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Jackie Aina has inked the first co-branded collaboration for her lifestyle company, Forvr Mood. Aina’s Forvr Mood and Canadian whisky brand Crown Royal have created a limited-edition Crown Royal Blackberry x Forvr Mood candle, which will be available for purchase online and at the Crown Royal Blackberry Stand (a lemonade stand, but make it adult ), per a press release. Throughout her career as an influencer, Aina has amassed more than 3.5 million YouTube subscribers. She has also worked with major beauty brands, from Anastasia Beverly Hills and Sephora to Fenty Beauty. Aina’s made a name for herself as a Black woman within an extremely competitive industry. However, she will rarely turn down the opportunity to use her platform to amplify and support other Black women, and this recent partnership is no different. While attendees sip Crown Royal Blackberry and shop the Forvr Mood candle, Crown Royal is also collaborating the nonprofit Black Girl Ventures Foundation by providing a...
Terzel Ron understands that if nothing else, the entertainment industry is volatile. So, after he graduated from New York University in 2018, he spent nine months looking for a job — only to finally land a job as a production assistant at ViacomCBS. Thanks to that job, he was able to pay off $5,000 in student loans — but according to CNBC, he wanted more. In 2021, he got a job at a “large television network” where he makes $110,000 per year. Terzel Ron subsequently got a second part-time job, where he makes an additional $40,000 per year, for a grand total of $150,000 per year. And, he says, it was imperative to save — and invest — as much of it as he could. “I invest most of what I make and try to forget the amount of money in my accounts. Jobs come and go, and when they go, the only thing left to show for it is the amount of money you have saved and invested from it,” he said to the outlet. What’s more, Terzel Ron said he works a lot, too. He told CNBC that he works seven days a...
Daniel Moses’s story of going from an Uber driver to a millionaire is nothing short of inspirational. The Nigeria native told his story to the British newspaper, The Guardian. He explained that he’d lost more than 150,000 GBP (more than $200,000 USD) in his transportation business, so he had to re-adjust and rethink his strategy. “My search for a better life started in 2004 when I first visited the UK for the first time. In 2015 I lost well over £150,000 in my Nigerian transportation business which caused me to go through anxiety and depression,” he told the outlet. To make ends meet, he first became a delivery driver, then moved on to become an Uber driver. He drove for Uber until he happened to find some information about property investments. He began implementing the strategies he’d learned, and within five years, he’d become a millionaire. “Sixteen months after, I got into property investing, and through the use of various property investment strategies, I have successfully...
Black men are unemployed at a much higher rate than their counterparts — and it’s creating an economic crisis in the country. According to the Atlanta Black Star, Black communities take a hit totaling $50 billion annually in costs due to this unemployment crisis. “Black people need to take this report and take it to their elected official and say ‘You need to do more because you don’t fully realize how big this problem is,’” said Algernon Austin, who authored the study initially published by the Center for Economic and Policy Research. “I’m hoping that this work serves to inspire people, and, frankly, particularly Black men.” And that’s just the beginning of the problems, according to Austin. Using data going all the way back to 2014, he revealed that Black men between the ages of 25 to 54 would have to get nearly a million jobs (947,000, to be exact) to be on par with their non-Black counterparts and close the economic gap. What’s more, if one million of them got jobs and kept...
It’s a tale that’s as old as time, white people practicing Black face and not thinking twice about it! This time, it’s a tech company that provides human resource training to large corporations. They’re using white actors to portray people of color within sessions about diversity, equity, and inclusion — the audacity, right? According to BuzzFeed News, Mursion, a corporate education company, has created virtual reality simulations for various clients where hypothetical scenarios are conducted between the participant and an animated human avatar played by live human actors. Those human actors follow concise plans while also improvising where they use voice modulators and remote controllers to switch between characters. This feature means that the actors, known as “simulation specialists,” often play characters of races and genders that are not their own.
