Originally published by The 19th
On the first day of Black History Month, dozens of Black businesses joined together for the 15th Street Block Party in the backlot of Paramount Studios in Hollywood. The weekend-long event featured Christopher John Rogers, a fashion label popularized by Michelle Obama; Pattern, the haircare line started by actress Tracee Ellis Ross; and Brandon Blackwood, the accessories and apparel line with celebrity fans including Jenna Ortega and Beyoncé.
As companies from McDonald’s to Target to Google roll back their diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives following President Donald Trump’s executive orders to strike such programs from public life, the two-day block party to drum up support for Black businesses verged on an act of defiance — and in a way, it was.
“Black people have been through so much. This administration is not what’s going to stop us from celebrating our culture and our community,” said Aurora James, founder of The Fifteen Percent Pledge, the nonprofit that put on the event and a special gala to support the organization’s mission to close the racial wealth gap among business owners.
Shortly after the Minneapolis police murder of George Floyd led to mass global protests in the summer of 2020, James got the idea to start The Fifteen Percent Pledge, a commitment major retailers have made to reserve 15% of their shelf space for Black businesses since Black people make up nearly 15% of the US population. Nearly 30 corporations, including Macy’s, Nordstrom, Sephora and Ulta Beauty, have signed the pledge. In five years, The Fifteen Percent Pledge intends for its efforts to lead to $1.4 trillion of wealth generation by Black enterprises.
James, who is from Toronto, started her luxury accessories brand Brother Vellies in 2013 with her $3,500 life savings at a flea market on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, so she knows what it’s like to need resources and exposure as a small business owner. Today, Brother Vellies has a celebrity following including Solange Knowles, Zendaya, Halsey and Beyoncé, who featured boots from the brand on the vinyl version of her Grammy-winning album “Cowboy Carter.”
The 19th spoke with James about the movement away from DEI, how the public can respond to it and how diversity helps, rather than harms, the nation. She also discussed this year’s 15th Street Block Party, which raised money for Black businesses affected by California’s wildfires.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Nadra Nittle: You came up with the idea for The Fifteen Percent Pledge shortly after George Floyd’s murder, a time when the country experienced a so-called racial reckoning. How did your idea go from conception to implementation?
Aurora James: I think I’ve just always been a little bit of an advocate for different things within the fashion industry, so in the wake of Mr. Floyd’s murder, I was getting a lot of calls and texts from CEOs and just all sorts of people asking, “What should I do? How should I respond?”
I am a small-business owner. I was at home like we all were during the pandemic, and I was paying attention to the statistics showing that 90% of Black-owned businesses didn’t get access to the first round of PPP [Paycheck Protection Program] money. They were projecting over 40% of them to close, which was almost double the national average. I could just see that the disparity was really there, and I thought, “Black people are almost 15% of the population. Major retailers should commit 15% of their shelf space to Black-owned businesses.”
So I just kind of wrote that all out in the notes section on my phone, and an hour later, I screenshot it and I posted it to Instagram. That was Saturday. On Sunday, I stayed up overnight with my web designer. We ended up launching a petition on Monday at noon. We had 100,000 signatures on Wednesday and registered it to be a nonprofit. On Day 10, Sephora actually became the first major corporation to commit to the idea of the 15 Percent Pledge. Since then, we’ve had about 30 major corporations commit. They all signed multi-year contracts with us. Nordstrom signed a 10-year contract.
How concerned are you to see companies roll back their diversity initiatives since Trump took office and issued an executive order to root out DEI in government institutions?
At the end of the day, there are people who understood what the idea was behind doing this work. There are people that worked hard at it, and there are people who reap the rewards of that. It’s not just a nice thing to do; it’s also a smart business decision. Danessa Myricks is an incredible beauty brand, and regardless of the color of her skin, that product is absolutely crushing it on shelves. But because of her lived experience, she was not in a situation where she could get the attention of a major retailer like Sephora. And so the pledge is just about creating alternate pathways.
An executive order does not mandate private company behavior. So there’s obviously some companies that just wanted to ingratiate themselves to this administration. They did it because they wanted to, not because they were forced to.
