Category Archives: Business

Internet Services Startup Launched By Three HBCUpreneurs – Who Have Never Met

Posted on January 25, 2021 by | Leave a comment

“Great things in business are never done by one person. They’re done by a team of people.” – Steve Jobs

It is a business story worthy of Hollywood. Mainly because it seems to be a storyline that you only find in movies. However, the story is very real and very powerful. Not only because of its potential, but also because of the possibilities that it presents. Three HBCUpreneurs from three different HBCUs start a business, but have never actually met each other in person. The power of the internet, the power of Twitter and most importantly, the power of the HBCU community.

The company, HBCU Real Estate, is an internet services company that seeks to help the HBCU community (but not limited too) find and use HBCU real estate service providers. Everything from real estate agents, mortgage brokers, interior designers, and more. The founders hope that it will even lead to business creation in the spaces of real estate that the HBCU community may have little to no presence. HBCU Money is aware of only one title company* owned by an HBCU alumnus. HBCU Real Estate’s mission is to help facilitate circulation of the HBCU community’s dollars and keep them in the HBCU community. If successful, it could potentially keep tens of billions of dollars within the HBCU community. The fact that none of the founders have ever met in person makes what they are trying to accomplish even more astounding.

For two years it sat on the proverbial shelf according to organizer, cofounder, and HBCU Real Estate’s Director of Product Development, William A. Foster, IV, a Livingstone College, Virginia State University, and Prairie View A&M University alumnus. “I am a multipreneur and have learned that more hands and brains on deck is almost always a good thing. I needed to meet and find the right people who could understand, compliment, add value, and who could see the potential just as much as I could. Also, I promised myself no more solo projects. When you are involved in as many businesses and organizations as I am, being able to spread the load is vital to success – and sanity.”

Enter Christen Turner, Spelman College and Southern University alumnus, and Marcus King, an alumnus of Prairie View A&M University, both HBCUpreneurs themselves. Ms. Turner, HBCU Real Estate’s Chief Technology Officer, also owns Janelle T. Designs, a graphic designs firm, as well as Forever Femme, an accessories company. Mr. King, HBCU Real Estate’s Chief Marketing Officer, owns Hardly Home, a clothing line that is catered towards travel that was featured on HBCU Money’s The HBCUpreneur Corner in 2015. What does it say to you (King) about the potential of collaboration for HBCUpreneurs that 5 different HBCUs are represented among the 3 cofounders? King answered, “The motto at my alma maters is that “PV produces productive people” and I think that can be said about HBCUs across the board. For years HBCUs have been producing top talent and should continue to do so as we seek to move forward and provide solutions to the problems our community faces.”

The three have followed each other on Twitter for years, although no one can remember for how long. It was towards the end of 2020 that Foster said he approached Turner and King about doing a collaboration or tweeted at them rather. “I sent out a tweet and tagged both of them saying that I need to cofound something with the two of them. Having watched them over the years I knew we would click and have the same kind of work ethic. I just needed to find out if they thought the idea had any legs. If it was not this, it was going to be something else.” The work ethic was confirmed when he said he got an email from Turner on Thanksgiving while he himself was working. Turner further drove the point home of the potential of the moment, “This business will be successful because of two reasons, respect and trust. Despite not having met in an ‘official’ capacity, our partnership seems to have a natural fit to it; almost like pieces of a puzzle. With William’s intuition, he was able to unknowingly add the right people to his team who would each be able to add something different. Whether from a professional standpoint or specific personality traits, we all came in with an immediate respect for each other’s talents and skills. This is why the business will be successful. There’s no questioning; there’s only action, openness, and honesty.” Usually in Hollywood the movie ends with and they lived happily ever after – The End, but in this case it is clear that this is just The Beginning.

