For Ujima, the celebration of the third night of Kwanzaa, we look towards how we can incorporate collective work and responsibility into our lives. It is imperative that we continue to take care of ourselves and others as this year comes to a close and find a way to do it as an individual and as a group. Wellness can include making changes for the sake of your better health, finding ways to create change within your small community and the idea of dismantling ideas that suppress Blackness.
Sisters Malaika and Nia Jones founded BROWN GIRL Jane alongside Tai Beauchamp, a wellness expert. BROWN GIRL Jane specializes in making products that contain Broad-Spectrum CBD designed for balance, sleep, beauty, intimacy, and the overall body. They have created a brand that aims to change the way women see themselves and empower each other with natural and beautiful ingredients.
Carolyn Gray founded NOIREBUD in Brooklyn in 2018 after seeing the lack of representation of people of color in the cannabis business, particularly women. The design and creative process of the business happened in three phases. After completing the second phase, Gray found that there were more products that women would want to use on a daily basis. NOIREBUD’s products such as teas, hard candies, lotions and more promise luxury and tranquility in every use.
Davielle Jackson created Femi Secrets while looking for a solution to a friend’s menstrual problems. She realized that there wasn’t a way for women to feel and look sexy while menstruating because of the lack of understanding a representation of women in the design of anything having to do with menstruation. Femi Secrets’s mission is to help women feel like their best selves while still offering comfort and protection. They offer multiple products such as traditional feminine hygiene products to the Pretty Panty® to different subscriptions boxes
Naaya is a meditative and wellness center located in New York City with the mission to de-stigmatize the word “wellness” and remove the ableist attachment that it has. They have completed Phase One and Phase Two which secured fifty computers to be distributed to young people in New York City so they could have access to the virtual yoga and meditation classes that Naaya began hosting in September. Founder, Sinikiwe Dhliwayo, is an educator and creator who believes Blackness and humanity are forever connected.
The idea of “radical self-care” has been growing more and more popular throughout 2020, and founders Morrisa Jenkins and Bonkoshi Horn took that idea and ran with it. Their company, Freedom Apothecary, seeks to build community by providing all women with means of self-care, which they believe to be a vital aspect of a woman’s health. Freedom Apothecary specializes in products for the body, cosmetics, face, and hair as well as for families, the home, internal wellness and books. Their internal wellness shop includes products such as herbal chews, tinctures, and teas.
Founded by Caribbean immigrant Karen Young, OUI (Shave) the People works to empower men and women to shave for themselves and not for the sake of the impression of others. Young became inspired to change this mindset because of the language she saw as both a child and adult that beauty magazines around shaving. Products include shave sets, merchandise, candles and bath soaks.
Golde was founded in 2017 by Trinity Mouzon Wofford and launched with a singular product, their Tumeric Latte Blend which is still a best-seller to this day. Golde aims to create beautifully designed products that catch the eye of the buyer and encourage them to incorporate wellness into their lives. Their products encompass superfood powders that can be mixed into food and drink as a way of making it easy to include these ingredients in their day to day lives.