Black-Owned Business Challenge LA

[bobchallengela2016]

#BoB Challenge: Day 7

LORI: For our early lunch, my boyfriend and I went BACK to Sattdown because he saw the photo of my meal there and wanted in on that action.  He ordered jerk chicken and gushed about it.  I ordered the same thing that I ate on Friday - tropical tofu.  We had the same server, and she joked that she would see me tomorrow.  Then, she added that they are closed on Sundays and Mondays, and I told her I would definitely be back.  I’m happy to have a new place to go for work lunches.

REBECCA: One of my favorite Saturday rituals when I have a day off is to go get a nice coffee somewhere and chill. I woke up craving a cortado or a cold brew but there was absolutely nothing I could find anywhere that indicates a black-owned shop, although I will say most of the ones I frequent happen to be owned by Asians or Asian-Americans. There is a coffee shop in Watts that closes at 1 but they didn’t answer their phone and I didn’t want to drive all the way there if it, too, was permanently closed.  So I abstained, made coffee at home as usual, and thankfully no obligations kept me from breaking BoB.

TENN: A life event took over Saturday morning and kept me from the things I’d hoped to do. By 4pm, I was an hour out from my evening event, and I still needed to pick up pumpkins.Pumpkins… Who knew that a lumpy orange melon would be my downfall in this challenge? (No, I’m not talking about Trump.)  A literal pumpkin for carving at the party later.

LORI: In the afternoon, I may have consumed a slice of leftover peach cobbler and sweet potato pie from the 27th Street Bakery, which was still in my fridge, so I wasn’t hungry for dinner until late.  While trying to stay awake to see Lin Manuel Miranda host SNL, I ate the remaining food from Simply Wholesome.  The week was exhausting to say the least and I needed to rest and stay in, not to mention, my gas light was on and I couldn’t fill up until after the challenge on Sunday.

REBECCA: Saturday evening, our friend Keli came up from San Diego and stayed the night. I told her about the challenge and suggested we hit up a BoB for dinner, and right away she said chicken n waffles, so we ewnt to the Roscoe’s in Pasadena. And DAMN it’s what I’ve been missing all my life! So, so good. I laughed that the menu literally ssays “Succulent chicken” but it’s totally true and the waffle as a conduit for butter and syrup is just on point. Great service, HILARIOUS people-watching, and some good mac n cheese on the side. What’s more to love?

Syrup and butter the waffle first, then top with chicken.

TENN: No BOB within our researched database sold Pumpkins, and if they did – they weren’t close enough that I could risk driving to them and still make the event on time. I bought pumpkins at Whole Foods like a quitter, and doubled down on drink mixers. I didn’t account for mixers on day one at Simply Wholesome, the vegan and organics store in Inglewood. Or a party for that matter. It was a last minute thing.That really drove it home for me that this challenge can be nearly impossible sometimes. Life gets in the way. I thought about smaller communities where I grew up and realized this challenge might not be feasible. 

LORI: This week pushed me out of my comfort zone and neighborhood, and I’m grateful to now add lots of new restaurants to my “favorites” list.  I plan to create a comprehensive list of all the wonderful restaurant suggestions sent our way, and that we’ve found in our research. I will organize them by neighborhood, as that would have helped me the most this week.  Without a doubt, this challenge has instilled in me the importance of supporting my local black-owned businesses, and I will definitely continue to visit and champion them as much as possible!  I urge anyone who might be reading this to please consider challenging yourself to do the same - recruit your friends, write reviews, blog, engage in thoughtful conversations, and lift up the black community as much as possible. 

REBECCA: Keli is one of my good social justice-oriented friends who also happens to be half black and adopted and a woman and an artist - this intersectionality drives a lot of her interests and activism. We had a great conversation over dinner and I felt like BoB ended up a very thematic high.

Coincidental side note: Keli had a YOU CANT TOUCH MY HAIR theme going even before Phoebe announced her book, and a year or two ago did this awesome piece that she sells through Studio 6. She’s thinking about doing another batch and adding new designs - I totally think she should.

Art by Keli Gagen

TENN: We have a responsibility as a better-abled Los Angeles community to lead in the fight.

BOB challenge over, but not out. I look forward to sharing other experiences in the future. Please share your own!

[bobchallengela2016]

#BoB Challenge: Day 6

LORI: My work lunch on Friday ended up being rescheduled, but I still had my heart set on trying the only BOB I could find near my work in Studio CIty: Sattdown Jamaican Grill.  Full disclosure, when I visited Jamaica over a decade ago, I wasn’t a fan of the food.  As a vegetarian, there just weren’t many options for me and jerk flavorings don’t really have the same effect on vegetables. Fortunately, Sattdown features many vegetarian offerings on the menu, so I was down to check it out.  I went by myself - it was tucked into a strip mall off of Ventura.  There were two full tables of people there when I arrived.  I sat by the window, next to a wall filled with headshots of black actors who I assumed stopped in before or after auditions at the nearby studios.  The server was attentive and friendly, and she seemed to really understand my annoying dietary needs (vegetarian who is also allergic to fish/seafood, which is prevalent on the menu) - she said she used to work at a vegan restaurant.  I ordered a homemade drink that she recommended called Sorrel, which is hibiscus and ginger. Holy moly, it was delicious - if you like ginger or want to fight a cold, this is a must-try.  I ordered the tropical stir-fried tofu which came with vegetables, plantains, and beans/rice.  It was really tasty - a perfect combination of flavors.  I also ordered a vegan veggie pattie to go, which had a tasty spice to it.

REBECCA: Friday was both good and bad. Never had time to leave the office for African or Jamaican food for lunch - lunch was instead watching the deplorable Trump/Bush ’05 video while choking down some dry cereal I’d bought at Simply Wholesome - but was able to leave in time to book it down to Skylight Books in Los Feliz for a Phoebe Robinson (2 Dope Queens, Sooo Many White Guys) appearance.  She is plugging her brand-new book, “You Can’t Touch My Hair,” so it felt timely. To be honest, I love 2 Dope Queens but I don’t love Sooo Many White Guys and I was worried that I wouldn’t really care for Phoebe - I didn’t even reserve a copy of the book. But the evening turned out well and I was impressed with her intelligence, observation-analysis, and wit. She read excerpts from her book, essentially about her experiences as a young black woman in America, but heavily peppered with jokes and pop culture references. Then she had a conversation with Michaela Watkins, of Casual fame, who was a really great counterpart. Two women of strength talking about race, women’s issues, and laughing. 

LORI: In the evening, my boyfriend and I snagged free tickets to see a sneak preview of the Hamilton documentary on PBS, which was downtown at the Japanese American National Museum.  We left with enough time to hit up Wood Spoon beforehand, but we hit an obnoxious amount of traffic en route and had to go directly to the theater in order to get there in time.  After the screening, we were sad to realize that Wood Spoon was closed for the night, as was the only other downtown-located BOB that I could find, The Black Fig.  So, due to a lack of options at that late hour, we had to snag food elsewhere. (My boyfriend paid, so I didn’t technically spend the money there, but I still feel guilty since this is borderline cheating. We were starving-to-the-point-of-headaches and nowhere close to home, so had to make due.)