The daunting reality many women face navigating the music industry is one of concern. Prevalent issues such as misogyny, harassment, and sexual violence are some of the evils preventing women from thriving in the industry. It was to Selena B. Hunter’s dismay when she realized her musically inclined daughter, Nia Hunter, desired to have a career in the very industry that was dysfunctional. Rather than dismiss the idea and shield her daughter from entertainment, she decided to create a safe space for all women. “I had to figure out a way that her father and I could be comfortable with her being in this industry,” Selena told AfroTech. “The only way was with me stepping up and supporting her by building an infrastructure around her where I felt comfortable as a parent first because she’s a woman as well.” In a pursuit to not only keep her daughter’s vision alive, and even beyond that, Hathor Entertainment was born in Los Angeles, CA. The mother-daughter duo debuted the record label on...
When Black Women Talk Tech announced that Peggy Alford — the EVP of sales at PayPal — would be hosting a fireside chat at the Roadmap to Billions conference, attendees couldn’t have been more excited. But, perhaps, no one was more excited than Alford herself. “You know, I have to say this was a long time coming,” she told AfroTech. “It’s nice to see that, more and more, Black women are taking charge of their own careers, especially in the tech sector, and to see them come together in such a way to let everyone know that they’re here? I couldn’t be happier.” Photo Credit: Road Map To Billions The Roadmap to Billions is a conference built from the perspective of Black women that Black Women Talk Tech organizes. The organization empowers Black women who are driving innovation worldwide within untapped markets that can unlock billion-dollar opportunities. Roadmap to Billions is the only tech conference created by Black female founders for Black female founders and supporters of the...
Aaliyah fans are in for a huge treat. According to Forbes, the late singer’s music could soon be available on streaming platforms. Aaliyah — who passed tragically at the age of 22 — singlehandedly changed the music industry as one of the most influential singers of R&B. To this day, her music continues to impact the masses. Now, it will reportedly make the transition into the digital age. The official paperwork has been reportedly been completed to share her music digitally with a staggered rollout of her music onto streaming platforms starting with “One In A Million” (1996) on Aug. 20. The only music from the singer that lives on streaming platforms is her 1994 debut album, “Age Ain’t Nothing But A Number.” Her “One In a Million” hit, which was released in 1996, along with the self-titled album “Aaliyah” released just one month before her death in 2001, is noticeably missing from streaming platforms. Plus, singles like “Are You That Somebody?” Documents reveal that the music...
Black women are some of the most innovative playmakers in sneaker culture today. Their contributions have made a global impact through some of the biggest streetwear brands and even their own self-made platforms that have helped pave the way for others. As previously reported by AfroTech, Black women aren’t waiting around for major corporations to offer them opportunities in the streetwear industry anymore. They’re carving out their own spaces and making room for other people in their communities to erase the “boys club” stereotype. And that’s exactly what True To Us founder Jourdan Ash set out to do when she created her forward-thinking online platform. True To Us — which is labeled as “a platform for you to be seen” — strives to center Black and brown women as the foundation of the streetwear and sneaker industries while also extending career opportunties. Like many sneakerheads, Ash got her proper introduction to the culture very early in her youth, even as early as the day she...
When Daveed Benjamin co-founded The Overweb with Joshua Armah, he knew that his clients needed an added layer of protection and support that most web browsers, at the time, couldn’t provide. “At the time that we first came up with The Overweb, we only had computer-based sites to work with,” he told AfroTech. “Now, of course, with more and more people using mobile web services — sometimes, almost exclusively — we realize that we needed to add different types of services, too. But our commitment to protection remains unchanged.” The Internet as we know it is facing a critical challenge, with “fake news” being one of the most debated socio-political topics of recent years (thanks, Trump). According to one study, there’s a 52% perceived frequency of online news websites reporting “fake news” stories in the United States, and 96% of U.S. adults say they distrust what they read on social media. But that’s where The Overweb comes in. It leverages collaborative annotation: a process where...
