PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A conference for Black business owners is bringing entrepreneurs from all over the country to the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia this week. It is the largest gathering of its kind, meant to help bridge the racial wealth gap.
“The net worth of a black household is roughly 10% of the net worth of the average white household,” said Alfred Edmond Jr., an organizer of the Black Enterprise Entrepreneurs Summit.
“Our mission with Black Enterprise is to grow the positive net worth of Black families and Black communities to close that racial wealth gap. And that wealth accumulation happens over generations. And entrepreneurship is a huge part of that the value of a business.”
The Summit has, for more than 25 years, connected inventors and innovators to opportunities for coaching, capital and information to start and run a successful business. Edmond says forging those connections is one of the keys to ending racial wealth inequality made even worse by the pandemic.
“Lack of access to capital, and lack of access to the networks that lead to capital,” Edmond said. “And in fact, that's one of the reasons why we created events like the Entrepreneurs Summit, to be able to bring together not only Black entrepreneurs, but financing resources, corporate resources, that can provide access to corporate contracts, and other resources to give entrepreneurs access to the networks that mainstream entrepreneurs already have.”
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Dozens of vendors in attendance, like Mika Johnson of Northeast Philadelphia, also gained an opportunity for exposure — which is particularly important after the pandemic closed many brick-and-mortar small businesses. She says being at the conference has been a rare opportunity to build relationships and clientele in-person.
“This is for everybody to start seeing and learning about awesome Black businesses that they can support and they can shop,” she said. “This is needed. This is needed more. Most businesses are online now. So you don't get to see the person. So I'm so glad that we can come here and pop up and see people in person.”
Creator Adrienne Rhodes, also of Philadelphia, said she hopes the seeds she planted during the conference will go far beyond the event.
“Yesterday I met Master P, who expressed interest in executive producing my show, and I had a very good conversation with Walmart about presenting,” Rhodes said, “and so those are important relationships that I would not have had an opportunity to pursue.”
Edmond echoed Rhodes, saying the benefits from the Black Enterprise event are meant to succeed long after the conference.
“The Entrepreneurs Summit was designed from Day One, not as just a conference to talk about business, but a conference that's going to empower people to actually do business both at the conference. And once they leave.”