REBECCA: A cool side story of this event was actually that I had started talking to the young woman next to me while we were wating fopr theeven to start. We were chatting about podcasts, which ones we like, etc., and the girl on the other side of me overheard and chimed in. It turns out the first girl was talking to is a recent college grad currently working with special behavioral students but trying to find a job in her passion/field of study: domestic violence survivors. The girl who chimed in on our podcast conversation happens to be a lawyer at a rad-sounding domestic violence nonprofit here in LA, right where the first girl also happens to live (but she was unaware of the org).  They totally connected, and lawyer told her she gets job notifications all the time and would be thrilled to have someone to pass them on to so they swapped contact info. How cool is that - women helping other women randomly, and over a really great career cause. It warmed my heart.After the event was tough because Woo and her friend Sam met up at the bookstore and wanted to go to a local spot for food and drink. The spot is cool but to to my knowledge not BoB, and I knew I was too tired to abstain but also be cheerful. I knew I’d be cranky if I had to go hang out in a bar and drink water and be tempted by what the others were having. So I went home.

TENN: Today, technically I cheated on the challenge. I went to Trader Joe’s to pick up a cake for a co-worker’s birthday (not with my money) There was a kind faced black woman named Tiana sitting outside. She was asking for change on behalf of a non-profit organization that she was working for. I told her I didn’t have cash, but instead I shook her hand, introduced myself, and then sat down next to her.

She told me that she was also from Tennessee. That she just moved out here in the past year to receive help with a mental disability that she wasn’t able to get help with back home. She received EBT, but was expected to live assistance free in the projects. Tiana told me that she couldn’t have had a good life in the projects or in Nashville. Not in her position. She explained that California has better assistance for people struggling with mental conditions like hers, and she was placed into a home and helped to find work in just four short months here in LA.

We talked about the upcoming election this year, and why it’s so important to vote. She admitted that she’s almost thirty and has never voted before, and also isn’t even sure where she stands on most issues. I told her that she could have her ballot mailed to her so it would give her time to research her positions for each candidate and proposition on the ballot. We looked up the phone number together, and she told me she could use the internet at the library.  

She thanked me for spending some time with her, and it made me feel a little ashamed. I knew that she shouldn’t feel like she owed me gratitude for a conversation, and I certainly didn’t deserve her thanks. All I did was stopped, and listened to her. So, instead I thanked her for letting me take time away from her fundraising and entertaining another southern transplant.

I left so she could get back to work. I had to get to my job too. I thought about her all day long, and when I went back later to pick up items for a company party – there she was, still sitting in the sun on her folding chair. This time when I walked up, we greeted each other by name. I asked how long she would be out there, and she said “a few more hours.” So, this time… BOB challenge or not… I knew what I wanted to do. I asked if I could buy her some food or water; something to help with the sweltering heat. She asked for lemonade.

Inside, I found that Trader Joe’s doesn’t carry many individually served, cold beverages – but I found a half-gallon of lemonade cold on the shelf, and asked the store manager for a few throw away cups. She was excited to have the large container because she could take the rest home with her. Trader Joe’s isn’t a black owned business, but I wanted to support a member of my community directly. Half of this challenge is awareness, and Tiana gave me more insight into part of being a member of the black community in Los Angeles (specifically someone who struggles with poverty and a mental disorder, as well as racial segregation) than all of this challenge combined.

For $3.75, I made a new friend smile. BOB or not, I believe that it was worth it.

[bobchallengela2016]

#BoB Challenge: Day 5

LORI: Today I planned to meet one of my college besties and her husband, mother and toddler at a BOB in Noho.  They live in Arizona and went out of their way to swing by Los Angeles to meet me for a brunch on their drive back home from their family vacation at Disneyland.  I told her about my challenge and offered up Sweetie Pie’s, which recently opened in NoHo in a tiny little building where Phil’s Diner used to be.  Sweetie Pie’s is known for having a reality television show on Oprah’s network, and the place looks pretty family friendly.  When we met there at 11AM, when they opened, there was already a short line of people, but the employee informed all of us that they were currently not offering anything from the burger or waffle menu. Limited strictly to chicken and sides, and my friend and her family opted to cross the street to a pizza place instead.  Since it wasn’t black-owned, and because I had a work lunch meeting only two hours later, I had water and enjoyed catching up.

Tenn, Rebecca and I had also agreed to make a challenge exception to mandatory work events/meals in which we do not personally pay for things ourselves, so my Thursday lunch fell into that category.  We also made an exception for medical appointment co-pays and the like, so my dermatology appointment also didn’t count against the challenge.

TENN: My favorite day. After the rough Tuesday and Wednesday I had, I felt a little worn down in this challenge. But Thursday was so much different. It was Lady (Parts) night. Lori, Rebecca, Woo, Emily, and myself all went out for dinner together at My Two Cents on Pico. You might miss it if just driving by as the sign only has a red lettered sign that ha the image of a fork + knife = heart (love.) I had to call the girls upon arrival to confirm I was in the right place.

REBECCA: I’d been looking forward to this night of BoB all week - what excuse to hang out with like-minded friends and what better way to celebrate black-owned enterprise than with a night out mid-week at a favorably reviewed soul food joint?! Even though we all had to go out of our ways during rush hour to get there ;)

LORI: This trendy restaurant was small and bustling, and it featured a mouthwatering display of baked goods (and with many vegan options). We had ordered and paid for in advance at the cash register, and they brought us cornbread to munch on while we waited for our food.  The menu has tons of vegetarian options with a soul food flair, and the restaurant boasts that all ingredients are locally-grown and all materials are biodegradable.  They are also BYOB, which rocks, although we didn’t bring any booze.  

TENN: They’ve been open now for three years, and the restaurant was packed by the end of the evening. People even kindly moved from the larger table to give room to our big group. I loved the décor, as it had a quaint modern-meets-chicken coop feel, with old wooden boards over white paint, chicken wire, and long wooden tables.

Their menu was mainly soul and comfort food. Megan and I split the Seafood Gumbo that included actual crab legs and pickled okra, and the Jamaican vegetable rolls. I was in in Heaven. Especially since Megan doesn’t like pickles, so I got to eat all the okra.

REBECCA: Woo and I split the porkchop-on-plantains entree, a side of collard greens, and the mac n cheese. The pork chop was good, if slightly on the drier side, with a definite cinnamon-nutmeg spicy flare which I liked. The plantains were super-sweet and more like bananas, and the dish felt like it needed rice and beans or something to round it out, but overall we enjoyed it and even boxed up some leftovers. The mac n cheese had a thick, tough crust on the top which simply meant it had been over-broiled, but once you dug past that the melty cheesy part on the bottom was flavorful and delightful. The greens were OK. We had a rad cracked-out Arnold Palmer made with lemonade  and sweet tea, and finished it off with Lori’s cake. The orange cake is like a creamsicle dreamsicle and even for this non-cake person I’d totally order it again!

LORI: To share with the group, I ordered the warm goat cheese salad with tomato confit from the starter menu - it was huge and delicious. For my meal, I devoured the red and green ravioli which was made with beets and a cream sauce and tasted about as homemade as possible. For dessert, I ordered a slice of orange cake to share, but they accidentally brought us a massively huge strawberry cake slice instead.  Their mistake was to our benefit because when they realized it, they also brought us a giant orange cake slice, and we pretty much inhaled both.

TENN: While at dinner, we talked about our experiences during the challenge. A lot of my frustrations were shared around the table, but we felt at least like we were educating ourselves – and maybe even helping a few others become more aware along the way.

REBECCA: Yes, Tenn! This was definitely my favorite part. I appreciated the diverse vibe that thrummed throughout the dinner hour. Playlist was on point, too, but loud - too loud for conversation, even with a medium-sized group. And the service was questionable - I might have to process that in a separate entry, but suffice it to say, my (Asian) girlfriend actually made a lot of interesting observations and the bottom line is she felt very much reverse-racism, whereas I didn’t feel well care for on a professional service level. Woo and I had a really good conversation about it later, so I suppose that at least dialogue was sparked at the very least, though I’m not sure what more could be done to improve the situation. We might write separately about that later. Anyway, at least we ended up at Brownstone Bistro, which was arguably the highlight of the evening.

