- It's important to have black voices
and black artisans in the sustainability space.
Because we know what we need
and we understand what is lacking in our communities.
We understand the things that
our individual families are in need of simply
because we come from those families
and we come from the unique things
that connect our heritage.
- It's extremely important, it's actually vital
to have black owned products in the sustainability space
because you have to have someone targeting what you need.
So black women's hair care, black women's skin products,
who understands that and who knows better how
to create that, what's healthy for our skin and our hair,
than other black artisans.
BLK + GRN is an all natural marketplace
that connects black women with nontoxic, high quality,
black brands.
And it's amazing.
- When it comes to personal care,
communities of color are often
targeted the most in advertisements, marketing,
ads, etc.
And often times, communities of color do not have the
resources that are needed to know the difference between
toxic and nontoxic products.
- Black women spend $7.5 billion annually,
80% more on beauty products, skin care, hair care,
all these products than their counterparts.
- Our personal care products often affect
the state of our health.
- I know we hear nontoxic all the time,
but what does toxic mean exactly?
Products that are like chemically created,
almost kind of like fast food,
like processed food,
you want whole food.
- So we make sure that our products are free
of paraffins, are free of ingredients
that you cannot pronounce.
We also source products that are primarily plant based.
We recognize that we come from the earth,
and it's also really important to us
that the products that we source also consider
nontoxic use in terms of their packaging.
- The BLK + GRN marketplace features some 77 artisans
and their products range from body products
to hair care to cleaning solutions
for your bath, for cleaning surfaces.
- BLK + GRN was started by our founder,
Dr. Kristian Henderson who is a public health expert
as well as a black woman's health expert.
- And when you look at public health,
black women are always kind of at the bottom of the numbers.
We have the highest numbers for like infant mortality
and all these horrible things.
And so she was interested in finding out why,
being a researcher.
- BLK + GRN started as a spreadsheet, honestly.
Kristian was keeping
track of what products she was purchasing
and what their use was
and what the benefits had been.
And so she has a spreadsheet,
she has all these items and people start asking her.
"Well where did you get that?
"Where did you get that?
"If it isn't Trader Joe's, if it isn't Walmart,
"if it isn't a Kroger, like what are you doing?"
- Finally she decided what if there was a platform
where all of these products could be purchased at once
and all of these products could be sourced.
And that is how BLK + GRN came to be.
- She is my sister
and all the people that work on BLK + GRN
have a sisterhood because we recognize the void
that was there in a larger marketplace.
- So BLK + GRN features an artisan, Marla Rene.
- Marla Rene grew up in the rural south,
and with just her mother and her sister.
And when she was in her early 20s,
her mother was diagnosed with cancer.
- [Yana-Janell] The doctor handed over a list
of ingredients that essentially were toxic
and were harming her mom's body
and wouldn't be helpful in terms of her mom's recovery.
It's disheartening to know that beauty companies,
personal health companies,
are creating products that essentially are impacting
the health of women widespread.
- She's surprised that she can't find not one product
without one of these toxic ingredients.
- And so from that store visit
and that doctor's appointment,
she made it her life's work to create products
that wouldn't affect her mom,
that wouldn't affect other women
that purchased these products.
- Marla Rene did what
black women have always done,
and she fixed the problem herself.
So she started creating organic products,
all these all natural products for her and her mother,
and women like her to use.
And Marla Rene is not doing this alone.
She is one of 77 black artisans
that produce, that promote their products,
on the BLK + GRN marketplace.
- In the black community,
we've often curated
or made our own products to solve, again,
issues that are in the community.
- When you think about sustainability,
when you think about organic lifestyles and living,
you may associate it with more like white women.
There's already an image out there.
What BLK + GRN is doing is not necessarily rewriting
the narrative, but actually zooming out.
They're plenty of white women who are doing yoga
and drinking green smoothies,
but zoom the camera out a little bit
and you'll see five black women next to them.
Women of color in general.
- Making little changes along the way,
truly does go far,
and that's like the beauty of this wellness journey
that each and every day
you can make a better decision.
Whether you start with your food,
or you start with cleaning like I did,
or you start with hair, your nails, etc., etc.
There's always a way to begin your journey
to better health.
- And what better way to spend your money
than to put it back into the black community.
That's sustainability.
(upbeat pop music)