With new conversations around race resulting from the protests over racial injustice and police brutality, there have been more and more calls to support Black-owned businesses and bring more awareness to Black entrepreneurs. Inspired by the change, one Black woman decided to create unique way to advertise Black brands through a curated gift box.
Constance Panton is the founder of Bifties, a creative curated gift box company that creates unique, themed gift sets with Black-owned brands. She launched the e-commerce platform at the beginning of the year as a fun way for Black consumers to learn more about Black-owned businesses based on different interests. “Bifties started as a gift exchange in 2016 with the sole purpose of every gift coming from a Black-owned business,” said Panton in an email interview with BLACK ENTERPRISE.“This was a great way to funnel money into Black-owned businesses at a time where everyone was buying gifts. One of the main challenges when we first started was that many people didn’t know the first place to go for quality Black-owned gifts.”
Since the
start of the protests, Panton has seen a huge increase in interested consumers looking at the brand. She hopes the new spotlight will help her connect consumers with an assortment of Black-owned businesses to try. “I have gotten so much positive feedback from in and out of our community, thanking me for creating a platform that makes it easy to send someone a gift while supporting multiple Black-owned brands,” she explains.“Some customers actually include in their personalized messages statements like “hope you love this gift as much as I love supporting a Black-owned business!” Or other nods to the fact that they are supporting Black businesses…The support all around has been positive and what this current atmosphere is doing to highlight Black businesses is what I was trying to do all along. To show the nation the awesome products our community makes and that it isn’t solely for the Black community but for all communities.”