The Black Informant | African American Commentary, News and Community Building

I dare you to do a Google search under the following terms~

Support Asian owned businesses

Support White owned businesses

support Jewish owned businesses

support Mexican owned businesses

Now search this:

Support Black owned businesses

The Philadelphia African American Chamber of Commerce is once again begging Black folks to support Black businesses. I totally understand the sentiment and I absolutely love hearing about other Black businesses succeed. But when you have to plead and beg folks of the same race to support their own, something seriously needs to be addressed. Check out this excerpt from a spokesperson from the organization. Read it carefully.

“It’s not just saying go support these businesses regardless of the quality of service that you receive, but saying go support these businesses knowing that at the same time we’re working to help them improve their business.”

Just over 5 years ago, this same organization released the following press release.

African-American Chamber Survey: 40 Percent of Black Businesses Have Difficulty Finding Trained Staff; 81.8 Percent of Black Firm Employees are African-American

PHILADELPHIA, Jan. 12 /PRNewswire/ — In a recent survey of its member-businesses, the Philadelphia-area African-American Chamber of Commerce (AACC) found that 40 percent are experiencing difficulty in finding appropriately trained employees to work in their companies and that targeted training programs would allow them to hire more people, with greater confidence.

Among the impediments to finding suitable employees, the businesses said, was “technical skills deficiency,” “insufficient training,” “lack of expertise in the business’s specialty,” “lack of education,” a “lack of a clean background” and a “lack of work ethic, professionalism and punctuality.”

The firms, each of which was African-American owned, said that being ableto hire qualified African-Americans is a high priority for their businesses.”

If the quality of service does not improve, don’t expect Black folks to come knocking down your door.

But then again, would ANYBODY want to go through the door in the first place.