Black-Owned Businesses On TikTok. You Love To See it. #SupportBlack This Holiday Season!

At TikTok, we believe that Black-owned businesses must be seen and heard, and we’re striving to embrace and empower these voices. Given our foundational mission to bring joy and inspire creativity, TikTok is committed to supporting Black-owned businesses and creators. Through a series of initiatives and partnerships, TikTok is driving the awareness, patronage, representation and sustainability of Black-owned businesses through their entrepreneurial journey.

In 2020, in partnership with Yinka Taiwo-Peters, we launched our Support Black Businesses initiative to support, educate, amplify and represent the black-owned businesses on the TikTok platform. Support Black Businesses seeks to address generations of economic hardships that directly affect Black people and Black entrepreneurs while recognizing the significant impact of Black-owned businesses, amplifying their visibility, and providing resources to drive continued success.

Earlier this month, we launched the #SupportBlack campaign which invited our larger TikTok community to show support for their favorite Black-owned businesses with a Hashtag Challenge. We asked our audiences what the benefits were for shopping Black this holiday season and encouraged them to share their experiences as a Black business owner or supporter with the hashtag #SupportBlack!

The goal of this campaign was to amplify Black-owned businesses during the holiday season and some of the most influential shopping days of the year such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday. The Hashtag Challenge highlighted our cohort members through official videos and paid ads to drive direct sales for their business. This campaign encouraged TikTok creators to amplify and support their favorite black-owned businesses outside of the cohort to drive awareness holistically.

Now, we’re excited to promote the #SupportBlack campaign further. From November 26 to December 19, we’re highlighting the #SupportBlack campaign at the Pendry West Hollywood Hotel. The #SupportBlack campaign will be featured on the billboard attached to the hotel and feature 21 dynamic cohort members of our Black Business Initiative. This billboard campaign aligns with our #SupportBlack Hashtag Challenge to further amplify and support buying from Black-owned businesses this holiday season.

On the billboard, you’ll find short clips of each cohort member enthusiastically describing what it means to them to be a Black business owner and how they’re empowering their local communities with entrepreneurship. See what our highlighted cohort members had to say about being featured on the billboard and their experience with our SBB program!

Cecilia’s House: Kadisha Phillips

Kadisha Phillips is a Brooklyn, New York-based interior designer and growth marketing strategist. As the Founder & Chief Creative Director of Cecilia’s House, Kadisha has created a destination for luxury art decor that celebrates Black culture and style. When the ViacomCBS and A+E Networks alum isn’t helping her customers outfit their homes with the perfect art decor pieces, she works with purpose-driven tech companies to achieve organic growth.

"Being a part of TikTok’s SBB cohort has helped expand my business tremendously," said Phillips. "The tips and tricks that we learned in the cohort sessions motivated me to produce more content. Creating more content led to my account going viral a few times, led to several sales surges, leading to my first 1,000 customers. As a Black-owned business, it’s essential to have the visibility and credibility of a brand like Tik Tok behind you. I’m grateful for the opportunity to tell the story of Cecilia’s House and being a Black business owner through this relationship with TikTok.”

Amp Beauty LA: Angel Pyles, Montre Moore, Phyllicia Phillips co-founders

Angel Lenise is a Webby Award-nominated director and creative producer who previously oversaw original video content for ELLE magazine. Aside from being a beauty junkie, she’s passionate about diversity, inclusion and supporting POC-helmed brands in the industry. She manages communications, content creation and distribution, public relations, press and media partnerships as President and Chief Creative Officer of Amp Beauty LA.

“Community — whether virtual or IRL — is paramount to the success of startups like ours. The TikTok SBB cohort not only prepared us to expand our reach to a critical audience but connected us to a great network of fellow founders who are striving for equity and changing the face of entrepreneurship. Our experience with SBB affirmed our mission to emerge as the best beauty retailer for all textures and shades and equipped us with insights to AMPlify #ShopBlack," Lenise said.

"AMP Beauty LA has only been in business for a year. Seeing our brand on a billboard in our city, so early in our journey, is electrifying This opportunity amplifies our business during the peak shopping season and brings visibility to our retailer that will resound well into 2022. And that is what we, as a Black-owned business, need. We need sustained viability, not only during the holidays, not only during Black History Month, not only during Women's History Month, not only during Small Business Week. We need this platform and this opportunity every single day. And the SBB billboard has the power to cement AMP Beauty LA in everyday conversation. It's major!”

Love You Cookie: Sahr Brima

Sahr Brima is a nationally recognized business lawyer. He was born in Sierra Leone and came to the United States as a civil war refugee in 1998. Sahr is a co-founder and CEO of Love You Cookie (an award-winning gourmet cookie company based in Minneapolis).

“The SBB program is a refuge of support and practical guidance for Black-owned businesses seeking to grow their brand on TikTok. I’ve been inspired by fellow cohort members and inspired by mentors to keep going despite many challenges. The advertising and marketing tools I’ve gained through SBB are invaluable," said Brima.

"We didn’t have a brand presence on TikTok before joining the SBB cohort. Now we have the confidence and skills to support growth. I’m humbled to have Love You Cookie featured on the SBB billboard. The visibility could be a game-changer as we strive to become a national handmade, gourmet cookie brand. My team works incredibly hard to spread “defiant optimism” deliciously. Beyond gourmet cookies, our goal is to make defiant optimism tangible by de-stigmatizing mental health issues and eliminating barriers to mental health services for BIPOC in our community. This feature is rewarding and inspires us to keep working toward this goal.”