For more information, visit http://www.hbcurealestate.com

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5 Things African Americans Have To STOP Saying About Black Businesses

Posted on January 12, 2021 by | 1 comment

“Negro banks, as a rule, have failed because the people, taught that their own pioneers in business cannot function in this sphere, withdrew their deposits.” – Carter G. Woodson

African American businesses face a lot of hurdles in their ability to get started, grow, and survive. They come from everything from a lack of access to capital, predatory behavior by other communities, and a plethora of other variables that make being an African American entrepreneur not something for weak of heart. However, one of the most formidable adversaries to African American entrepreneurs is the African American community’s perception and attitude towards the very businesses trying to spur economic development in and for the community. 

The HBCU Money staff put together a list of five things they would like to see the community’s behavior and attitude towards African American businesses improve.

5. Can I get the “hookup”?

The goal of a business is to pay for its expenses, pay its workers, and hopefully after all is said and done leave enough money for its owners to have a living. Yet, family, friends, and sometimes strangers seem to think for the African American small business owner or entrepreneur we are the exception to that rule. The “hookup” has been the downfall of many African American businesses. Instead, this is a great opportunity to say how can I hook this business up with more word of mouth advertising so that they can grow and bring jobs and wealth to our community? 

4. Black businesses have bad customer service.

Has an African American store ever followed you around the store? Accused you of stealing before you walk in? Redlined your whole community? The list could go on and on. Yet, you rarely hear us as loud and vocal about customer service from other communities as you do the trope about African American businesses’ customer service. Is there bad customer service? Yes. Is there good customer service? Yes. Like all other communities we run the gambit, but the bad ones whilst a minority tend to get the lion’s share of the perception. Do African American businesses take customer service seriously enough? That is a different question all together, but what is definitely not true is that African American customer service is far worse than the predatory behavior we experience in other community’s businesses. Perspective.

3. Black businesses charge too much.

African American businesses are often accused of charging too much for their product or service. There are a number of factors to this misconception. More times than not African American businesses are in line with the market pricing. However, when they do tend to be higher than the industry, it is because their business is heavily reliant upon an African American consumer or they lack the ability to scale. Being heavily reliant on an African American consumer base is fundamentally economically challenging. We are the group with the lowest median income and wealth, which means we have the least disposable income to be consumers in the mainstream sense. Whereas a consumer in another community maybe able to purchase a product every week, we maybe only able to purchase it every month. For an African American business this forces them to try to capture more sale at once because of how rare the sales will be. We also rarely have the resources to scale our businesses which allows for driving down costs, but again this in large part is because of factors like African American small businesses having less access to capital, businesses too highly focused on African American consumers who have little disposable income, and a concentration in businesses that are often very difficult by their very nature to scale (i.e. restaurants, barber/beauty shops, clothing lines). 

2. Products are inferior.

Outside of food, hair, and entertainment there seems to be a pervasive belief that African American businesses tend to offer subpar products and services. To Dr. Woodson’s aforementioned point, it is often in areas where our own community believes we are incapable of competing and doing well in the space that this is so acute. African American businesses tend to try to produce a product that is superior in many cases because they are fighting this perception. However, it should be noted that there is often a disconnect of what should be quality and should not be. Also, if a consumer is buying a knockoff or counterfeit product which is popular in the community, then the expectation needs to be aligned as such. Unfortunately, that is not always the case. 

1. Need to do more for the community.

Before African American businesses can often become profitable they are being asked to give away their products and/or services to the community. A common misconception often that because you own a business, then you must be making money. It can take an average of two to three years for most conventional businesses to become profitable and even that is a tricky statement. Being profitable simply means that your business revenue is greater than your business expense. So for instance, if your businesses expenses are $2,000 and your business earned $2,001, then you are profitable. However, nobody would assume that that businesses is making enough money for its owner to live on let alone even take a salary. In most instances, especially for African American businesses those early years are spent plowing every dollar of revenue back into the business because usually there was little in the way of startup capital provided. It is usually many years before a business can actually support its owner(s) financially. Does this mean African American business owners should do nothing for their community? Absolutely not. In reality many do even when they can not afford to do so, but we are saying that our community needs to be slower to criticize just how much a business should be doing before they have even had a chance to get our their proverbial feet.

