Now, winning the grant is not only a game-changer for Brown but for the untapped space for scalp needs that caters to various backgrounds.

Although she’s fresh off of a win, Brown is cognizant of the ongoing challenge for Black women founders like herself to secure funding.

“My challenge was reframing the idea of ‘asking for help’ to ‘inviting others to a valuable opportunity.’ That mindset changed my outlook entirely. For many Black women, we have not been told we could give someone an opportunity to build business with us. Instead, we are grilled that we ‘need help’ and ‘need to ask’ and that’s a completely different mind frame [lack mindset]. Let’s be real. The world usually tells white men, specifically, ‘You can have anything” and ‘You deserve someone’s help.'”

She added: “Also, we get financial literacy later in life and by then, we may have made credit mistakes, have more expenses due to taking care of others, or just life’s responsibilities. We can do ANYTHING, but sometimes the business-building journey is longer and real life does not always give us freedom that time provides. We get less time to do what we need to do with less resources. So it’s hard, but we got this!”

Arielle Brown

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