Black Entrepreneurs Day To Award $225,000 Grants to Business Owners
On Saturday, October 24. 2020, Daymond John of “Shark Tank” fame, with the help of a few of his high-profile friends in the business world, will be hosting a live event where he will announce the winners of 9 grants totaling $225,000. The event dubbed Black Entrepreneurs Day will feature celebrities like Chance the Rapper, and Quest Love. The virtual audience will have an opportunity to submit business questions to John via his Facebook page.
In an interview with Forbes, John spoke about why he decided to create the Black Entrepreneurs Day event. Instead of being angry, he decided to launch into action and created a free event that will take place on Saturday, Oct. 24, 2020. Sponsors for the event include Chase for Business, UPS, investment app Robin Hood and PepsiCo. During the event, John will interview other black celebrity business owners, including Shaquille O’Neal, who joined the Papa John’s board last year, actress Gabrielle Union and BET co-founder Robert Johnson. They will provide insight into their business challenges and successes.
“People of color need more inspiration and more of the right inspiration, instead of letting out frustrations and disappointment in today’s current environment in a negative way.”
Daymond John
According to https://blackentrepreneursday.com, the goal of Black Entrepreneurs Day is to provide
guidance and inspiration to the next generation of rising entrepreneurs, as well as $225,000 in bottom-line financial support, via its “NAACP Powershift Entrepreneur Grant,” which was created in partnership with the NAACP. Black entrepreneurs and small business owners across the country have applied for the NAACP Powershift grant and we will be announcing the winners on the live stream on October 24th.”
The grants which are funded by the event’s partners: Chase for Business, The General® Insurance, Pepsi, Cisco Webex, Quickbooks, Robinhood, and Yappa, will be broken up into nine awards. Each grantee will be awarded $25,000 each to help them grow and scale their businesses during a time they need it most. Additionally, winners of the grant will receive mentorship from Daymond John and join him live on air to showcase their businesses. Plus Facebook will provide $1,000 in Facebook ad credits and mentorship/support to each of the winners.
Chase Business Banking Managing Director Christopher Hollins had this to say:
Our goal is to help as many Black-owned businesses as we can survive this pandemic and be in position to thrive when this crisis ends. The economic health of Black communities depends heavily on this.”
If you missed the application deadline for the grants that will be awarded on Black Entrepreneurs Day, you can still find more than 900 grants in the grants for minority category on GrantWatch.com. Take a look at this grant of up to $15,000 and this grant of $5000. These grants will help to mitigate the negative impact of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Black Entrepreneurs Day, which will be aired on Facebook, LiveXLive, YouTube, and Twitter.