At the end of the day, our businesses are trying to compete against sometimes what feels like insurmountable odds. Those odds do not need to be exacerbated by our own community. Holding African American small businesses and companies accountable is one thing, but continuously treating them in a nihilistic manner is a recipe for economic disaster. Economic development strategy has a myriad of components to it and our behavior and attitudes toward our own institutions goes a long way in our ability to become economically empowered.

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12 Things Your HBCU Alumni Association/Chapter Needs To Do To Be Financially Successful

Posted on November 6, 2020 by | 2 comments

“Planning is bringing the future into the present so that you can do something about it now.” – Alan Lakein

Far too many HBCU Alumni Associations and Chapters have been asleep at the wheel for far too long financially. They have conducted themselves like a child who says they want to start a lemonade stand, but refuses to take the time to make a plan of acquiring lemons, sugar, water, and certainly not building a lemonade stand. There is more time spent playing with their friends and then seemingly complaining that their friends do not support their lemonade stand – that does not exist. It is enough to drive one mad. We have laid out twelve steps that HBCU alumni associations and chapters need to do to make themselves financially integral and sustainable for the future to meet the financial needs of both African America and the HBCUs they serve.

  1. Move banking accounts to African American owned banks and/or credit unions. It is utterly baffling that HBCUs and HBCU Alumni Associations/Chapters at this point still have not done this very elementary point of economic development given the acute presence of the #BankBlack movement over the past few years. Public HBCUs have more red tape by being state institutions and there are significant political dynamics at play there, but private HBCUs and HBCU alumni associations/chapters at private or public HBCUs at this point simply have no excuse.
  2. Invest in technology, especially financial technology. If HBCU Alumni Associations/Chapters want younger alumni involvement as they claim then they have to come into the 21st century – do you realize we are two decades into the 21st century and some HBCU foundations, alumni associations/chapters do not have a functioning web presence. This is where typically you would insert a mind blown emoji or gif. It is unfathomable and inexcusable at this point. HBCU Alumni Associations/Chapters need a web and social media presence independent of the mother institution for a myriad of reasons that should be readily apparent without great explanation. Alumni associations/chapters can work out an agreement with their schools to create work study that involves social media work and web development for those students who are interested and have the necessary skillset. Otherwise, spend the money and pay for a real web designer and social media manager – it is worth it. Financial technology – accepting payment by Venmo, CashApp, etc. should not be groundbreaking it should be standard. There are a plethora of financial technology available for nonprofit organizations. This should be the job of the treasurer at both the national and chapter levels to find technology that can improve the financial efficiency.
  3. Collect information on your members. Know your association/chapters strengths and weaknesses. If you plan on doing education outreach with your alumni association/chapter, it may help knowing who in the organization that has a background and connections in education. Need to put on an event? It may help to know the alumnus who worked in event planning or knows someone who does. Other information should be household income, level of education, home ownership, etc. The more information the better (we will explain the value of this in another point). But not knowing what assets you have is a dearth of proper planning and strategy.
  4. Write a business plan. If you do not know where you are going, any road will get you there. This opaque behavior is stressfully true with HBCU Alumni Associations/Chapters. We have an alumni association/chapter, now what? Having a written plan of what you want to accomplish, why, and how is paramount to any organization. HBCU Alumni Associations/Chapters are no different. The business plan should be reviewed and updated every 3-4 years to ensure that goals are on track . A review committee made up of internal and external members would be advised.
  5. Create a revenue and investment committee. These can be one committee or two committees, but it needs to exist. Beyond dues, how does the association/chapter plan to make money? Thinking of ways that revenue can be generated and those ideas presented to the association and chapter would be vital. Seriously, because have we not killed the annual golf tournament? Someone on this committee needs to have an investment background and if there is no one in the chapter with it, then invite a local financial adviser to sit on the committee in a volunteer role to help.