LORI: We drove 3/4 of a mile down Pico to Brownstone Bistro for a post-meal cocktail, which proved to be the highlight of my week.  We sat at the bar and made friends with the awesome bartender, Clarissa, who shared stories of her partying days in Belize where, she says, they work hard and play hard. She brought us complimentary meat pies from the buffet to share, and went out of her way to fill my $6 sauvignon blanc up to the tippy top of the glass. I would go back just to see Clarissa again - she made the experience memorable and fun.  We closed the place down at 10PM and I headed back to the Valley, which couldn’t have been further away.  I wish we had places like these in the Valley!

TENN: Along with being a B.O.B (black owned business), My Two Cents is also a B.Y.O.B (bring your own beverage.) Since none of us knew that, we hadn’t brought anything along. We thought about running across the street to grab something, but realized we probably couldn’t confirm if the liquor store was black owned without asking, so instead Lori googled black owned bars, and one appeared .7 miles down the street.Brownstone Bistro is a bar and restaurant that was going on it’s fourth year in the neighborhood. They also served Jamaican and comfort food, and even had a buffet for $16.95. Fried catfish, pork chops, collard greens, and more.Clarissa was our bartender, and she was absolutely the sweetest. She even gave us free meat pies to sample! They had a special Jamaican fruit punch that she let us taste. It was really good, but a little stronger than I felt was safe to drink and drive on. I’d love to had a glass on the weekend!At the end of the night, we said our goodbyes, excited to blog about our experiences. Shout out to Rebecca who paid our tab. THANKS, LADY! And I walked away from the evening with two more great restaurants under my belt (literally) that I couldn’t wait to try again.

REBECCA: I would probably not make the trek back to this area for My Two Cents, but I certainly plan to come back for a full meal at Brownstone Bistro! Friendly service, amazing-looking food, and a bar that felt like we weren’t quite in LA in the best of ways. Clarissa is indeed my new favorite bartender, and those complimentary meat pies were certainly the best I’ve had this week. But really, the good conversation that such a challenge invokes: the passion for social justice, the creative inspiration, and the fun day-to-day gossip of really brilliant people cannot be beat. I am finally feeling more complete here.

[bobchallengela2016]

#BoB Challenge: Day 4

LORI: I started my morning off sipping Marley Coffee in order to stay alert through my weekly staff meeting (having learned my lesson the hard way after forgetting it for Tuesday’s brutally early 7AM sitcom table read). I wish I had purchased more at Simply Wholesome, but will be ordering some more in bean-form online.  Breakfast was a bowl of cereal from Simply Wholesome.

TENN: I haven’t much to report from Wednesday. I spent more time thinking about all of the things that I couldn’t have than finding new things that I could.

Driving through LA in 96 degree heat. I want a bottle of water. Where is there a black owned gas station? How do I find one if it isn’t on the lists we’ve compiled. Do I drive to ten different ones? Ask if the owner is black? Should it really be this difficult to support our black community? Is it even beneficial to shop only at BOB’s when I can’t find any close enough to spend money at, or find the things that I need there?

I need hair dye. The closest black owned cosmetics store is C&J Beauty Supply on W Martin Luther King Blvd., but they’re only open until 7pm. I work until 6pm, and don’t want to risk the time (or the gas) it would take to beat rush hour traffic. I also don’t know if they would carry the kind of products I would need for my hair type.

Can we just think about that for a minute? “I don’t know if they even carry the kind of products I need for my hair type.”

Have you ever been shopping in the cosmetics section and noticed the “ethnic” section? If you have, you’ve probably noticed that it’s usually very small. If you haven’t then you may live in an area where there isn’t one…

REBECCA:  I sipped my pre-purchased Ethiopian Yirgacheffe at the office and decided to go down a rabbit trail of black-owned business research. Maybe our BoB research hadn’t been targeted or smart enough, and that’s why we weren’t turning up more than a handful of eateries. 

Someone during our research had mentioned that some Buffalo Wild Wings franchises maybe be black owned so I started there, turning up some really interesting information about Rick Ross and his 9 WingStops, Queen Latifah’s coercive Fatburgers (while she was a spokesperson for Jenny Craig) and the fact that Fatburger itself was started in 1947 by an African-American woman, Lovie Yancey (unfortunately, it was sold to a corporation in the 1990s and is now run by a white dude, a former white-collar convict who did time). 

The only thing I could really nail down for BoB franchise locations in LA were these 3 locations in south LA, run by Karim Webb. This was a really inspiring read and it sounds like he’s totally the type of guy who can help spur change and foster more black-owned business in Los Angeles. I also read this interesting article about black-owned franchises in general: why there aren’t more of them, but why more of them could help narrow the poverty gap between whites and blacks (more on this later).

LORI: For my lunch meeting with two writers from my theater collective, we deliberated about where specifically to meet - they both knew about the challenge in advance but we needed to find whatever was most convenient because our priority was having as much time as possible to work on our outline.  Initially we chose a nearby cafe, but since it wasn’t black-owned, I said I would just opt out of ordering anything.  One of the two writer friends, who is black, jokingly offered to sell me a muffin there. (That counts, right?!)  We ultimately decided to pack lunches (I brought one of my Simply Wholesome pre-packaged meals) and eat lunch my office since none of us remembered to bring a laptop.

REBECCA: After quite a bit of reading but no success I finally searched “African restaurants”, then “Jamaican.” These still count as BoBs, but I’d been trying my best to focus on more African-American businesses, because to me African is a completely different thing. I did find a Ghanaian restaurant and a Ugandan restaurant in Van Nuys that actually both look amazing, but didn’t have time to leave that long for lunch. But then, oh joy! I found a new-ish Jamaican bakery/restaurant near those African spots that said they serve the Jamaican empañadas (like a cross between a Latin empañada and a British pasty, maybe even a calzone), among other things. The reviews were a bit sub-par compared to the other places, but I liked that the owner, Edith, was very engaged with reviewers on the Yelp page. It proved they were paying attention to feedback, and also totally fit the BoB profile, no question. Plus, a hand-pie (what a weird term) would be the perfect evening snack since I’d be on the go! I calculated how much time it would take for a thirty-minute detour en route from work to a live-Nerdist podcast taping I was attending of female showrunners at the CBS Radford studios (what a dope panel!). 

Re-energized by my Internet find, I finished my work quickly and weaved my way through rush hour traffic to get to Starlight Bakery Cafe. Unfortunately, they were out of vegetarian pies, but I ordered a Jamaican meat pie and Ghana chicken pie warmed up to go. This is a family-run operation, to be sure: the cute late teens/early twenties son, Davis, served me at the counter as the grandma sat and observed, dad and buddies put up some shelving, and mom and older sister cooked in the kitchen. Only one couple was eating in the restaurant. Davis told me the place has only been open about three months. As I waited, I noticed a fridge with a big variety of really different-looking, authentic Jamaican juices and malt beverages. So rad! I got two juices and a ginger beer to take home with my pies. My total for three drinks and two hefty pies was about $14 before tip, and I was soooo happy to have found the perfect snack to tide me over for the evening. The pies were very crust-heavy and I would have liked more filling - thankfully I’m a bread person, but if you’re one of those weirdos who cuts off your PBnJ crusts and leaves your crusts lying stale on a plate, these aren’t the pies for you. If I had to choose, though, I preferred the Ghana empañada. 

