Texas, with more than 340 stores throughout the U.S. state of Texas, as well as in northeast Mexico. The company also operates Central Market, an ...

supermarket chain in 1971. The privately held company has more than 300 stores and $31 billion in sales, according to ''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also r ...

''.

Early life

Charles Clarence Butt was born on February 3, 1938, the son of

Howard Edward Butt Sr. Howard Edward Butt Sr. (April 9, 1895 – March 12, 1991) was an American businessman, and CEO of the H-E-B grocery store chain, which was founded by his mother, Florence Thornton Butt, in 1905. Early life Howard Butt was youngest of the three ...

and Mary Elizabeth Holdsworth, and the grandson of Florence Butt, who founded

in 1905. Butt graduated from

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

Wharton School The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania ( ; also known as Wharton Business School, the Wharton School, Penn Wharton, and Wharton) is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, a private Ivy League research university in P ...

with a bachelor's degree, where he joined the

Sigma Chi Fraternity Sigma Chi () International Fraternity is one of the largest North American fraternal literary societies. The fraternity has 244 active (undergraduate) chapters and 152 alumni chapters across the United States and Canada and has initiated more tha ...

. He earned an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Career

He became chairman, CEO and president of the H.E. Butt Grocery Company in 1971.H-E-B Official Website - History
" HEB.com. Retrieved on April 23, 2010. In late 2019, Charles Butt and Family had a net worth of over US$10 billion according to ''Forbes''.

Awards and recognition

In 2013, AdvisoryCloud ranked Butt as the No. 5 CEO on its Top Chief Executive List. In November 2001, the Mexican government awarded Butt the Aguila Azteca medal for his philanthropic involvement and business dealings in Mexico.

Philanthropy

Butt pledged $50 million to the Raising Texas Teachers scholarship fund to support the training of Texas public school teachers. In January 2017, he pledged $100 million to Texas public education and created The Holdsworth Center, named after his mother Mary Elizabeth Butt (née Holdsworth). In September 2017, Butt donated $5 million to J. J. Watt's Houston Hurricane Harvey relief fund. As of May 2018, Butt pledges to

The Giving Pledge The Giving Pledge is a campaign to encourage extremely wealthy people to contribute a majority of their wealth to philanthropic causes. , the pledge has 236 signatories from 28 countries. Most of the signatories of the pledge are billionaires, a ...

and writes in his release that he intends to help children and teachers.

Personal life

Butt is single. Butt and his family were excluded from the annual Forbes list of the world's top billionaires beginning in 2016. The magazine changed its methodology to exclude individuals from families that share their fortunes.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Butt, Charles 1938 births 20th-century American businesspeople 21st-century philanthropists American billionaires American chief executives of food industry companies American grocers Butt family Giving Pledgers Harvard Business School alumni Living people Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania alumni