PROGRAM SUCCESS – AUGUST 2009
PAGE 25
Celebrate National Black Business Month
Buy Black
By Dr. Robert M. Spooney
Executive Director of the African-American
Chamber of Commerce of Central Florida
The Month of August is National Black Business
Month. We should celebrate by buying products and
conducting business with a Black owned firm. The
latest statistics on how American workers spend their
time helps explain why National Black Business Month
was created. Essentially National Black Business
Month is a way to channel the economic power of
African-Americans through their own communities.
The average African-American worker spends 8.6
hours a day working and 0.6 hours shopping. The
average worker in general spends 8.3 hours working
and 0.4 hours shopping. That means we’re working 2.1
hours per week more and shopping 1.4 hours more.
Seeking out at least one black business per day during
the month of August means you’re likely to find firms
that you would like to do business with. I suggest you
start with a deposit in a black-controlled bank or
financial institution. You can find a list of banks at
blackmoney.com. While shopping for groceries seek
out one or more of the growing number of products
produced by black manufacturers. Black book stores
help preserve our heritage and are the launching pad for
new authors. Make sure you find one.
.
As this is the 100th year anniversary of the NAACP,
August would be the perfect month to renew or take out
a membership in a local, state or national civil rights
organization.
If that doesn’t seem like a business to
you, consider this. D. Parke Gibson wrote a book
called the $30 Billion Negro in 1968. Now, blacks in
Illinois alone have that much yearly income.
If you’re wondering how this impacts you, consider
this. More than 60 percent of the black labor force
works in occupations where the average yearly wage is
less than the national median.
That short order cook
who’s been pleasing customers for decades can be
transformed from a minimum wage worker to an
employer with the right support to open her own
restaurant. The patient janitor who can fix anything
can put five more folks to
work with his own
maintenance
company.
Contrary to stereotype,
there’s nothing wrong with
our work ethic, just who
we’re working for. There
are well over 1.7 million
African American owned
businesses in the U.S. If we
spent $50 on each business
for one day we would
generate $85 Million
Dr. Robert M. Spooney
dollars in sales for one day.
If we spent $50 at each business for 31 days we would
generate $2.6 Billion in annual sales in a month or $31
Billion in a year. Your stimulus package is in your
pocket. Instead of buying “stuff” because it’s most
expensive, African-Americans and their friends must
return to the question that Rep. Adam Clayton Powell
Jr. asked in Harlem in the 1940s when he led mass
consumer campaigns — how many blacks are being
employed when I buy this product or service?
If we don’t ask it, no one else will. BUY BLACK IN
AUGUST.
We’d like to hear from you about how you are seeking
out the businesses that are keeping our culture and
neighborhoods alive. Make a comment by sending us
an email at [email protected].