LORI: Post-work, I came home and ate another pre-packaged meal from Simply Wholesome for dinner.  Unfortunately, Wednesday didn’t include any new BoB adventures but tomorrow I’ve plotted two black-owned restaurants.

TENN: As I think about my own struggle with this challenge, I can’t help but become blatantly aware of the struggle our black neighbors go through everyday. There shouldn’t be a bias against minority communities. I’m not saying that black owned businesses should carry more white hair care products. They would take up shelf space, and the black community already has a lack of the products they need, and locations that sell them.

It is the responsibility of major stores to carry more products for black customers, and help promote minority product research and product expansion. They should also hire people from the black community to lead these projects, offering more jobs and opportunities to lift up the community from within.

REBECCA: After the panel, some friends were heading to a local diner. I could have gone to hang out, and who knows - the diner might have even been BoB, who knows. But I told them about it and bowed out instead: they loved the idea of the challenge and were very encouraging.

Finishing this day’s reflection, I want to circle back to more reading I did about black-owned franchises.

“Scholars who study the wealth gap say that efforts to bring minorities into franchising are well-intentioned, but fail to acknowledge a Catch-22: in order to create wealth, a person must already have some.

‘Existing racial differences in wealth go the full distance in explaining racial differences in self-employment,’ says William Darity, a professor of African-American studies, public policy and economics at Duke University. ‘If we’re really concerned about the self-employment gap in the United States, or the franchise participation gap more narrowly, we have to address racial differences in wealth.’”

Um, yes. But at least to me at this point that’s kind of obvious: we’ve certainly become very sensitive to this during our challenge this week. So what exactly is the practical solution? At it’s most basic level, it means hiring more blacks and minorities, but also training them in professional and managerial skills and enabling them to move up in ranks and even branch out into their own franchise ownership or business startups. There’s no shame in being a host or a server as a career path, but in order to move up you have to be trained in higher-level work and different skillsets: working hard and smart. I’m glad that it seems like Karim Webb is making moves to foster that kind of environment for his employees, and make black business leadership/ownership more accessible in his community.

THE GHANA EMPAÑADA (DETAIL).

THE DRANKS. (Jamaican empañada in the background. Jamaican Ginger Beer, June Plum, and Guava Carrot).

SHAMELESS SELFIE BECAUSE SO EXCITED. SO HUNGRY.

[bobchallengela2016]

7 Reasons to Support Black-Owned Businesses

Lori here with a little mid-week reflection.  A curious colleague inquired about what exactly I expect to happen from this challenge, and what am I trying to prove by not shopping at white-owned stores?  This colleague further questioned why one would consider a business owner’s race at all - isn’t that further isolating a particular population?

Let me be as clear as I can while also using a double negative: this challenge isn’t about NOT supporting white-owned businesses.  I'm a big fan of many businesses owned by people who are not black, which isn’t difficult since the playing field is dominated by white-owned businesses. Without requiring any effort, thought, or consideration, I support white-owned businesses every other week of my life, along with the rest of Los Angeles, along with the rest of the country - because it is convenient.  Because they are EVERYWHERE. Chances are, my decision to invest thoughtfully in black-owned businesses won’t negatively affect the multitude of already-thriving businesses. On the flip side, seeking out and supporting black-owned businesses, and encouraging others to do the same, could help sustain and lift up a marginalized community.  

I imagine many people already make thoughtful decisions as consumers, such as shopping at locally-owned stores instead of giant chains like, say, Wal-Mart.  Or purchasing American-made products instead of cheaper, imported goods made with slave/child labor. Or opting against buying your new pet from a puppy mill, knowing that rescuing from a shelter would not contribute to the abuse of animals.  Or going to see Ghostbusters on opening weekend in order to support female-driven films.  Even if these decisions aren’t always convenient or cheaper, it is clearly understood that a bit of extra effort when made by large numbers of people could potentially add up to a huge positive impact in the grand scheme of things. These decisions reflect an understanding of what your hard-earned money is supporting. 

Long story long, to answer my colleague’s question, I didn’t have a hypothesis when starting this challenge - I was armed with good intentions and a curiosity to learn. The more I research, however, my reasons for doing this challenge have increased significantly. 

Here are seven reasons to justify why YOU might want to seek out and support your local black-owned businesses:

INVESTMENT IN COMMUNITY: Compared to big box stores and chains, locally-owned businesses tend to circulate more of their revenue back into their local economy, which ultimately strengthens the entire community. In addition, a locally-owned business owner will be more likely to consider impact on their own community when making decisions, in contrast to a larger national brand with concerns only about the bottom line. (This isn’t to say that there aren’t big corporate chains with black owners, but I have really struggled to find them.  Less than 1% of Fortune 500 companies have black CEOs, and there are currently no majority black-owned companies in the Fortune 500 rankings.) 

TOURISM:  Wouldn’t you rather visit a city that has local character rather than one filled with a bunch of big chain stores that you could find anywhere, anytime? 

INCREASING JOBS: Spending your money at black-owned businesses enables these businesses to keep their doors open and hire more employees, which increases job opportunities. Algernon Austin, a senior research fellow at the Center for Global Policy Solutions, did an analysis of minority entrepreneurship, finding that “we need to add 1.1 million more businesses owned by people of color to the economy in order to make the racial composition of American business owners match that of the overall American labor force.” According to Austin, these new businesses would add about nine million jobs—enough jobs to achieve full employment for all racial groups. “These jobs would close the black-white unemployment-rate gap and the gaps for Hispanics and American Indians as well.”  - Carolyn M. Brown, BlackEnterprise.com

YOUR DOLLAR GOES A LONG WAY: Prosperity through entrepreneurship in the black community means more people can pull themselves out of low wage jobs and into the middle class. Many articles state (although I have yet to find the actual study) that the dollar lasts 6 hours within the black community, compared to 17 days in the white community, 28 days in the Asian community, and 19 days in the Jewish Community.  To pull from Carolyn M. Brown’s article: “If we spent nine cents of our collective dollar with black-owned businesses we could employ every single man, woman, and child within the black community,” claims PurchaseBlack.com founder Brian Williams. “So, it only takes one dime to solve the unemployment problem. No marching. Not protesting.  No Al Sharpton. Intentionally spending our money with each other will impact our standard our living.” 

MORE COMPETITION IS BETTER FOR CONSUMERS: Supporting small businesses means more small businesses, which gives consumers more choices and creates more competition.  Competition will keep costs lower and promote innovation.

ENVIRONMENT:  Having more business options could also make for less driving to find a store that carries what you need. That helps the environment, especially in Los Angeles where people drive everywhere.

SUPPORTING BLACK LIVES IN ACTION: Words and Facebook posts only go so far. Meanwhile, legislative and social change can take a frustratingly long time. This challenge is a way for you to invest in actionable solutions NOW.

I’m curious - why do YOU support black-owned businesses?  Please feel free to share in the comments!

[bobchallengela2016]

BoB Challenge - DAY #3

TENN: Tuesday was rough. I planned to stay in and have a can of soup that I purchased at Simply Wholesome earlier in the week, but when I got home after work my wonderful girlfriend Megan was restless from being at home all day and wanted to get out of the house. In a crunch, and seeing as how I was completely exhausted, we had to compromise for something quick and close by. I heard that Buffalo Wild Wings was black owned so in an effort to support me in my challenge, Megan who is vegetarian agreed to find something on the menu that she could eat. So, we stepped out the door and headed down Hollywood Blvd to B-Dubs for some din-din…

Sadly, while researching more about the franchise for my blog post this morning, I learned that Buffalo Wild Wings is not a BOB. To say that I am disappointed is an understatement. I did learn that there is at least one BOB Buffalo Wild Wings franchise location in Los Angeles, but I can’t seem to figure out which one it is. I’m crossing my fingers, hoping it’s the one we stumbled into, because I can't figure out who owns that one either. Grrr. What I learned from this is how truly difficult it is to find out who owns what businesses, and franchises, and how long of a process it is to do the research.

