A Gallery Of Business Baddies Serving Looks While Securing The Bag, Vol. 2

Boss baddies!

Black women are elevating entrepreneurship as the fastest growing group of business owners despite rampant sexism, racism, elitism and an egregious lack of available resources in the problematic space.

According to the Harvard Business Review, 17% of Black women are in the process of starting or running new businesses compared to only 10% of white women and 15% of white men.

In 2019, 35% of all Black-owned businesses were owned by women, according to a Wells Fargo report.

At this rate, Black women are starting (and self-funding) businesses faster than anyone else while receiving less than 1% of venture capital funding and being largely ignored by the government’s sketchy Paycheck Protection Program that helped an embarrassing 29% of Black business owners stay afloat compared to 60% of white applicants.

“At a time when folks are rethinking their lives and choices, it is not surprising that more Black women are electing to become CEOs of their own companies rather than waiting for their intelligence and skills to be recognized at their current firms,” said Melissa Bradley, Founder of 1863 Ventures–an agency for Black and brown entrepreneurs–in an interview with (Business) Insider.

To date, Black business ownership is up nearly 30% above pre-pandemic levels based on research by University of California Santa Cruz economist Robert W. Fairlie.

“The potential return of the freedom of time, lack of unnecessary controls and financial success far outweighs the risk of failure for these Black female entrepreneurs when leaving their full-time jobs,” added Bradley.

With this in mind, we compiled a gallery of bag-securing business baddies to follow, support and celebrate on the flip.