50 Cent, Texas’s newest resident, has put his money where his mouth is and helped some students get money of their own. According to ABC 13, the rapper-turned-actor — whose given name is Curtis Jackson — donated $300,000 to the Houston Independent School District, which is to be used for the G-Star Program at the county’s historically underperforming schools. In turn the district, matched the actor’s donation for a total of $600,000. The underperforming schools in question — Wheatley, Worthing and Kashmere high schools — will have the G-Star Program installed to provide paid internships and other business opportunities to the students there. There will even be a chance to meet, and work with, 50 Cent himself. That’s thanks to the G-Unity Lab, which the rapper set up to work with a dedicated group of students who are interested in getting mentorship from the “Power” creator himself. The idea is to help create the next generation of minority-owned small businesses and create more...
Goldman Sachs has added the Currys as two new additional members to help it reach its ambitious goal. As previously reported by AfroTech, Goldman Sachs announced a new initiative back in March that aimed to invest $10 billion in what they called the One Million Black Women (OMBW) initiative — a hefty effort that plans to support Black women over the next 10 years. The original 15-person Advisory Council has now grown to include NBA superstar Steph Curry and his wife Ayesha to assist the company in its grandiose mission to end racial inequity. “Given all that’s happened over the course of the last year, we’ve done a lot of talking at the firm—and even more listening—to help us figure out how we can do more to end the racial inequity and the gaps that have existed in society for well too long,” Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon previously shared in a statement to ESSENCE. “Impact comes with sustained effort over a long period of time. We’re very prepared for that.” According to the...
These Black men in business are going the extra mile to create opportunities for their community, all while creating a seat at the table for themselves. André Walters and Derrick Brown — co-founders of Charlotte-based hybrid investment firm Free Fenix — have announced their latest move in the franchise space. The two are partnering with investment firm New Spring Capital to close a deal that makes them part-owners of Duck Donuts — a Mechanicsburg, PA -based chain of donut franchises. As part-owners of the franchise, Walters and Brown also hold board seats at the company, which makes them the one of the first Black men to hold such positions at Duck Donuts. “We believe the world is just getting to know Duck Donuts and when they do, they will notice what we noticed,” they tell AfroTech. “It took many long hours, conversations, compromises and perseverance to get this deal done, but in the end we accomplished the objective we established over a year ago and we think this is a win for...
This week, Issa Rae’s audio-everywhere company Raedio announced that it has joined forces with award-winning podcast duo, The Read, to bring a historic, first-of-its-kind record deal to life for an upcoming original comedy album. Shadow and Act confirmed the news with the company, which revealed plans to release the new full-length project — executive produced by Raedio president Benoni Tagoe, Rae, The Read’s (Kid Fury and Crissle) and talent manager Alexandra Rago — featuring both commentary on historic pop culture moments from The Read along with original music from today’s most prolific artists. For nearly a decade, entertainment and podcast personalities Kid Fury and Crissle, formally and jointly known as The Read, have amassed a huge following of listeners and supporters through their unfiltered opinions that have taken the industry by storm. As one of the more prominent players amid the podcast era, The Read has made a huge impact in the way that audiences consume and resonate...
Chris Classic is not your average renaissance man! Not only is he an American Music Award-winning recording artist with tracks that can be heard on movie soundtracks like “Alvin and the Chipmunks,” “Just Wright,” “Horrible Bosses,” and more, but he is an entrepreneur, social media influencer, and founder of the lifestyle brand Savoir Faire. “I feel like authenticity kind of allows you to be timeless and that’s what I aim for,” said Classic in an interview with Will Lucas on the latest episode of Black Tech Green Money. Classic always understands his assignment simply by showing up as his authentic self. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Chris Classic™️ ©️ (@mrchrisclassic) “For me, authenticity doesn’t go out of style,” continued Classic who gained popularity just from sharing different parts of his day as he was on a mission to dispel myths about Black fathers. He is known for sharing intimate moments of his life including what it’s like to be an amazing co-parent and...