REBECCA: I don’t know why - I kind of feel trapped today. The mere knowledge that I can’t escape the office for a coffee or meet up with anyone for lunch is constricting, claustrophobic. Perhaps it’s also the amount of time I’ve spent researching, and seemingly fruitlessly, black-owned businesses in the area. They’re all far away and they’re all lunch or dinner spots that close early - nothing I can take advantage of this week. I don’t feel like a minority per se - my daily ritual of long commutes and small-office days remains the same as before I started BOB. It’s just the feeling of not having accessibility that is really challenging.  

LORI: Tuesday’s breakfast was a bowl of cereal and lunch was a pre-packaged meal - both of which I bought at Simply Wholesome.  Dinner was more of a challenge.  I had scheduled drinks with a former colleague who just started a fancy new gig in Beverly Hills.  Last week, I planned in advance for us to go to House of Music and Entertainment (H.O.M.E.) a restaurant/live jazz club in Beverly Hills; I had been there once before for a murder mystery dinner I found on Groupon.  However, when I went to make a reservation, the phone number was no longer in service.  Upon further research, I learned the place had closed.  Unfortunately, this is something I’ve noticed with lots of the black-owned businesses that I’ve gotten myself excited about - they have already shuttered. I asked my friend if she would be willing to meet in Little Ethiopia instead, and she was game to try something new.

REBECCA: Tuesday night after work I went to Korean class downtown, then came home and finished up some work. My girlfriend was home, and another friend had come over to spend the night while her home was being fumigated. They wanted to go to our favorite local bar for a beer and a bite, but I patiently reminded Woo/informed Annie that I’m observing BOB. They got into the spirit of it and since it was too late to drive to any BoBs, we made a dinner out of leftovers and beer that I’d already purchased...although I’ll admit Woo had shopped at Target that morning and we supplemented the beers with those. Not my fault ;) But it was cool to visit with Annie, because she had a suggestion to follow up with BJ’s, the brewery/pizzza chain - she’d heard a segment on NPR about the lack of African-American craft brewers and encouraged me to research it (turns out, there is an African-American former craft brewer who is now director of operations for BJ’s, but BJ’s itself doesn’t qualify as BoB and his own small operation is now defunct). But it was cool to see my two friends abandon their plans to go out in order to help honor my challenge. Even though we weren’t necessarily supporting a black business, we were consciously making a decision to not spend money at a non-BoB.

LORI: My dinner ended up being at Rahel Ethiopian Vegan Cuisine, located in Little Ethiopia on Fairfax and Pico - quite a drive from the Valley, but I was in a pinch with H.O.M.E. falling through last minute.  I arrived a smidge early, and the place was pretty empty.  I snagged us the table in the window, and I overheard the server tell the two women next to me that the restaurant is BYOB and that there is a 7-11 a few blocks down.  Thrilled at the idea of a glass of wine, I leapt out of my seat and skipped over to 7-11, only to stop myself: 7-11 is not black-owned.  Wah wah.  I trudged back to the restaurant, returned to my seat, explained to the hostess that I changed my mind about the wine, and awaited my friend.

LORI: We ended up splitting the Millenium Special which was a sampling combination of split lentil stew, split-pea stew, string beans mixed with carrots, greens, sunflower mixed with injera, potatoes mixed with carrots and cabbage, pumpkin stew, tomato mixed with injera, salad with house dressing and baklava.  We also split a YEMITIN SHIRO WOT, which is powdered peas in red pepper sauce, seasoned with assorted spices.  We each ordered a traditional Ethiopian drink - mine was the 3D: a combination of SUFF (sunflower), TELBA (flax) and BESSO (barley) drinks mixed with agave.  If you like to slurp up the milk leftover after eating a bowl of high fiber cereal, this beverage is for you. 

LORI: There is no silverware with Ethiopian food, so to eat, you tear off pieces of the spongey Ethiopian flat bread (injera) and use it to pinch up the food.  I found it fun to share the giant plate with my colleague and sample the various foods together, and we wondered why the place wasn’t packed considering they won Los Angeles Magazine’s award for Best Ethnic Vegan Cuisine.  I wish I took a picture of our actual meal, but forgot - sorry!  Eating the baklava without silverware was a really silly, messy experience.  Although full, we still ordered the vegan cheesecake which tasted more like key lime pie, and at that point, they thankfully brought us forks to dive in. Our server and the hostess were very sweet and took the time to explain the foods to us. Towards the end of the evening, when they were helping the staff in the back with the dishes and clean up, it took a bit of an effort for us to get our dessert, track someone down for our check and then to pay the bill.  They accidentally gave us the wrong table’s check and then had some computer problems which took about 15 minutes to fix.  Overall, though, I would go back in millisecond for the food.  Highly recommend.  I also found a little sidewalk art on my walk back to my car in Little Ethiopia:    

REBECCA: Most week nights I have random activities after work, more work to finish up, and hopefully end up chilling for an hour or two at home by the end of the night. But there is always a night or two that I’ll swing by the grocery store for supplies to make a rad dinner, or a night that a friend wants to grab a couple beers at a bar. At the risk of sounding overly-dramatic: those things aren’t so easy for me now during BOB, and although it’s self-inflicted, it does give me pause to think that in some place of the world, having no accessibility to groceries or pubs is actually an involuntary problem.

LORI: When I got home from dinner, I was super excited to see a box on my doorstep that contained my SWEET POTATO PIE and PEACH COBBLER that I had ordered last Thursday from the 27th Street Bakery!!!  I’m holding onto the pie to share with Tenn, Rebecca, Emily and a few others at our dinner on Thursday night, but I have zero self-control and dove into the peach cobbler immediately, making it my third dessert of the evening. I’ve never had a doughier, flakier, more delicious crust in my life. And I’ve had a lot of pie (ask anyone who has attended my annual Battle of the Pie - I take pie seriously).  I’ll definitely be ordering more of this cobbler for Thanksgiving this year.

REBECCA: I’m getting a little stir-crazy, so even though I don’t necessarily eat out most nights of the week, I think I will try to eat out a few more times this week so that I can be proactively supporting BOBs. I’m looking forward to a group dinner with the girls on Thursday, so we can bounce more ideas, share soul food, and support more BOBs.

TENN: I guess some may say that I’ve already failed this challenge, but my mistake has honestly encouraged me to work harder, and plan more in advance for the remainder of the week. After all, challenges can’t always be won…but we can still choose to accept them anyway.

[bobchallengela2016]

#BoB Challenge: Day 2

REBECCA: My first BOB work day was fairly uneventful: typically I like my Mondays like that. The office is quiet - most of the crew is shipped off to Minnesota for a shoot and my biggest fear coming in to work today would be that my boss would ask me to go for lunch at a sushi spot nearby. 

But he didn’t go to lunch today. Instead, he ate peanut butter pretzels and wrote scripts while I nibbled a Lara bar (purchased at Simply Wholesome) and fielded hours (literally) of phone calls. Sushi and BOB never even came up. (The coffee wasn’t BOB-purchased, but it was Ethiopian, and a pre-existing good that I had in my home).

TENN: The workweek is difficult for me. I shop and order lunches for 13 other people, and am on a strict budget as well as schedule. I wanted to try and incorporate the challenge into what I’m doing at my job, but I found quickly that it wouldn’t be possible. There aren’t enough healthy black owned restaurants in the valley that are within our budget and are also HEALTHY which is extremely important in a writer’s room. In fact… I couldn’t find any.

