By now, we have all heard the statistic that African American consumer spending is forecasted to break $1.4 Trillion by 2020 (yes, with a T; yes in less than 2 months), yet Black owned businesses receive a mere 2% of that total amount.

This year, a deliberate campaign has been launched to help connect Black owned businesses to consumers consciously looking to put their dollars back into our ecosystem.

I can't tell you the first time I heard about Maggie Anderson, but when I read about her Buy Black year challenge, I was fascinated.

It forced me to take ask myself an honest question; Could I shop with only Black businesses for an entire 365 days?

The answer was sobering. It would be possible but extremely difficult.

Which led me to the realization that more had to be done to build up and sustain the capacity of Black owned businesses to not only survive, but to thrive.

From that moment, a movement has emerged.

Shop Black Week is a nationwide campaign that seeks to encourage consumers to support Black-owned businesses from November 22 through the 29th, giving new context to the term Black Friday. What initially began as a grassroots campaign has become a movement that has galvanized over 1.5 million supporters, and counting.

Here at the South Florida Black Business Hive, we are on a mission to help Black-owned small businesses capture a greater share of the total dollars spent by Black consumers.

In support of Shop Black Week, we encourage you to not only make a commitment to spending your dollars with a Black owned business, but that you also share your support of this movement using the hashtags: #ShopBlackWeek and #SBW2019.