  6. Raise dues. There was just a collective gasp from everyone just now. However, creativity. Right now, most associations/chapters charge annual dues of $25-35 annually. Going to a monthly model of $5-10 can skyrocket annual dues revenue to $60-120 which is an increase of over 100 percent in dues revenue and it is an amount that few will miss. Implementing financial technology can allow this to be automated around alumni pay periods.
  7. Produce a newsletter and sale local advertising. Remember the roster of your membership and the data we talked about collecting. This is extremely valuable in putting together a media kit that you can use to sell local advertising in. Most alumni associations/chapters send out newsletters anyway. The ability to monetize that in the most optimal way requires being able to tell potential advertisers who they are reaching. Imagine being able to simply sell ten advertisements a year with twelve month commitments that each pay $50 per month. This is $6,000 in new annual revenue for the chapter from local businesses and relationship building.
  8. Hire a financial adviser. It can be the aforementioned one or a different one, but this also needs to be done. Associations/Chapters should be generating far more income than they do with the collective financial ability at their disposal. As an entity, your association/chapter can have a brokerage account that invest in stocks and bonds – not just sitting in a checking and savings account losing purchasing power. Ensure that the financial adviser is credible. There are even African American brokerage firms that can provide accounts and advising all under one roof. Again, we are not going to fundraise our way to institutional wealth. Our organizations’ money needs to be making money while it “sleeps” because money never sleeps.
  9. Purchase real estate. Now that you have a financial adviser, your chapter should also retain a real estate adviser to help build a rental property portfolio. Remember, we just created $6,000 in new annual revenue via the newsletter. You also raised dues from $25 to $60 and with the $35 surplus on a chapter of just twenty alumni that provides and extra $700 annually. In line with your investment income from your brokerage is also rental income. The association/chapter can focus on purchasing everything from single-family to commercial properties. If chapters purchased near their HBCU, it could help stem off any potential gentrification as many HBCUs are seeing, but in little position to do anything about. They could also purchase real estate locally where their chapter is located. This would provide the association/chapter another stream of revenue and diversified real estate holdings.
  10. Invest in African American small businesses. This could be done in conjunction with African American owned banks/credit unions. If a small business could not qualify for a SBA loan, then the chapter could work out a deal with the bank that would allow them to review the investment on the bank’s recommendation. The chapter would then either invest in the business with equity or provide a loan and act as a shadow lender. We know this is something desperately needed for many African American small businesses who are trying to grow and for some reason or another lack access to traditional financial products. Imagine a local African American kid comes to the bank with the next great social media company, but he needs $38,000 to get it going and does not qualify, but the bank says they have a program that may work to help him. The chapter invest the $38,000 for a 50 percent stake and acts as a passive investor while the kid builds his dream. Why $38,000? This is the amount Mark Zuckerberg and classmate Eduardo Saverin invested to get Facebook off the ground in 2004. A company now worth $840 billion and a 50 percent stake would be worth $420 billion – from a $38,000 investment. Not to mention the potential to secure jobs and internships for your HBCU’s students and alumni as the company grew.
  11. Endow internships at local organizations. HBCU alumni constantly complain about our students not having access to opportunity. Well, now with your new found financial wealth you can buy them access just like everyone else does for their community. The Museum of Natural Science in New York, Miami, Houston, etc. sure do appreciate that $100,000 donation your association/chapter gave them to hire a paid summer internship. The condition? That intern needs to come from your HBCU. Now, a student from your HBCU gets a paid summer internship, work experience in a field of their interest, and most importantly builds their professional network.
  12. Be transparent. Associations and chapters need to ensure that members feel like they know and understand what is going on. Part of this is improving the membership’s financial aptitude through financial literacy so that they understand the decisions being made on some level. Have a quarterly review of the financial portfolio and an annual audit. Trust is vital and for African American organizations that trust is built through transparency.