Collectively, the ladies and I decided that as long as we weren’t spending our own money, we wouldn’t hold it against ourselves if there were circumstances out of our control. I know that Lori also has a lunch where she has no influence on the location they choose. It’s frustrating, because you want to stay true to the challenge – but I reminded myself that half of this challenge is about awareness.

LORI: When I showed up to an 8AM table read only to find out that it had been pushed to 7AM the next day, I was happy to have my One Drop Marley Coffee in hand.  I scored the coffee from our trip to Simply Wholesome on Sunday.  Upon research, I learned that Marley Coffee is founded by Bob Marley’s son, Rohan, and he also created the first recyclable EcoCup to replace the popular but waste-generating K-Cups.  Marley Coffee also partnered with Water Wise Coffee to work towards alternatives to the current coffee processing system which pollutes water.  Sustainably grown, ethically farmed, rainforest-friendly, Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee?  Sign me up.

REBECCA: The thing is, I’ve spent more time trying to research black-owned businesses than I’ve spent money supporting them. Today I did even more research on black-owned businesses/services - anything - within a twenty-minute radius of my Encino workspace. Food? Tax services? Churches? Nope. It’s hard, man. Tonight I spent a half-hour researching mechanics, or anything auto-related that is black-owned. Nope. Then I researched spas because I need some back work, badly. Nothing. Then I researched any bars that I could suggest as alternatives to the local non-BOB my friends want to meet at tomorrow night. Nothing. Everything I can find, IF it has a website, closes early, has wrong or minimal information, and is just too damn far for me to realistically get to on a week night.

LORI: I ate my prepackaged meals from Simply Wholesome for both lunch and dinner, and so didn’t really have any opportunities to spend money at any BOB on Monday.  At one point, I thought I lost my mascara but then I found it, but not before traveling down an internet rabbit hole searching for black-owned beauty stores that sell cosmetics and also happen to be located near my work - no luck.

In the evening, I served on a diversity panel at Mount Saint Mary’s University as a part of my company’s community outreach initiative to create a direct pipeline for diverse individuals from academia to the professional world. Seeing that room packed with women who are so eager to change the world filled me with hope - these untapped powerhouses are the next generation of the entertainment industry, and I'm already a fan of the stories they will tell.  (Side-gush: Did you know that Mount Saint Mary’s University’s undergrad program has a Bachelor of Science in Film, Media and Social Justice?  How cool that this women’s university instills in their students the responsibility to create positive social change through the film/media work they do.) 

At the very end of the session, the class invited all of us on the panel to join in an exercise that culminated with chanting the affirmation, “I am enough. I am enough. I am most certainly enough.”  Too often do I doubt that I am enough to make any real difference in the world’s problems, but that moment served as a much-needed reminder of my own strength and power as an individual.  What a wonderful way to start the week.

TENN: The highlight of my Monday was being at our screening for Lucifer that night at Hyperion Public, and being reminded that the location that I was in was actually black owned! I’d met the owner previously, but had forgotten since the restaurant never showed up in any of my black owned business searches before. I found this out by talking to the staff and the manager.

The ambiance of Hyperion Public is nice. There was a DJ following our screening which was cool, and we stayed and talked to him for a little while after the show.

There is a section in the back with 6-8 large TV’s on the wall where we watched our episode. It can be difficult to hear if there are a lot of people at the bar, but the bar manager Chad was a really nice guy, and worked with us on the volume.

Their mac & cheese is AMAZING, and their chicken fries were pretty tasty as well! Glenlivet 12 yr on the rocks was $12, so not extremely cheap, but if you’re looking for a cool place to go during a challenge like this, it’s a nice location to add to the list.

REBECCA: Overall observations on black culture and enterprise in Los Angeles from Day 2:

Our urban metropolis is really segregated.

BOBs MUST exist in greater quantity in the city, just not online. And the online databases that do exist to help curate them for the most part suck.

I’ve spent so much time researching and reading that I’m exhausted. Trying to figure out BOB alternatives for the simple things I do or stops that I make daily is nearly impossible.

I guess I’ll be saving money this week by not buying coffee and booze (my two greatest spending habits) most days.

I have found myself incorrectly but consciously thinking “oh I can’t read this because it’s not about black culture,” or “oh I can’t wash my hair with this shampoo because it’s not black-owned…” I feel so immersed in the project because of the research we’re doing.

A fair amount of hair and beauty products and food exist, but there is little to no information on black services or other entities. This makes me think the community is very tight-knit within itself, and probably operates more on word-of-mouth recommendation or small community style. Which I totally understand - white rural communities are the same way. But it’s odd to have an entire pocket of the population seemingly not represented online.

None of my black friends have been willing to comment on this project or advise on businesses I should try. I even sent two personalized emails asking for advice, recommendations, or just overall thoughts to two fairly close friends who haven’t responded in any fashion.

I have mixed feelings about the social media reactions so far. Most of my friends who have “liked” social media posts related to BOB are fairly recent, social justice -oriented friends from LPC or similar networks with a random sprinkling of friends from around the city or former coworkers. Very few current close friends or oldest friends from home and zero family members liked or commented.

This project has inspired me to want to research more about black history in Los Angeles this week. Pretty much Straight Outta Compton and Dope are all I know.

LORI: I am super grateful for the restaurant suggestions sent via Facebook - I’ve been trying to figure out how to visit as many as possible this week.   Thanks for that, and please keep the suggestions coming!  

TENN: It’s amazing how much I’ve talked about the BOB Challenge. All it takes is effort, consideration, and determination to make this challenge feasible.

[bobchallengela2016]

#BoB Challenge: Day 1

Where did you go on Day 1?

LORI: I had two breakfast prep meetings before my 11:30AM theater collective’s weekly meeting.  At 8:30 AM, I met up with my writer friend at the closest black-owned restaurant to the theater collective, which is on Gower and Sunset: Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles.  Being a vegetarian, there were limited options for me, so I had scrambled cheesy eggs and toast with a coffee.

In my research, I learned that the 27th Street Bakery is the largest manufacturer of sweet potato pies on the west coast, and has been black-family-owned for three generations.  The place has been around since the 1930′s and drawing in customers for its famous sweet potato pies since 1956.  I really wanted to bring a sweet potato pie to my theater collective’s meeting in order to entice others to jump aboard this challenge.  Because they aren’t open on Sundays, I ordered a pie and a cobbler for delivery on Saturday, but they didn’t arrive in time.  Instead, I bought an entire sweet potato pie at Roscoe’s so that I wouldn’t show up empty-handed.  I'm still determined to try the pies at 27th Street Bakery, but this one didn’t disappoint.

My second meeting was at a coffee shop, but I didn’t spend money there (my friend did) because it wasn’t black-owned.  We have yet to find a black-owned coffee shop.  Hive mind - send suggestions our way!

REBECCA: We drove all the way down to Compton to Hooper’s Shell, the only #BOB gas station in California that we could find online - about a 35 minute drive in minimal traffic from Los Feliz. (If there are others, let us know! We’d love to check them out). The store itself was closed, no attendants present, but there was a clear sign on the window stating that this was very specifically Hooper’s Shell. There were a couple vehicles trying to get gas: A girl in fro and sweatpants tried a few different pumps and was about to drive off as I pulled in: she kindly told me not to waste my time, but I pulled over anyway to wait for Tenn and Lori. An old green pickup truck with an elderly black couple inside who drove painstakingly to every single pump to try to pay with cash. Two middle-aged dudes filling up on opposite sides of the pump and swapping general chit-chat while they waited. A trio of boys who sauntered through and reminded me of my own brothers - presumably looking for Gatorades and candy, at least that’s what my brothers would be doing at a gas station, along with buying scratch-off lotto tickets - and sauntered right on by when they saw the closed sign on the door.

