The Hair Raising Claim that Blacks Don't Support Each Other in Business

I recently saw a rant about Blacks not supporting each other in business after a successful Black business, Shea Moisture, in the haircare industry, sold a minority stake in their company that was acquired by a mainstream investment group. To put it mildly, a significant number of Black women lamented that the resulting marketing had taken a change in direction from the traditional ethnic marketing to Black women. 

This seemed to cause a significant outcry about yet another successful Black company being bought and whitewashed in the Black haircare industry.

In response some Blacks in social media seem to be taking a more traditional outlook on this business move.  They seem to take the position - it's all about expanding into different market segments and growing a company.  They also usually add that Black women shouldn't take it as a personal or ethnic insult.

Some even rationalized that Blacks don't support Blacks in business any way so a company has to do what's best for it's bottomline sans the ethnic solidarity.

This is what annoyed me in the discussion.  This justification really rubs me the wrong way.

If you want to have a bottom-line approach to business where green is the only color you see that's on you.  But don't try to peddle the negative narrative that Blacks don't support other Blacks in business as justification for your outlook because - it just isn't true!

What people may be forgetting is these companies buy black companies because they have reached multimillion dollar status, often doing tens of millions or even hundreds of millions in sales, because Blacks supported these companies as consumers!  This is how they become valuable targets to mainstream investment groups in the 1st place.

Companies like FUBU, Cross Colors, Essence, Karl Kani and Carols Daughter to name a few became multimillion dollar companies that were valuable to investors because Blacks supported them to a large degree. I don't get why some Blacks are so vested in this negative narrative that Blacks don't support other Blacks in business.

In my experience If Black businesses market creatively and well to black consumers they will flock to them. I've seen it happen a quite a bit. Sheeesh.

They even offered up this infographic as proof of their sentiments...

However, this graphic has little to do with the psychographics of the Black consumer. There are countless Black companies supported to the tune of millions of dollars by Black consumers.

This business infographic, if true, is more a reflection of a lack of mentorships, the scarcity of financial institutions loaning to Black entrepreneurs, redlining, lack of government contracts etc. It has  little to do with Black consumers not willing to buy from Black businesses.

This is a demoralizing type of negative narrative towards the Black community. I work with Black businesses who are making millions from Black consumers, customers, and clients. One of my clients I've had for 8 years, and help market 400 apartments, to primarily Black tenants, is Black owned. I've helped them do about 25 million dollars primarily from rentals to Black apartment tenants.

Another of my Black clients owns a multimillion dollar tax service and Jazz club. Almost all their business comes from Black consumers.

The sad thing is some really smart people are saying things like this. My 1st day in business, about 25 years ago, I made near $5,000 the 1st day and 1st month close to $12,000 - almost exclusively from Black customers. I get Black clients to pay me thousands of dollars without even meeting me personally. So enough of these glib stereotypes about Black consumers.

I wrote a book on business finance. One of the major reasons you have more Latino and Asian businesses is because they have large viable nonprofit business loan organizations like Accion and Grameen bank which have the capacity to afford them billions in loans for their businesses.

The Black community doesn't have a national microfinance organization, with over a billion dollars in capital, dedicated to loaning to small businesses in our community. That's one of the major reasons why we don't have more viable businesses.  It isn't a psychographics issue it is more of a lack of business finance and strategy issue.

Kamau's Qu!ps is Published by Kamau Austin. Austin is a popular Blogger with over 11,000 connections in social media.  Austin is an author, writer, and Internet Marketing Professional helping small businesses grow more profitable businesses online.

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