A retail business incubator opens in the Grove to help support minority female entrepreneurs

For years, Joi Riley burned soy wax candles throughout her home to create a warm ambiance and a familial smell for her family to enjoy. She burned traditional candles and scented ones. Riley had to stop using traditional candles because she noticed that some of her children who suffer from asthma began wheezing and coughing when she burned candles.

This spurred her to research the ingredients used in some of her favorite candles. She began to source materials and make her own. First, Riley gave them away as gifts, which people loved, and after two years of research, she started JR Candle Company in 2019.

“I had no idea there were different waxes, different wicks, so I found coconut apricot wax and experimented with that,” Riley, 39, said. “I found out there’s a lot of toxins in the great smelling candles that we use every day.”

The mother of five ran her business out of her home over the past five years. She worked as a nurse in the day and created candles and other smell goods at night. She sells candles, diffusers, room sprays and soaps on her online store. The products are free of toxins and made of vegan and natural ingredients. She also produces wholesale candles for various businesses across the country.

Riley is one of three female business owners selling products in Park Central Development’s Eric Outlaw Business Center at 4256 Manchester Ave. The Grove neighborhood’s business incubator, which opened Oct. 10, helps women in the St. Louis region develop their businesses online and in store.

The 14-month program allows business owners to learn how to expand their operations to storefronts and provides business education, training and coaching. It also connects entrepreneurs with mentors to help with marketing, finance, e-commerce and other business operations to help businesses grow. The program will also help entrepreneurs gain access to capital.

After gathering data on small businesses in the St. Louis area, the development corporation saw there was a disproportionately small amount of support for Black female-owned businesses, said Abdul-Kaba Abdullah, Park Central Development’s executive director.

“While our incubator is for women, and to help women launch out, we knew that we had to make sure that we centered Black and female-owned businesses first in the space, so that way they are the ones that are getting the support,” he said.

According to research, only 3% of African American female-owned businesses survive and thrive after five years. Reports also show that they are disproportionately funded by venture capitalists.

The business incubator is trying to improve those numbers, and for the next three cohorts, the minority business program will help support Black female entrepreneurs.

The incubator is named after Eric Outlaw, a Black longtime business owner in the Grove’s business district. Before he died in 2018, Outlaw owned a tattoo parlor next door to the incubator for 12 years where he created bodily designs for people in the area.

Abdullah said the Grove area generates about $50 million annually in retail sales and Black-owned women’s businesses need to be a part of this growth. The Grove’s mile-long business district is home to a few Black-owned businesses that have been in the community for decades, and others have come and gone.

African Americans have historically been locked out of accessing loans through banks and other financial institutions because of systemic racism. Abdullah said many Black-owned business owners like Riley use their savings to start their companies.

“We have an opportunity to do something,” Abdullah said, “I think that when there is such a deficiency, the only reasonable solution is affirmative action immediately to right that.”

Michelle Robinson also started DEMIblue nail polish with money from her savings account and sourced funding through pitch competitions and grants, so she would not have to take out business loans.

“Nothing’s passed down to us or, we don’t have a rich uncle or even a family member who had a business and that was able to pass it down,” she said. “Oftentimes, when we start our businesses, we’re well into our careers … and we have to use that career as our initial investor.”

Robinson created a nail polish brand free of 21 known toxic chemicals. It was after Robinson’s mother told her she could not wear any store-bought, fingernail polish because the chemicals inside of them burned her mother’s nails because of her cancer diagnosis.

In 2017, Robinson began researching nail polishes to find a healthier choice for her mom. She soon found some, but the color choices were bland, and some of the toxic chemicals were still being used. In 2019, DEMIblue started with 14 nail polish colors free of seven formulated ingredients, and over the years Robinson was able to draw more chemicals out and create more colors.

Robinson has found success with her brand through her e-commerce store and retailers across the country. Last year she saw profits close to $600,000. She became interested in the business incubator because she wants to scale her business and offer manicures and other products in the future through a potential brick-and-mortar location. She also is interested in finding investors and new capital ventures to increase her reach and products.

“I feel like as part of this experience, I’m able to bring people in and better educate them, and have that one-on-one relationship, and have an isolated environment where DEMIblue is not among a sea of other products,” she said.

Recent Clark-Atlanta University graduate and St. Louis native Gabriel Williams likes that she can have one-on-one interactions with customers in the retail business incubator. She started Truly Rare Customs in 2020 while she was in school in Atlanta. Her company creates custom hand-painted or drawn designs on garments. She also alters and sews clothes and offers wholesale products.

Williams said the retail market is different in St. Louis than in Atlanta, and because it is oversaturated, it does not leave much room for new talent to emerge.

“St Louis, they’re mainly looking for people and it’s not like everybody has their hand up, like, I can do this, so being here allowed me to have more of a platform to shine,” she said.

Williams has little experience in the business side of retail, so she said she is looking to gain more insight into marketing and building brand awareness, financing her business and how to run an operative business.

“This is definitely a learning curve. I think I’ve always been very adaptable and resilient, but being in a space like that, it doesn’t give you another option,” Williams said. “I just have to constantly keep figuring it out, like if this month (my business) did not do what I wanted it to do, let me figure out what I need to do for the next month and a month after that because honestly, it’s no going back to a nine-to-five.”

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