HBCU Alumni Associations & Chapters should be the symbol of group economics for African America. Instead, the actions have been more hat in hand with the rest of African American organizations who could, but do not leverage their capability. The infrastructure is there for HBCU Alumni Associations & Chapters to be financial forces if the proper financial strategy and plan is implemented. It is time to stop playing and start planning, there is a lemonade stand to build.

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2020 HBCU-Based Credit Unions Directory & Map

Posted on September 16, 2020 by | Leave a comment

HBCU-based credit unions have been largely stagnant in the past four years since our last report in 2016. Assets have increased marginally by $1.7 million or a 1.9 percent. Only the top three HBCU-based credit unions saw increases in their assets of the eleven with all others declining. The asset decline was coupled as well with an acute decline in overall members with an almost 10 percent drop from 2016. With millions of dollars and thousands of potential accounts at their doorstep, it is extremely baffling how these institutions continue to struggle to grow. Especially in an environment of heightened social and economic desire to #BankBlack. The most glaring issue for these credit unions is a lack of FinTech investment. This includes everything from lack of a quality website, debit cards, bill pay, an app, and more. Things that would be considered basics at most financial institutions are still notoriously lacking at HBCU-based credit unions.

In 2012, we published a proposal for a merger among the 11 HBCU-based credit unions (or at the very least an alliance) that would immediately create one of the largest African American credit unions by assets and membership. You can read that here.

  1. Southern Teachers & Parents (LA) – $30.3 million
  2. Florida A&M University (FL) – $22.9 million
  3. Virginia State University (VA) – $10.2 million
  4. Howard University Employees (DC) – $10.1 million
  5. Prairie View (TX) – $3.7 million
  6. Councill (AL) – $2.9 million
  7. Savastate Teachers (GA) – $2.7 million
  8. Arkansas A&M College (AR) – $2.3 million
  9. Xavier University (LA) – $1.7 million
  10. Tennessee State University (TN) – $1.5 million
  11. Shaw University (NC) – $0.4 million

TOTAL ASSETS: $88.7 MILLION

MEDIAN ASSETS: $3.3 MILLION

AVERAGE ASSETS: $8.1 MILLION

TOTAL MEMBERSHIP: 14,953

MEDIAN MEMBERSHIP: 754

AVERAGE MEMBERSHIP: 1,359

Source: National Credit Union Administration

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HBCU Money’s 2020 African American Owned Bank Directory

Posted on May 26, 2020 by | 8 comments

For the most current African American Owned Bank Directory visit the 2022 link by clicking here.

All banks are listed by state. In order to be listed in our directory the bank must have at least 51 percent African American ownership. You can click on the bank name to go directly to their website.

OTHER KEY FINDINGS:

  • AAOBs are in 16 states and territories. Key states absent are Florida, Mississippi, New York, Ohio, and Virginia.
  • There has not been an AAOB started in 19 years.
  • Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee, each have two AAOBs.
  • 14 of the AAOBs saw increases in assets from the previous year.
  • African American Owned Banks have approximately $4.3 billion of America’s $19.5 trillion bank assets or 0.02 percent.
  • AAOBs control 1.7 percent of FDIC designated Minority-Owned Bank Assets, which is down from 1.8 percent in 2019. A third straight year of declines.
  • 2020 Median AAOBs Aseets: $106,140,000 ($142,129,000)*
  • 2020 Average AAOBs Assets: $225,519,000 ($217,533,000)*
  • For comparison, Asian American Owned Banks have approximately $129.3 billion in assets spread over 73 institutions. Asian AOBs saw an increase of $9.9 billion increase (8.3 percent) in assets from 2019, while African American Owned Banks saw a 5.2 percent increase in assets.
  • TOTAL AFRICAN AMERICAN OWNED BANK ASSETS: $4,284,856,000

