For Us, By Us. 2 Black-Owned Business Directories To
“For Us, By Us”, an important topic previously discussed in everything is political. The power of the Black dollar and how it can be used to help the Black community ranging from the food you consume, the goods you purchase, your chosen method of transportation, to the money that you use to pay for all of it - it all relates to “Buying Black”.
Buying Black is Important
When most people hear “economy,” they think of investment stocks and Wall Street, however, the modern economy revolves around consumer spending specifically consumer spending which happens to be the backbone of the American economy. Did you know that by 2020, the Black buying power will reach 2 trillion dollars? The unfortunate part is that the majority of those 2 trillion dollars from Black consumers don’t cycle back into the Black community.
Studies show that the Black dollar stays within Black communities for 6 hours on average, which is an extremely short time when you consider that other racial communities keep their dollar for more than twenty days. This contributes to the racial wealth gap and the fact that “though black people make up nearly 13 percent of the United States population, they hold less than 3 percent of the nation’s total wealth,” according to NYT magazine.
The first episode of the Netflix show Trigger Warning with Killer Mike shows how tough it is to spend a day buying and consuming only Black-owned goods. Part of the reason that the Black dollar doesn’t stay in Black communities for a long period is that Black people have been historically discouraged from owning businesses. Nowadays Black-owned businesses are thriving and easier to find, thanks to online directories that focus on highlighting them. Here are 2 directories:
Photo Credit: eatblackowned.com
Eat Black Owned
Eat Black Owned, a national online directory of Black-owned restaurants, went live this past June. Edward Dillard compiled this list of over 2000 spots, after he had trouble finding Black-owned restaurants on the road as a truck driver. Now he adds new restaurants regularly, and updates the related Instagram with pictures of food from the restaurants.
Part of his goal for forming the site was to make an effort to keep the Black dollar within Black communities. “We spend our money with other communities and rarely ever with our own,” he told NewsOne. “I hope individuals will use this site and find a restaurant to patronize that they never knew about.”
Photo credit: Shoppe Black
Shoppe Black
Shoppe Black was started in 2015 by husband and wife team Shantrelle P. Lewis and Tony O. Lawson. The company’s website includes interviews with Black business people and profiles of various types of Black-owned businesses, including banks, yoga studios, makeup brands, and farms. They also plan to expand their company to include an agency that will help Black-owned professionals with resources including marketing, branding, and customer training.
The main goal of the company is to promote Black businesses and culture. Also, as Lawson told Ebony magazine, “another goal of the company is to reduce the rate of Black business failure… You may not know that there’s a Black-owned leather-bag company, a water company or a toiletry company. Those companies are out there, and it’s [their] mission to let the people know they exist and support them.”