TENN: It was empty, and the office was closed. Probably for Sunday Service. Only one pump was working, and it didn’t take my credit card, but thankfully Rebecca offered to let me use hers. I encourage people to try to do this challenge with friends or a support group. It helps!

There was a steady stream of people stopping by the station. Most of them asked us if the pumps worked, which implied that maybe they were new to the business or area.

REBECCA: Through the next thirty minutes that it took the three of us to wait in line, gas up one at a time, and figure out which credit cards would work, quite a few cars pulled over to the Shell for gas. At one point, almost every pump had at least one vehicle trying to run debit and credit cards and calling it out, sharing info. One pump worked on both sides for credit cards only, so I got in line to fill up my half-tank. In the meantime, several cars left without even bothering to wait. And even when my credit cards worked for me, Tenn’s and Lori’s wouldn’t, and mine wouldn’t swipe twice. Thankfully we scrounged up enough working cards, saluted #BLM, and drove across town to the black-owned grocery store for a snack and some supplies.

LORI: Then, we drove to Simply Wholesome.  When investigating black-owned grocery stores, SImply Wholesome was the only one we could find, so we planned our Sunday around stocking up on food for the week.  I want to mention a black-owned food co-op in the works called SoLA Food Co-op.  We couldn’t find an address and, after reaching out and quickly hearing back, we learned that’s because they need some more member-owners in order to get a brick-and-mortar going:

We are working hard to open a co-op, but we don't have the store yet! The area where you are looking is our ideal target area. Please subscribe to our email list on our website by clicking on the pop-up that says "Get Hip", that way you'll be informed of our progress. Then, please join the co-op! We need 300 member-owners to take it to the capitalization phase, where we actually begin the site selection process. Right now we're 99 member-owners strong. Thanks for your support.

Back to Simply Wholesome.  The place was right up my alley - they sold books, health and beauty supplies, crystals and pre-packaged vegetarian food on one side of the retro 60′s-looking building, and on the other side featured a full patio and outdoor cafe.  Lots of windows gave it a sunny atmosphere and the place was hopping with a friendly, happy, laid back energy.  We were very comfortable because of the welcoming, inclusive environment. The service at Simply Wholesome was excellent - the employees came around to check on us, deliver our food, make sure we were satisfied, clear plates, etc. multiple times. 

REBECCA: The shop/café combination sports a really nice patio, big windows overlooking a busy corner of Slausen, and an overall vibe of happy comfort - a variety of people eating, talking, laughing. We ordered smoothies - people rave about them online but they were really more like those super sugar-laden 711 slurpees - be forewarned that anything “blueberry” comes out electric blue, which can’t possibly be natural unless they’re using those cochineal bugs used in blue dye. The shake list is long and delightful and there’s a pretty big vegetarian selection. I personally loved the mac n cheese and the almost nutty cornbread. The peas and tofu were also good - I didn’t slather them in mayonnaise so according to Tenn I was missing out a little. But the banana pudding that Lori ordered was just as legit as promised: a hearty graham-style cracker on top of a creamy pudding on top of diced banana wedges. It came together really well. 

LORI: I ordered the Caribbean tacos with tofu (which came with rice and a salad), a strawberry smoothie (#8 on the menu) that the friendly employee suggested to me, and vegan banana pudding for dessert.  The vegan banana pudding was SO GOOD.  I love that they have an expansive vegetarian menu, but meat options, as well.

TENN: THEY HAD BLACK EYED PEAS, FRIED OKRA, AND SWEET TEA (in a bottle, but still.)

LORI: There was a huge crowd in the cafe area - as three white gals, we were clearly in the minority which is an important thing to note. I take for granted what it feels like to exist in the majority, and noticed myself feeling self-conscious because we stood out as different.  It made me wonder...what if every white person in America could somehow experience the feeling of being at the mercy of the people in the majority - the distinct feeling of not speaking the language or being outnumbered or designated as “other”?  Would there be more understanding and empathy?  

REBECCA: After we ate, we shopped in the grocery for lunch supplies for the week. Unfortunately they carry no produce, which makes up 85% of my weekly shopping, but I did snag some hemp milk (my first), some Heritage cereal, some GF pasta, and a few specialty Lara bars that Lassen’s and TJ’s don’t carry.

LORI: I stocked up on food for the week - as a vegetarian, I was in heaven.  I’ve never seen so many freezers full of vegetarian and fake-meat products.  Seriously, if you don’t eat meat, you need to visit this place.  I saw so many vegetarian brands I had never seen before.  I do wish they carried fresh vegetables, but I was able to buy some pre-packaged meals to get me through the week.  The cashier also threw in a free Simply Wholesome burlap bag (for those who don’t live in Los Angeles, we have to buy our bags or bring our own re-usable ones, so this was a total score).  If I didn’t have to drive 40 minutes away to Inglewood, I would definitely visit Simply Wholesome on the regular.

TENN: I bought groceries to prepare pasta that will last me for most of me at home dinners during the week, but the grocery store we visited didn’t have produce. For me, that was fresh vegetables. Mushrooms. Zucchini.  I’m making do with a can of whole tomatoes, and adding flavor with spices from the collection in my cabinet.

What did you like the most?

REBECCA:  Getting to go on a mini adventure and break bread with some really great girls. Also, so many people were so friendly - these are parts of town where I rarely find myself but I found myself exchanging lovely smiles and hellos with people in the parking lots that I don’t normally experience in my normal haunts.

LORI: The vibe of Simply Wholesome, exploring parts of Los Angeles that were new to me, and the vegan banana pudding.

TENN: I loved the food at Simply Wholesome. It was everything that had been missing in my life. I also liked checking out new areas and businesses, and doing something meaningful with my friends.

What was the most challenging aspect of Day 1?

REBECCA: Having to drive across town for basic necessities, and not being able to buy any fresh produce.

LORI: So. Much. Driving. 

Do you think that BOB will challenge your work/week day compared to the weekends?

REBECCA: It’s going to be a challenge not being able to step out of my Encino office for lunch and particularly coffee this week. I’ll have to bring my own coffee in the mornings (a great Ethiopian, preexisting bag I have from Trystero) It’s also a challenge not being able to purchase fresh raw foods from a BOB. I wouldn’t be able to sustain this challenge fully unless I found at least a farmer’s market vendor or something. The shop did have coffee ground, but I was unfamiliar with it, they don’t carry beans, and I’m not sure it’s technically a BOB company. These are challenges for me that I’ll be able to adjust to this week, but would be harder to sustain long-term.

LORI: It really just requires more planning, and there aren’t many BoB (that I’ve been able to find) in the Valley where I work and live, so I don’t have many options, especially as a vegetarian.

TENN: You don’t register how difficult this challenge is until you’re stuck in the moment needing something that none of the black owned businesses you’ve researched sell. Also, I’ve found that work functions are almost impossible to work black owned businesses into if they’re not super conveniently located. It’s Los Angeles, and no one wants to spend an extra forty-five minutes in the car if they can drive for five minutes instead.

How are you preparing for day 2? 

REBECCA: Packing a lunch, getting up a little early to make coffee.

LORI: I’m bringing two of my pre-packaged vegetarian meals from Simply Wholesome to work.  I have to speak at a college right after work, so I have to consider my dinner in advance.

