Not all businesses are successful right from the start. Sometimes a young businesswoman needs a little bit of help to realize her full potential. The Girlboss Foundation exists for this very reason: to enrich the future of businesswomen across the country by giving them the tools they need to get their companies off the ground. From its founding to the present, the foundation has sparked the careers of dozens of women and will continue to do so every year that goes by.
The History Behind It In 2006, Sophia Amoruso was a 22-year-old hoping to make a few extra bucks by selling vintage clothing on her eBay store. This store, named Nasty Gal Vintage, quickly took off as growing demand for vintage apparel increased her earnings from a few dollars per item to over a thousand in some instances. When this online store grew into its own $250 million business, it faced ups and downs Amoruso couldn’t have foreseen. Although Amoruso stepped down as CEO of Nasty Gal Vintage in 2015 and the company officially filed for bankruptcy in 2016, Amoruso’s business career was far from over. In the midst of these setbacks, she released her book, Girlboss, in 2014. This best-selling memoir inspired young women entrepreneurs around the country and led to the founding of the Girlboss Foundation.
What It Is Amoruso established the Girlboss Foundation in 2014 with the intent of awarding grants to the next generation of women entrepreneurs. In the process, the foundation has taken on the mission of helping women around the country redefine the meaning of success. By offering the tools and connections needed to begin a business career, Girlboss gives aspiring women entrepreneurs the means to make their dreams come true. Girlboss awards grants biannually to creative individuals who are in the beginning phases of kicking off a business. Each grant includes $15, 000 in project funding along with career-building tools and networking opportunities. Since Girlboss Foundation’s opening, it has awarded over $130, 000 in grants to women hoping to reshape the future through their companies.
Meet Black Girl Magik: Your New Girlboss Foundation Grant Winners
Who Can Apply for Funding The grants offered by the Girlboss foundation are exclusive to women business owners in the design, music, fashion, music, and arts fields. For a person to be eligible for the grants, they must identify as female, be able to show United States residency, and be 18 years or older by the end of the submission period. The ideal candidate for these grants should demonstrate creativity and innovation in their field and show that they have a thorough plan for their business.Black Girl Magik is an online and IRL platform, but it’s much more than that. It’s a collective that speaks to and for women-identified folk across the African diaspora.
Through physical gatherings and digital content, BGM seeks to unite and empower women of color through politically-informed dialogues around self-care, healing, recognition, networking, and exchange. As founder and executive director, Shydeia Caldwell puts it, “The more I learn about my history and family genealogy, the closer I get to me.” That’s Black Girl Magik.
The collective that counts artist Princess Nokia among their loyal fans, is planning a US-wide event/workshop tour starting Summer 2019, that’ll see them travel across the country, creating programming and meeting creators in NYC, LA, Atlanta, DC and New Orleans. There will be a site extension including new services, and Black Girl Magik merch. This is where the Foundation grant comes in.
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We’re thrilled to announce that Black Girl Magik have been awarded the latest Foundation grant, for the first half of 2018. Below, Caldwell—along with a bunch of key collective members—talk us through their backstory and what’s next for BGM.Oh and guys, keep your eyes peeled to the grant application page—we’ll be opening the next round soon.
Shydeia Caldwell, founder and executive director:The name Black Girl Magik because there is no better name to encompass the feeling and action of black women gathering in a space of love, honesty, humility, realness, creativity, and encouragement. I think Sampa The Great did an excellent job of depicting what it means in her “Black Girl Magik” song and video.
Shydeia Caldwell, founder and executive director:I was inspired to form a collective when I had the opportunity to be guest panelist at Brooklyn Museum for BUFU’s Community Conversation with Art Collectives. During that panel, I gained so much knowledge on how oppressive and harmful hierarchical structures can be for marginalized people. I launched Black Girl Magik in New York with no financial backing during the summer of 2015. At the time of BGM’s first meetup, my bank account was minus 20 bucks.
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With my focus zeroed in on the mission, I completed my undergraduate degree in South Carolina while managing the steadfast expansion of Black Girl Magik in New York City. Currently, I am navigating the complexities and hardships of being a black business owner … The accessibility to sustainable financial growth is a real topic of conversation for black women entrepreneurs.
Sierra King, social media manager: It feels like home. You are greeted from community members with hugs, smiles and an energy that envelops you as soon as you walk into the room. It gives you permission to place your bags down, take your coat off, remove your shoes, all of the things that you are holding on to and just breathe. There’s always music and sounds playing, not jarring but still makes you want to get up and dance just because.
Zai Aliyu, creative director: Since our inception as a collective, we have operated remotely across several locations and time zones. This has posed a challenge for how we organize, interface, and collaborate productively with one another. We’ve overcome this by leveraging tools that help us communicate more efficiently, generating workflows across our different roles that has led to fruitful and fluid cross-functional exchange.
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“It is fulfilling the dreams of our ancestors. It is love…the love of our skin, our hair, our culture, our history, our future.”
Our grassroots work, as fulfilling as it is, remains an uphill battle within the larger context of that which proceeds us and that which has yet to come … Remarkable revolutionaries have advised us to beware of forces that serve to distract us from organizing collectively; we can’t allow physical distance to keep us from our collective praxis.
Amina Cush, PR director: We applied for the Foundation grant because it was imperative that we continue to provide safe spaces for women of color to share their stories and begin their healing journeys. Our platform provides an outlet for WoC to express themselves authentically without judgment. As such, it was important that we seek outside funding sources to expand our program offerings and ensure the sustainability of the BGM platform.
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Isabelle Ofume, events director: They’ll be used to establish self-sustaining components to the BGM brand while expanding our community and brand goals for the next year. Lots of exciting work will be coming out of us in 2018/19 including but not limited to our North American Tour and the community marketplace. Our community programming will touch areas in the US and Canada … We will be able to interview the women of color in these locations which add to the greater BGM narrative centered on love, self-care, recognition, healing, and professional exchange.
Shydeia Caldwell, founder and executive director: In Beyonce’s recent interview with Vogue she said, “There are so many cultural and societal barriers to entry that I like to do what I can to level the playing field, to present a different point of view for people who may feel like their voices don’t matter.” I felt that shit in my heart chakra.
BGM’s underlying mission is to create space for black women in every industry we are not fully and respectfully represented. In consequence, that is essentially why we exist as an arts space; a hub for dialogue and critical consciousness; a multimedia realm; a center for solidarity and self care.
Meet Mara Binudin, Our Newest Girlboss Foundation Grant Recipient!
Amora Miller, editor: To me, #blackgirlmagik is existing and flourishing as a self-identified black woman. It is thriving in a world that never intended to see us succeed. It is righteousness and ratchetry. It is establishing and nurturing an inclusive and accepting community to support all of our sisters throughout the diaspora.
It is setting in motion the processes to collectively and individually heal from generational trauma and to create a legacy for ourselves. It is fulfilling the dreams of our ancestors. It is love…the love of our skin, our hair, our culture, our history, our future.
Shydeia Caldwell – Founder and executive directorSierra King – Social media managerZai Aliyu – Creative directorIsabelle Ofume – Events directorMaureen Nicol – Project managerAmora Miller – EditorAmina Cush – Public relations directoVideo | Agriculture | Confidence | Economy | Energy | Employment | Finance | Media | Property | RBNZ | Science | SOEs | Tax | Technology | Telecoms | Tourism | Transport | Search
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