JACKSON, Miss. (WJTV) – Black Mississippians have had a huge role in the state’s economy for years, and many are using their skills to carve their own path.
The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) reports that Black owners’ share of small businesses in Mississippi was about 28% in 2022. Those businesses employee more than 13,000 workers in the state.
Anu Amen-Ra is the founder of Sartorial Tobacconist, who has been rolling and selling cigars and tobacco for years. He started his own business after getting out of the Army, and he wanted to work for himself.
“My family has grown tobacco for personal reasons, you know, spiritual practices and also as medicine for a very, very long time now. And I fell in love with the whole plant getting a chance to be out in the garden with my grandmother and my relatives as a child was always a cool thing for me. And I fell in love with agriculture,” he said.
Amen-Ra said there are great opportunities to owning your own business, but there can also be challenges as a Black business owner.
“And for me, what I did was I took the resources that I did have available, start doing more, asking for assistance. That was probably my biggest point, asking for assistance when needed. Just telling people, ‘Hey, this is why I’m here.’ Ray Dalio says in a book called Principles Radical Transparency. So, I’ve just been radically transparent about my pain points and just luckily, every every step of the way on that journey, people have offered to assist me, whether whether that was financially or giving me certain advice, his own best practices in order to keep keep going,” he said.
Amen-Ra has rolled cigars at events for the governor and the House Speaker. He’s currently on tour rolling cigars for Cam Newton.
Almost 60% of Black businesses in Mississippi are owned by women as of 2018, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Amy Robinson, owner of Beauté Hair Salon, has been doing hair for more than 20 years and has had her own hair salon in Ridgeland for the past 10 years.
“Entrepreneurship is basically, you basically control your schedule. You’re basically in control of what you’re doing, and you can kind of decide on your destiny. It’s up to you how hard you want to work,” she said.
Ezra Brown loves coffee and jazz music and has been drinking coffee all around the world. He decided to bring his love of coffee back to Jackson and setup Soulé Coffee Shop in Fondren.
“I was that guy spending $10 a day on coffee. And I’m also that, you know, maybe a little design snob of sorts. So, I would go to people’s coffee shops now like this, I like this and I like this. And they always tell you, you know, get your own. So, that’s actually what I did and was telling me in a group of friends, we really wanted to get together, and we’re about Soulé itself is a social enterprise, so we’re about doing well in the community and well financially,” Brown said.
He plans to open another coffee shop on Capitol Street, as well as other coffee shops outside of the state.