What advice do you have for consumers who care about diversity? Is it supporting companies like Costco that have refused to end their diversity programs? Is it supporting the companies that have signed The Fifteen Percent Pledge?
The thing that I know to be true is that over the last two years, the consumer data has not changed. We know that consumers, now more than ever, are really, really focused on shopping with their values, and I don’t know why Target and Walmart are so ready to call people’s bluff on that. I think, for me, it’s really about continuing to shop with your values, whatever those are. I’m a big believer of small business in America, so I always try to shop directly from small businesses wherever possible. That’s really how I focus as it relates to where I want to spend my money. If someone’s telling me that they don’t value me as a customer, they don’t value people that look like me, I don’t really want to shop there. I work too hard for every dollar that I make, especially when there’s so many different places that you can shop, and there’s so many other CEOs, like the Sephora CEO, who was on stage at our fundraiser saying that they are still standing with this work and are unwavering in it.
Why do you think “DEI” is a positive for companies and institutions and not a negative, as the Trump administration has suggested?
DEI is really about the idea of creating more space for different voices, thoughts, ideas —creating a stronger, richer quilt that’s more multifaceted, that can endure different situations because it’s bringing different points of view to the table. Our pledge-takers realize that. They’re doing this work because it’s good for the country. When we talk about making America great — you can’t do that without small business. To the extent that [major retailers] don’t want to commit 15% of their shelf space to Black-owned businesses, rest assured that they have not committed 15% of their shelf space to any small businesses in America. The majority of the product that’s on those shelves is imported from China, made in sweat shops, etc, etc. There’s nothing about that that’s great for the American economic landscape. That’s not supporting American workers, right? So, for me, it’s like, “What does it look like to actually support Americans?” That means supporting real small business in America, mom and pop stores.
This year, you turned your annual block party into a fundraiser for Black businesses affected by the wildfires. How did that idea come about?
When the wildfire started, I pretty much decided to cancel the event. Then I started thinking a little bit more about it and talking to some of our vendors, and I realized, “Oh, this is absolutely the time that we’re supposed to double down and continue celebrating Black businesses and creating opportunities. Why not use this as a vehicle to fundraise for some of the businesses in Altadena [the Los Angeles County community where the Eaton Fire occurred]?” So we just decided to get it together and make it all happen. I couldn’t be more grateful that we were able to pull it together and create such an incredible event, and it’s our most successful one to date. I think it stands as a proof point that there’s actually still momentum in doing this work.
The Fifteen Percent Pledge presented a $50,000 check to Little Red Hen, one of the Black businesses affected by the fires. Why did that particular business stand out to you all?
When we realized that we were going to try to keep this event, this block party, we started trying to reach out to some of the businesses in Altadena. We just started trying to do our part to get in touch with them and understand the different situations that people were in and not just write a check, but also say, “OK, how can we partner with these businesses in the long term to figure out what they need?” With Little Red Hen, for example, it’s like, “Does she want to reopen? Does she want to reopen in Altadena? Does she want to open as a restaurant versus a cafe versus a food truck? What does that look like? What was working and what wasn’t working?” I think it’s this whole idea about building Altadena back, but also trying to do it a little bit stronger. I’m really hopeful that we’re going to be able to allocate more dollars to deserving Altadena businesses over the coming months and hopefully pull some resources from some of our partners as well.
Many members of the public want to support entrepreneurs from underrepresented groups but don’t always know how to find these businesses or how to identify which businesses are Black-owned. How much of an issue do you think that is?
Sometimes people have that issue, but we have thousands of Black-owned businesses on our website that everyone can look up. We’re constantly posting on social media and trying to spread the word about different Black-owned businesses. But it’s always great to give people some new exposure, and I think that’s really what the goal is. I’ve benefited so much from having my own business. I was able to buy my own home and that kind of thing. I’m so grateful to my customers, and so many of them found me in so many different ways. So I think just continuing to spread the word about different Black-owned businesses so that people can grow and really have their business on their own terms just feels really important to me.
