The Lay Out's BuyBLK.ByBLK. - Creating Economic Opportunities While Building A Community

From its inception, The Lay Out has always been about reclaiming and creating space for the Black community. The pandemic and subsequent murder of George Floyd created a deep need for community but also a desperate need for economic opportunities, particularly for those small businesses/ brands that make a vast majority of their revenue every year during outdoor markets.

Over the years I had developed a relationship with Ali, owner of AGOWA (Authentic Goods Of West Africa) as I would talk to him while out and about in the neighborhood. On June 6th, 2020 the day before the first edition of The Lay Out, I asked him to come vend at the event. and with one brand, The Lay Out’s cooperative economics platform was born.?

Creating economic opportunities for Black entrepreneurs is critically important, particularly in NYC. “While the Black community currently makes up 22% of New York City's population (1.9 million), just 3.5% of NYC businesses are owned by Black entrepreneurs” (NYC’s Small Business Services Black Entrepreneurs NYC division). And while this 3.5% is higher than the 2.7% of all US businesses that are Black-owned, it is still abysmal. According to a Lending Tree report, Charlotte, NC, the 10th-ranked city for % of Black-owned businesses, also has a Black population of 22% but 5.3% of their businesses are Black-owned. I want to be clear that I’m not praising Charlotte or the 9 cities ranked above it, they just happen to be slightly cleaner, but still dirty AF, shirts.

From a few brands in 2020 at The Lay Out’s park events in 2020 to a few more brands in 2021, the cooperative economics platform was formalized as BuyBLK. ByBLK. in 2022 with over 35 small, Black-owned brands vending at our annual Juneteenth and August events in the park. It is a natural fit to marry our ever-growing community with the growing number of entrepreneurs within, and connected to, that same community. In the holiday of 2022, due to Lindsay Greene , we also began our amazing and ongoing partnership with Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation as we curated +30% of the brands that were part of their annual Wallabout Wonderland holiday market.

In 2023, as BuyBLK. ByBLK. continued to expand within our own events, we also began to do our own standalone pop-ups as our ongoing partnership with Atlantic Terminal, in the heart of Brooklyn, began. Through that partnership we curated five weekends of BuyBLK. ByBLK. pop-ups starting on Small Business Saturday and continuing through Christmas Eve, enabling our brands to capture the attention of holiday shoppers. Over the holidays we also continued our partnership with Brooklyn Navy Yard for their holiday market, working with Janyce Hunt to bring over 75 brands, up from ~30 in 2022, helping to make 2023’s Wallabout Wonderland, one of the largest holiday markets in the city as we filled over 100k sq ft of space (two football fields). As there was one weekend of overlap between our standalone pop up at Atlantic Terminal and our inclusion in Brooklyn Navy Yard’s holiday market, in one weekend, we provided vending opportunities to over 100 small, Black-owned businesses.

The support of these Black-owned businesses does not end with IRL pop ups. From creating collaborative merch to bringing our brands together with The Lay Out’s corporate partners to for brand activations, I am committed to keeping as many economic opportunities in the BuyBLK. ByBLK. family as possible.? For example, for our activations with HBO/ MAX last year for Juneteenth, we created a collaborative ice-cream flavor and brought in two of our BuyBLK.ByBLK. partners to create the set for “family” portraits shot by Juan Veloz, brought in one of our brands to do a flower arranging workshop at RXR ’s Starrett Lehigh building for a wildly successful Brunch & Crafts event in the Olly Olly Market, created a collaborative hat with Nappy Head Club which is now carried by the Brooklyn Museum and most recently, worked with April M Rivera M.S at BSE Global to curate VIP gift bags for the Brooklyn Nets and New York Liberty featuring products from the brands.?

This past weekend, I hosted The Chill Out under The Lay Out umbrella, transforming a 7,500 sq ft space at Atlantic Terminal/ Atlantic Center, directly across the street from Barclay's Center to feature everything from 20+ Black-owned brands to acupuncture/ stretch therapy and workshops to bring the community together for a weekend of wellness but most importantly to create economic opportunity for the brands involved. I cannot thank Cristal Rivera and Atlantic Terminal enough for their continued partnership to bring the event to life.

Next up, all roads lead to The Lay Out’s 5th annual Juneteenth celebration, continuing the joy ecosystem of Black expression, social impact and cooperative economics as we not only host 50+ Black owned-small brands to vend but also find every way possible to integrate them into brand activations.?

Black-owned businesses should not only be supported during Black History Month and around Juneteenth. As a society we cannot win unless we all win so let’s all work together to circulate the $.?