12 Black-Owned Brands You'll Love To Shop
In 2017, Nielsen Report put Black buying power at $1.2 trillion, with black women having majority ownership in more than 1.5 million businesses with over $42 billion in sales. Understanding this fact makes it important to support and shop brands led by women of color. It's also a great reminder that what we buy matters.
If you're looking to get in formation, here's a great starting point to support black-owned businesses led by women of color. For Us, by us.
1.elouise & ethel
I'm all for feeling affirmed and empowered in my existence and elouise & ethel have that lane more than covered with their brand of wearable affirmations. Named for her matriarchs who led her family back in the day, the shop's founder Shante Bacon sought to create small trinkets that exemplified our black girl magic. "Each charm is a simple reminder that all of us has what it takes to crush the moment – whether it's a presentation, an important learning moment with your child, the runway of life, the mid-terms or anything that you seek to accomplish," she said on her website.
Her debut collection "Affirmations You Can Wear" includes jewelry, apparel, and mugs that say things like "Black Girl Magic", "Magic" and "Purpose". In addition to jewelry, the Brooklyn-based company is a one-stop shop for other things, such as mugs, pillows, candles, apparels, and hoops.
Featured image by The Wrap Life; Originally published July 31, 2018
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Kandice Guice is a lifestyle and beauty writer who doubles as an attorney and entrepreneur. She prides herself on helping multidimensional women discover personal and professional fulfillment by encouraging them to live with ambition, sass, and a whole lot of pizzazz. When Kandice isn't closing corporate transactions or writing blog posts, she is usually cheering on her husband as a football coach or looking for new travel adventures with friends and family. Check her out at kandiceguice.com and follow her on all things social @kandiceguice.
From Heartbreak To Healing: The Multifaceted Journey Of Nazanin Mandi
Nazanin Mandi is never out of options.
About a year ago, the 37-year-old life coach and actress was navigating life after divorce and determined to experience homeownership for the first time as a single woman. She’d been married to the R&B singer Miguel for three years, following a long-term relationship that started when she was 18 years old. But, in 2022, she filed for divorce. It was certainly the most public change she made but, in reality, it was just one of many decisions to refocus and reach her full potential in recent years.
“During my 20s, I was not ready for more. I was living a really crazy life. It was unpredictable. I was helping somebody else grow. It was a lot, and it was intense. I was not pouring into myself the way I should’ve been,” she says in an xoNecole exclusive.
Still, as Mandi worked to get to know herself and her needs during this new phase of life, she realized the home she’d purchased wasn’t a good fit. Overwhelmed by the echoing of her voice in the spacious home, she had a breakdown and called her cousin, who immediately suggested she lease the home and live somewhere else. “I woke up in my house, and I was like, ‘This is not it for me,” she says. “All those years, I had been accustomed to living a certain way [and] in a certain house, so I bought myself a house like [my old home]. But my family was not the same. Waking up in that house by myself, it highlighted the divorce. I was like, ‘Oh, no, we can’t do this. This is not it.’ My life has changed, so my choices need to change.” At that moment, Mandi became open to the idea that there wasn’t one set way to achieve ownership on her own.
“I feel so much better. I’m in a smaller place. My best friend lives a minute from me and I can walk to her house,” she tells me during a Zoom interview from her home one recent afternoon in early February. In the past two years, she hasn’t just been advising other people on varying circumstances, she’s also been healing herself.
"During my 20s, I was not ready for more. I was living a really crazy life. It was unpredictable. I was helping somebody else grow. It was a lot, and it was intense. I was not pouring into myself the way I should’ve been."
Credit: Solmaz Saberi
If supporters began following Nazanin Mandi because of her conventional beauty or the contagious, bright, white smile she often wears in many of her photos, that’s likely not the reason they’ve stuck around. Instead, she’s amassed a following based on her transparency about her own anxiety and depression, along with the encouraging messages of self-acceptance, gratitude, ambition, and humility that are often sprinkled into her social media posts.
In an era where looking at Instagram photos of models can often lead to feelings of self-doubt and insecurity, Nazanin Mandi is determined to be more than eye candy. She’s food for her follower’s souls, too.
Since being recruited to model while dining at an In-N-Out at 10 years old, Mandi has worked in many areas of entertainment. The Valencia, California native has modeled for brands such as Olay, Savage X Fenty, and Good American. As a teen, she sang at Carnegie Hall and auditioned for season 1 of American Idol, making it all the way to Hollywood before producers disqualified her for lying about her age. (Mandi was 15 at the time, and contestants had to be at least 16 years old.) Mandi has acted, too, including appearing on Disney’s That’s So Raven as a teenager and on the BET+ series Games People Play and the Prime series Á La Carte in more recent years.
In recent years, though, she’s also expanded her professional goals outside of entertainment, too. After becoming a certified life coach in 2020, Mandi launched the membership platform You Bloome in 2022 with the hopes of providing wellness services to others, including her self-published gratitude journal. “I wish I had access to something like You Bloome earlier in my own life,” she writes on the company’s website. The actress, who has been forthcoming about her struggles with anxiety and depression, has never had a life coach, but credits therapy as a tool that “really, really saved me and it laid the foundation to who I am becoming.”
Credit: Solmaz Saberi
"I’m trying to find the balance between living life and knowing that whatever is meant for me is going to happen, but also know that I’m doing everything in my power to make those things happen and better myself."
While she’s always had a nurturing personality, Mandi says her interest in becoming a life coach was inspired by the women who would message her for advice on social media. “I would answer them back. It really sparked a fire within myself to help people,” she says.