TENN: Same tactics. Google. Yelp reviews. Clear planning. Keeping my calendar and notes on hand has been really crucial.

Is #BOB coming up in conversation throughout the day? What are people’s reaction when you tell them about it?

REBECCA: So far, so good. My girlfriend is obviously supportive, but not participating. However, she promised to bring me a plate of leftovers from her catering at work so that I could have a lunch tomorrow without spending money at a non-BOB. My mom was nominally supportive on the phone when I mentioned it in passing yesterday. And the coolest one of all, I think, is my lovely friend Victoria wh found herself in the midst of a hating-Trump spiral and wanted to do something more proactive and kind, saw what we were doing through social media and decided to do her own activism. She’s researching one charity/nonprofit org per day from now until the election, sharing her info, and committing to support them in a small financial way. She began today with Doctors Without Borders, an org that I heavily support and promote as well, and gave us a shout out as to part of her inspiration. I’m pumped that people are using social media to activate and share that energy with others!

LORI: Lots of people have said that this is a good thing that we’re doing, and while it is cool to have support, it shouldn’t be an anomaly but rather something I should have already been doing.  And not only with black-owned businesses, but with businesses owned by all people of color (would those challenges be more or less difficult, I wonder?).  I’ve also had a few people express concern for my safety while exploring unfamiliar areas of Los Angeles.  To be honest, I see that as pandering to unfounded fear-based excuses - if we all just stay in our bubble and stick with what we know, then that really just perpetuates the system currently at play, right?  I’m not looking to always be comfortable within my own bubble, that’s not the point; I can’t help but think that comfort feeds apathy and limits growth. 

Overall, I’ve been really happy with the reaction on Facebook - we already have some excellent ideas and suggestions coming in, all of which fuels our fire!  We want this to be a conversation.

TENN: I talked a lot with my mom, and even more so to my girlfriend about what challenge I was participating in throughout the week. I knew that it would become a larger part of my conversation, but I’ve realized that the more I learn – the more I want to share.

[bobchallengela2016]

Welcome to our Black-Owned Business Challenge

We are four creative gals (Lori, Tenn, Emily and Rebecca) living in Los Angeles who want to support the black community. For one week, we are challenging ourselves to spend our money exclusively at black-owned businesses. That includes food, gas, entertainment, laundry - everything. We start on Sunday, October 2nd and will finish at midnight on Saturday, October 8th. We would love to share our experience with you - please follow along on this blog. Our first topic covers the WHY AND HOW of it all. Tune in tomorrow to hear all about the first day of the challenge.

Please send us a message if you want to gush about your favorite black-owned businesses in Los Angeles (or elsewhere!) and we’ll be sure to feature those places on our blog. 

What sort of preparation and research did you do?

LORI: I googled the heck out of “black-owned business Los Angeles” and came up with quite a few lists, directories and articles. I found one grocery store, one gas station, and a ton of restaurants - the majority of which are not in the Valley, where I live. I’ve plotted my meals out in advance to ensure that I try lots of new restaurants that accommodate my budget and my vegetarian diet.  For my work-related lunches and dinners, I gave the other attendees a heads up about my plan. I will have to drive significantly out of the way in order to eat at black-owned restaurants, and I will have to do so on one tank of gas for the week because I don’t think I can manage multiple 40-minute-one-way drives to the only black-owned gas station in town. Pending any unexpected surprises, I am feeling as prepared and excited as possible.

TENN:  Google, Google, Google – and did I mention Google? Thank the stars for the internet, because without it, it would have been really difficult for me to locate the black owned businesses in my area. My friends Lori and Rebecca found a lot of great leads, so that gave me a place to start. I also relied pretty heavily on yelp reviews and researched lists of black owned businesses other people in LA have compiled and shared online.  I was inspired by the comments in a lot of the reviews. Many people who have visited these places recently did so with this challenge in mind. It gave me hope that with enough buzz around it, we really can help sustain the growth and success of the BOB's in our communities.  REBECCA:  Lori’s research inspired me to also Google the heck out of “black-owned businesses in LA” and came up with a list. BoB restaurants weren’t especially hard - I’ve even been to a few, but of them aren’t in my area either or the area in which I work which makes it a challenge to utilize them throughout the week. I also specifically researched “black coffee roasters” and “black-owned coffee brands” - I only came up with a few but most of those are now defunct for various reasons which is already teaching me that a) Maybe this IS a really good thing to intentionally support BoBs and b) Coffee doesn’t seem to be a focal point of the community. It’s much easier, at least from an Internet standpoint, to find natural hair products or good jazz spots or fantastic soul food. I’m hoping that our experiences and conversations this week will lead to learning more, and also perhaps even lead to longevity for these businesses. Also, I might be compromising my BoB coffee with a lot of “fair trade Ethiopian” this week, but I think that’s OK. 

What are you most excited about?

LORI: Eating sweet potato pie - more on that later!

TENN:  I’m excited to contribute to my community in the real world. It’s easy to advocate behind a keyboard, and while it helps start conversations about racism and injustice towards the black community, advocating online is only part of the fight. Spending money at BOB's helps the owners support themselves and fight inequality in their real daily lives. 

I’m also excited to check out some new restaurants in Los Angeles. I’m a foodie, so anytime I can go out to eat at a new place I get pretty amped. A lot of the restaurants I've found are Southern or Creole inspired. Did you hear me? Southern. LIKE FRIED OKRA SOUTHERN.

This challenge is going to be great for me. I’ve been looking for some really good comfort food restaurants since I arrived in LA, and haven't checked out most of them because of how far away they are from my apartment. This challenge gave me the extra push I needed to get in my car and drive. 

REBECCA:  Hopefully meeting some of the BoB employees, and having good conversations/learning about what it means for me as a white person to support my black community.

Why do you want to do this challenge?

LORI: I first learned about the Black-Owned Business Challenge from a fierce and inspiring architect who I met at a creative community fellowship in Vermont. She tried to devote a month to the Black-Owned Business Challenge in her hometown of Detroit but found it extremely difficult, and she expressed the importance of investing in black businesses.  The conversation stuck with me and I realized how little I knew about the black-owned businesses in my own neighborhood - in fact, I didn’t know if there were any black-owned businesses in my own neighborhood!  That alone inspired me to do the legwork to ensure that I support and invest in them.

I am gutted by all of the police shootings, follow the important efforts of BLM on the news, and want to stop sitting on sidelines. This is something active that I can do NOW and ALL THE TIME. I easily enlisted some of my dearest social activist friends and together we decided to document our experiences here on this blog (and to leave reviews on Yelp). By doing this, I hope to generate excitement about the businesses we visit, discover new restaurants, and learn more about the city in which I live. In my dream universe, we might even inspire others in Los Angeles and across the country to seek out and lift up their local black-owned businesses.  (Do it!)

TENN:  Because it is still a challenge. I was actually pretty shocked at how difficult it has been to find businesses that are both black owned and conveniently located to accommodate every need. 

This challenge is about much more than just visiting a few restaurants, gas stations and grocery stores once over the course of a week, but having awareness about racial inequality, familiarizing yourself with the black owned businesses in your community, and actively incorporating them into your life year round.

REBECCA:  I want to put my money where my mouth is when it comes to Black Lives Matter. Mentioning this challenge to a couple people has already led to conversations about what/why/how and I’m eager to learn more this week and share that throughout this week and beyond. Seeing a lot of what seemed to be super chic, but black-owned businesses that have gone under, shuttered up, or just don’t seem to have much of a diverse consumer base makes me think that segregation is just as looming as it ever was and that it really does negatively impact those businesses.