Delores Chamblin | | Articles, Excerpts & Links to Inform People About Positive Useful or Important News & Issues Pertaining to Blacks
Web Merchants Gear Up For Busy 'Black Monday'
http://www.azcentral.com/business/articles/1121wsj-blackmonday21-ON.html
This coming Friday is one of the year's biggest days for shoppers and retailers. But for many, the Web has made the following Monday just as crucial. With the rapid expansion of the Internet, the Monday after Thanksgiving has grown to be the all-important kickoff of the online holiday shopping season. On that day, consumers head back to work - and their computers - ready to shop after the long holiday weekend. Last year, the Monday after Thanksgiving was the peak day for online transactions, according to VeriSign Payment Services, a unit of eBay Inc.'s PayPal that processes electronic payments for about 150,000 online merchants. Some 77 percent of online retailers said their sales increased noticeably that day, according to a recent survey by e-commerce company Shopzilla Inc. and industry group Shop.org, part of the National Retail Federation, which is calling the day "Cyber Monday." (Excerpt - Wall Street Journal)
COMMENT: Make the terms "Black Friday and "Black Monday" fitting by doing holiday shopping with Black owned businesses online and offline. --- Delores
OPPORTUNITIES; Despite Obstacles, Black Entrepreneurs Optimistic
http://content.helloworld.com/pages/helloworld/Story.nsp?story_id=85850164&ID=helloworld&scategory=Computers&
African-Americans in Milwaukee and across the nation continue to lag whites in key economic indicators from poverty and unemployment to housing and education. Entrepreneurs like Kalan Haywood say there are plenty of reasons to be thankful anyway. With renewed optimism, he and others are the latest crop of entrepreneurs to pursue a path to success that is better marked and pocked with fewer obstacles than the one their parents faced. Haywood, 30, owns Vangard Development Group, a company he launched in January with business partner James Jordan. The two young men had dabbled in real estate development separately for five years and decided that they could tackle bigger projects as a team. They see a gold mine of economic opportunity amid the stretches of vacant lots and abandoned properties that dot the central city. While he says it's still tough for African-Americans in a city known more for its beer, brats and smokestacks than for racial tolerance, Haywood and other African-Americans have learned to be patient. "It's what you make it," says Haywood, who grew up in the Brewers Hill neighborhood. "There are a lot of challenges that we face as black business owners, but you can't lose hope." African-American entrepreneurs face their share of roadblocks chief among them lack of access to capital but it's the greater good of creating jobs and bringing prosperity to impoverished neighborhoods that drives them. (Excerpt - Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)
Black Farmers Look to Ethiopian Crop for Marketplace Niche
http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/state/13212267.htm
Black farmers in Kansas are experimenting with growing the Ethiopian crop known as teff - a cereal grain popular as an alternative to wheat for gluten-sensitive consumers - as a historical and cultural niche in today's marketplace. Backed by a grant from the Agriculture Department, researchers and black farmers planted several test plots of teff in Kansas this year to see whether it would be a practical alternative crop in the Kansas climate. It grew well. In the late 1870s and early 1880s, thousands of former black slaves - known locally as "Exodusters" - flocked to the fertile Kansas prairie in search of a better life. Of the half-dozen of so black settlements here, only Nicodemus survived. The northwest Kansas town, located about 300 miles west of Kansas City, is now a protected National Historic Park site. It's there that Gary and Gil Alexander planted their first teff plots in the spring, experimenting with different varieties. The Alexanders - distant cousins and descendants of the former slaves who first settled Nicodemus - were both intrigued by the connection teff had with Ethiopia and Africa. (Excerpt - Associated Press)
African American Journalists to Change Negative Reportage on Africa
http://news.africast.com/africastv/article.php?newsID=56993
ACCRA, November 15 -- A group of Black American Journalists has vowed to work towards erasing the negative perception about Africa as an unfriendly environment for business. The group, which has been touring four African countries under the sponsorship of Diageo, the parent company of Guinness Ghana Breweries has returned to their base in the US. The journalists who came from across the US visited some corporate institutions and interacted with both business and political leaders as well as journalists in Accra, Kumasi and Obuasi. A senior member of the group, James told JOYNEWS that Africa has suffered tremendously as a result of the bad publicity it has enjoyed in the international media. Mr. Washington who is the Publisher of the Weekly Dallas Newspaper told JOYNEWS that it is time for the African journalists to publicize the other side of Africa. - myjoyonline
New Orleans Looking to Strengthen Relations with Jamaica
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/html/20051119T200000-0500_92886_OBS_NEW_ORLEANS_LOOKING_TO_STRENGTHEN_RELATIONS_WITH_JAMAICA_.asp
MONTEGO BAY, St James - Mayor of New Orleans, Ray Nagin, says as his city rebuilds in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, it would be moving to strengthen economic ties with Jamaica. "As we look to rebuild New Orleans, we are also looking to rebuild relationships and the first place that we are looking to rebuild and strengthen relationships is Jamaica," said Nagin. (Excerpt - Jamaica Observer)
Shaq, Wife Hope to Open Their Own School
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051121/SPORTS0403/511210425/1004/SPORTS
Miami Heat center Shaquille O'Neal and his wife, Shaunie, like to give back to the community, serving "Shaqsgiving" meals to the poor; handing out toys for his Shaq-A-Claus event; collecting donations for victims of Hurricane Katrina. But the couple's long-term charitable focus is their Real Models Foundation. Formed in Los Angeles in 2003 and named for a signature Shaquille expression -- "He says he's a real model, not a role model," Shaunie said -- the foundation wants to create a more lasting legacy for South Florida children. "Our ultimate goal with Real Models is to open a school, and I would love to do it here in Miami, open up a charter school," Shaunie O'Neal said. "So one day that's going to happen, the sooner the better."A charter school is a public school that receives state funding but is free of most regulations. Shaunie O'Neal said the Real Models Foundation typically focuses on organizations that help homeless women and children. The school is their "ultimate goal," however. (Excerpt - Star News Services)
Johnson Starts Financial Firm
BET Founder Aims to Build Major Black-Owned Investment Company
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101600.html
Black Entertainment Television founder Robert L. Johnson said yesterday that he is launching an institutional investment management firm as part of a broad effort to create what he hopes will be a major black-owned financial services operation. Johnson said the firm, which will sell its services to large investors such as pension funds and endowments that want to put money into hedge funds, is a key part of his "second act" after his career in cable television. "I'm approaching this in the same way I did 25 years ago with cable television," Johnson said. "Asset management is a sector that is open to opportunities by African Americans who can bring real talent to the effort. I see this becoming a major African American entity in this sector." The as-yet-to-be named company will be majority owned by Johnson, with Deutsche Bank taking a minority stake. Deutsche Bank, a German financial services conglomerate with major investment banking and investment management operations in the United States, will also provide advisory services to Johnson's firm. (Excerpt - Washington Post)
My Brothers' Keeper
http://content.helloworld.com/pages/helloworld/Story.nsp?story_id=85824899&ID=helloworld&scategory=Computers&
University of West Georgia program focuses on creating a brotherhood of successful Black male students. Dressed in crisp white shirts and ties, a group of African- American men are in a deep discussion about Black manhood. The discussion is led by Dr. Said L. Sewell III, an assistant professor of political science at the University of West Georgia. The students, all freshmen, live together, counsel together and reinforce one another in the effort to learn, achieve - and graduate. Called the West Georgia Learning Community, the students under Sewell's tutelage are learning to trust one another, almost as brothers, and then are learning to care about one another's success. (Excerpt - Black Issues in Higher Education)
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