You Bloome currently has three membership tiers, ranging in price from $2.99 to $39.99 per month. The highest tier offers a motivational text message twice a week, two live, group coaching sessions per month, and more. “We get emotional. We cry. We laugh. It’s really beautiful. I’ve built close relationships with my members through this. It’s been inspiring both ways,” Mandi says of the sessions. Still, the founder says she hopes to take on more motivational and keynote speaking opportunities in the future with the hopes of impacting as many people as possible.
And, she’s hoping to do all of this while continuing to explore a career as an entertainer.
At this point in her life, Mandi says she’s gained enough perspective on modeling, music, and acting to realize what she wants to prioritize moving forward. “We are going full force with acting,” she says, noting her goal is “to book a series regular or a film that impacts my career and the world.” She plans to continue to model, too, but has no desire to pursue music.
“I don’t want any part of that because I know what that life entails,” she says. “I don’t want to tour. I don’t want to do any of that. That is not where my heart is at.”
Credit: Solmaz Saberi
If you ask Mandi, she’ll tell you she feels most comfortable in front of a camera, but she’ll also admit that she’s recently experienced a lot of imposter syndrome when thinking about her acting career. “I think it’s a fear of not succeeding,” she says. If anything, she adds, she’s harder on herself now than she’s ever been. “There were distractions before. There’s no distractions now,” she says. “I’m putting pressure on myself for no reason.”
This is where the life coach’s own personal healing comes into play. Mandi says she’s learning recently that “slow progress is still big progress at the end of the day.”
“Currently, I’m trying to find the balance between living life and knowing that whatever is meant for me is going to happen, but also know that I’m doing everything in my power to make those things happen and better myself,” she adds.
Still, one of Mandi’s strengths is that she doesn’t feel the pressure to limit herself to just one passion. From working as a life coach to pursuing acting, she has given herself grace to explore all other dreams.
“We can be allowed to be many different things in this lifetime,” she says. “As people, our identities are allowed to expand. Don’t put us in a fucking box. I cannot live that way anymore.”
For more of Nazanin, follow her on Instagram @nazaninmandi.
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Featured image by Solmaz Saberi
Kierra Sheard-Kelly Talks Being A New Mom And How Her Children's Book Is Based On A True Story
Kierra Sheard-Kelly is a Grammy award-winning artist who has been a force in gospel music for almost two decades. Although she comes from the legendary musical family, The Clark Sisters (her mom being Karen Clark Sheard), she has managed to make a name for herself in gospel with hits like "Hang On" and "It Keeps Happening," as well as being a judge on the popular BET gospel singing competition show, Sunday's Best.
Besides music, Kierra has also ventured into fashion with her clothing line Eleven60 and is an author, penning her latest book, Kiki Finds Her Voice, which is a children's book based on a childhood memory. With so much success in her career, the singer has now started on a new journey, motherhood. In a xoNecole exclusive, Kierra opens up about becoming a children's book author, a new mom, and much more.
While Kierra already has two books under her belt, the Line Sisters star chose to make her third book, Kiki Finds Her Voice, a children's book. The story is about Kiki deciding to sing about God in a school talent show after her parents told her she couldn't sing a love song with her friends. Kierra says the story is based on a moment in her childhood.
"I was auditioning with some girls from school, and I think we all kind of go through this where we're discovering if we are extroverts or introverts, or even if we're in between, ambiverts and then sometimes we feel like it sometimes we don't," she tells us. "Children still have that space as well. But at this moment, I was trying to make friends. I was trying to fit in. I wanted to be popular and cool and be accepted. And I think every child goes through this at some point in their lives, and I auditioned for a talent show."
Kierra explains that they sang an R&B song during the audition, and when her mom caught wind of it, she made her change her song. "My mother was being my mother and being the protective adult that she was in that space, and she was like, 'This is not an appropriate song for you to sing as a child.' So, she bust into that talent show audition, and she made sure that I switched my song," she reveals.
"Of course, the girls, they dropped off, and they weren't interested, and they were like, we don't want to do your churchy song swap out kind of thing. And I had to learn the lesson my parents were saying, 'Hey, everybody's not gonna agree with your choices, and that's even now. Even when you become an adult, but don't let that define you."
Kiki Finds Her Voice was influenced by Kierra becoming a mother herself. The "Miracles" singer is a new mom to Khloé-Drew Valencia Kelly, who she shares with her husband, Jordan Kelly. The couple tied the knot in December 2020, and Kierra has been candid about their pregnancy journey. The gospel singer experienced several miscarriages before welcoming little Khloé in November 2023, and after a few months in, she is opening up about motherhood, calling it "great," "beautiful," and even "tricky."
"It's almost like motherhood has strengthened me to be more bold with what I know God has told me and to not question or doubt it. It's like you don't have too much time to second guess that because literally, someone else is dependent on your relationship with God, you know?" She explains.
"So it has me diving in. My prayer points are different. My prayers are more precise. Even with who's around me, I'm very careful now. I'm always looking around my shoulder, not, you know, out of fear, but just to make sure. And I read something the other day, and it said, not only is the baby born, but the mother is born also. So this new being that is a part of myself has been awakened, and it's beautiful. I'm writing and singing different. I don't worry about the little stuff, you know, the minutiae. I let stuff go. It's like I got other things to worry about. Like I feel grown grown now. If you know what I mean?"
Kierra calls Khloé-Drew her "miracle baby," and she hopes to build a relationship similar to the one she has with her parents. The "Something Has To Break" artist says her parents, Karen Clark Sheard and John Drew Sheard Sr., are her best friends, and fostering a relationship with her daughter is what's most important to her.
Keep up with Kierra and her family on Instagram and check out her children's book Kiki Finds Her Voice.
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Feature image by Michael Kovac/Getty Images for Lifetime