A partnership of real estate investors is behind a new event space taking shape just west of downtown.
Cullen Yards is a new project from partners Gus Bates Jr., Kyle Poulson, Jared Shope, and Ricky Stuart, who are turning their longtime property into an event space after a decade of ownership.
The 12,000-square-foot property at 2412 Cullen St. has a comfortable capacity of 350-375, though Shope says they could go more.
“We can get a big number in there,” Shope says. “It’s pretty flexible as far as how the space works.”
The partners have set up an entity for the operation that includes Graciela Todd as general manager and managing partner with the partners’ children with ownership stakes, Shope says.
Todd was the key player in this coming together. Todd has been in hospitality and catering for years, including most recently serving as general manager at Sodexo, where she oversaw catering of events at TCU. That’s where she met the four partners, who had a concept but only wanted one person to run it.
“She had an interest in the event center concept,” Shope says. “She grew up in California, and that’s what her family did out there. We had the perfect building with all this parking, and, two, we found the perfect person in her. About a year ago, she decided to step away from TCU and jump on board with us, and that’s how we got into it.”
“We’ll still help steer the ship over there and get to be in the middle of it, but we really are turning over the day-to-day operations to Graciela because this is what she does. She knows the catering and the food and beverage and the event-driven world. Ricky, Kyle, Gus, and I would just get in the way if we made too many decisions.”
The four met through their association with TCU. All four are graduates. Shope played baseball there in the early 1990s under Lance Brown. Bates was born and raised here, and all the others have stayed in Fort Worth since leaving Frogland.
Shope has 30 years as an entrepreneur of outdoors retail stores. He owned CD Ski and Sports and owns Climate in Clear Fork. Climate deals in brands like The North Face, Johnnie-O, Obermeyer, and Patagonia, to name a few.
Bates and his late father Gus Bates Sr. owned Gus Bates Insurance until selling to HUB International several years ago. Poulson has been in commercial real estate, and Stuart took over the family business, Chicken Express.
Shope, Poulson, and Stuart teamed to save the venerable and beloved Oui Lounge long ago.
“That’s how we got into the real estate business together. We were going to save the Oui Lounge,” Shope says, before adding with a touch of irony, “We wound up killing the Oui Lounge.
“But the great thing out of that transaction was we ended up with that little strip center on Bluebonnet Circle.”
Cullen Yards isn’t the group’s first foray into the event space. They also owned the MoPac Event Center on Rogers Road, a COVID shutdown casualty.
“We converted it, and it was a lot of fun. We had some great events in there,” Shope says. The partnership still owns the property. It leases to Courtside Kitchen, a pickleball and dining concept.
They bought the building on Cullen Street about 10 years ago. It was an industrial warehouse for much of its life, beginning in the mid-1950s. At various times, it was home to Humble Oil & Refining Company and later, Felts Oil.
The group leased it to Teague Lumber for a spell and Tesla for a bit.
“We really had no idea what we were going to do with it,” Shope says. “We just knew it was a great old building with great guts. And the funny thing is, for about the last 10 years, that building served as a batting cage for all of our kids who played sports. We had this ultimate indoor facility.”