Fabric of hair Investigates: Has The Corporate Beauty and Hair Industry Failed Black Women?🧐
The textured hair community is a billion dollar industry. However, there is a lack of resources that provide insight to proper services and products.
Especially to the black communities. According to Nielsen report, African-Americans currently hold a buying power of $1 trillion, a number that's estimated to reach $1.3 trillion and progressing. A majority is spent on cosmetics, spending nine times more on ethnic-targeted beauty and grooming products than the general market.
Black women, in particular, spend an estimated 7.5 billion annually on beauty products, giving out 80% more money on cosmetics and twice as much on skin and haircare than non-black consumers.
However, women of color have been continually ignored and underserved by the cosmetics industry throughout history.
Until now...sort of…
My Black is Beautiful, Black Girl Magic, and Melanin Poppin. These are powerful testaments of self-love and trending in the Black community on a national scale.
For many millennials, being Black and embracing their Blackness, has never been more justified. Never have their influence and voices been more powerful. Never has the value of the Black consumer been more apparent.
It not enough to put a product out in the market and then leave out a such important segment of the market with such financial buying power.
Brands are increasingly applying their best effort at marketing to Black women. But it's not enough to put a black celebrities face on your ad and call it due diligence.
The product must deliver and perform to the consumers needs. All too often brands are focused on a quick fix, and overlooking the needed time to understand this market and the concerns of the Black community.
Just because you put it out there, doesn't mean we will purchase it. This is a standpoint from the community, because not taking in some of the cultural factors and understanding and the nuances that relate to people of color, or recognizing that we're not homogenized.
A shared responsibility falls on retailers, too. Often, stores won't allow companies the space or investment needed to court the customer or community.
Over 60% of the time this consumer has gone in to retail space, and there hasn't been anything for her and magically you now you have something to serve her needs.
How do you communicate that to her when she patronized your store?
Through location, communication, marketing, education, having people that understand what she's looking for and are able to direct her, are important.
Many brands don't want to be placed in the "ethnic" space; because of fearfulness, based on being unknowledgeable of this consumers buying power.
Instead they want to be on the shelves right alongside the bigger established brands.
The room for improvement is in breaking this cycle of thinking that there needs to be a separate shopping section for people of color.
There just needs to be a broad range of products and services for all humans.
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