The Texas landscape is littered with the corpses of restaurants, juke joints and bars that opened with high hopes, and closed under financial mushroom clouds. Since the turn of this century, the businesses of more than half of all Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission permit holders have gone belly up.

LastCallTexas explores the winners and losers in this derby to sell alcohol in Texas. We look at what drives these capitalistic daredevils, and what tricks they’re employing to turn a profit. Behind all this are more than 2.3 million data records released from liquor license holders, who are required by Texas law to report beer, wine and liquor sales each month to the Texas Comptroller’s office.