ALABAMA

ALAMERICA BANK

Location: Birmingham, Alabama

Founded: January 28, 2000

FDIC Region: Atlanta

Assets: $19,584,000

Asset Change (2019): DOWN 27.8%

COMMONWEALTH NATIONAL BANK

Location: Mobile, Alabama

Founded: February 19, 1976

FDIC Region: Atlanta

Assets: $49,791,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 6.5%

CALIFORNIA

BROADWAY FEDERAL BANK FSB

Location: Los Angeles, California

Founded: February 26, 1947

FDIC Region: San Francisco

Assets: $438,033,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 5.0%

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

INDUSTRIAL BANK

Location: Washington, DC

Founded: August 18, 1934

FDIC Region: New York

Assets: $530,840,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 26.1%

GEORGIA

CARVER STATE BANK

Location: Savannah, Georgia

Founded: January 1, 1927

FDIC Region: Atlanta

Assets: $42,345,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 6.7%

CITIZENS TRUST BANK

Location: Atlanta, Georgia

Founded: June 18, 1921

FDIC Region: Atlanta

Assets: $418,130,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 5.6%

ILLINOIS

GN BANK

Location: Chicago, Illinois

Founded: January 01, 1934

FDIC Region: Chicago

Assets: $137,351,000

Asset Change (2019): DOWN 3.4%

LOUISIANA

LIBERTY BANK & TRUST COMPANY

Location: New Orleans, Louisiana

Founded: November 16, 1972

FDIC Region: Dallas

Assets: $627,856,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 5.2%

MARYLAND

HARBOR BANK OF MARYLAND

Location: Baltimore, Maryland

Founded: September 13, 1982

FDIC Region: New York

Assets: $311,321,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 9.6%

MASSACHUSETTS

ONEUNITED BANK

Location: Boston, Massachusetts

Founded: August 02, 1982

FDIC Region: New York

Assets: $654,051,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 0.8%

MICHIGAN

FIRST INDEPENDENCE BANK

Location: Detroit, Michigan

Founded: May 14, 1970

FDIC Region: Chicago

Assets: $295,951,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 15.8%

NORTH CAROLINA

MECHANICS & FARMERS BANK

Location: Durham, North Carolina

Founded: March 01, 1908

FDIC Region: Atlanta

Assets: $265,273,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 1.2%

OKLAHOMA

FIRST SECURITY BANK & TRUST

Location: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Founded:

FDIC Region: Dallas

Assets: $55,713

Asset Change (2019): N/A

PENNSYLVANIA

UNITED BANK OF PHILADELPHIA

Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Founded: March 23, 1992

FDIC Region: New York

Assets: $49,442,000

Asset Change (2019): DOWN 8.5%

SOUTH CAROLINA

OPTUS BANK (FORMERLY SOUTH CAROLINA COMMUNITY)

Location: Columbia, South Carolina

Founded: March 26, 1999

FDIC Region: Atlanta

Assets: $78,131,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 30.7%

TENNESSEE

CITIZENS SAVINGS B&T COMPANY

Location: Nashville, Tennessee

Founded: January 4, 1904

FDIC Region: Dallas

Assets: $97,321,000

Asset Change (2019): DOWN 7.2%

TRI-STATE BANK OF MEMPHIS

Location: Memphis, Tennessee

Founded: December 16, 1946

FDIC Region: Dallas

Assets: $85,617,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 2.9%

TEXAS

UNITY NB OF HOUSTON

Location: Houston, Texas

Founded: August 01, 1985

FDIC Region: Dallas

Assets: $106,140,000

Asset Change (2019): UP 6.8%

WISCONSIN

COLUMBIA SAVINGS & LOAN ASSOCIATION 

Location: Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Founded: January 1, 1924

FDIC Region: Chicago

Assets: $23,586,000

Asset Change (2018): Down 1.6%

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