Black Women-Owned Businesses Champion Entrepreneurial Ecosystem

By Jada Ingleton | The Washington Informer | Word In Black

This post was originally published on The Washington Informer

The Mecca Marketplace, an opportunity for Black-owned small businesses to set up shop and offer their products for sale, was hosted at the Black Commerce Conference on June 22 at the Gaylord National Resort. The Black Commerce Conference is one of the four national programs that the Howard University and PNC National Center for Entrepreneurship implements. (Courtesy of Noir Prism Studios)

(WIB) – August marks National Black Business Month and Black women-owned businesses have been celebrating with a rise in presence, revenue, and development opportunities amidst ongoing infrastructure challenges, research shows.

Black female entrepreneurs have dominated the business climate, representing roughly 2.1 million businesses and 52.1% of all Black-owned enterprises, according to a 2024 Wells Fargo Study. As the fastest-growing group of entrepreneurs, Black women have worked to shape culture and create spaces for diversity to prosper, with business methods rooted in increasing representation, access to capital, education and reducing the racial wealth gap.

“When I think about the inherent qualities women carry – to be nurturers, to be community developers, to be community builders … I think it’s a natural need that exists in every community. When you think about small businesses and Black women, Black women represent the fastest-growing new business opportunities in the country. Small business in general generates all of our local jobs,” says Monica Ray, president of The Congress Heights Community Training and Development Corporation (CHCTDC). “When you think about how to bridge the gap between how we build sustainable communities, we can’t leave Black women out of the conversation.”

Black women-owned businesses saw a surge with the COVID-19 pandemic, increasing 32.7% in average revenues between 2019 and 2023, compared to all women-owned businesses’ growth of 11.2%, according to a 2024 Wells Fargo Study. Many of these self-starters utilized the lockdown to pivot or expand into new ventures, which allowed them to pursue more passions or earn a steady income.

For Dr. Lakeysha Hallmon, CEO and founder of the Village Market, the economic shock of the pandemic inspired her to dig deeper into the systemic challenges that Black entrepreneurs face. Last April, on an episode of Meghan Houle’s “Pivot with Purpose” podcast, she shared her mission-forward vision to drive economic growth and explore how she can “actualize dreams” within the community.

“I think more than being an entrepreneur, I’m deeply passionate about proactively solving problems. My goal and vision was to create a very vibrant ecosystem,” Hallmon explained. “[I want] for Black entrepreneurs to have the resources, the mentorship, and then, the end piece of that, the relationship with customers.”

The former educator began her community outreach in 2016 with the Village Market, an Atlanta-based staple center for Black-owned companies to increase revenue through e-commerce, seasonal marketplaces, strategic alliances, retail, and commercial prospects. Since then, she’s built a self-designed multi-prong business model, founding Our Village United and most recently, Elevate, a free 12-week incubator program that offers professional insight on how to scale businesses and compete within the industry.

Altogether, Hallmon has generated 8.3 million dollars of direct sales to Black businesses.

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