Starting a business or creative project is scary for many reasons, but one that is often overlooked is the anxiety related to whether this is really “the one.” To some, this isn’t a valid consideration while to others this is the only consideration. Some argue that what you work on, along with who you work with are the two most pivotal decisions you’ll make and so we’ve asked folks to tell us about how they came up with their ideas and how they knew this idea was the one.

KIMAYA MCPHERSON

Today we continue to serve brides all over the country and cover their wedding fashion needs, from the bride, mother of the bride to the wedding party. Growing up I did not understand my talents, Although I had a profound curiosity to create dresses, I had no idea how it would play a part in my life today. In my adolescent years I arrived in the United States and understood that I could do anything! After years of struggling with myself I finally had the confidence to move forward with doing what I love to do, creating bridal and eveningwear dresses. It is my passion, my excitement and my ultimate escape into fantasy. Read more>>

Lindsey Mallon

There’s two things that inspired Nadjarina- labor and sustainability standards + the lack of apparel designed by women. Both motives in my vision were reactive to what I observed over the span of my career. I moved to NYC right after college, as many did. The economy was recovering from the 2008 financial crisis. Design jobs were far and few. I didn’t have the option to intern until a paid position opened, so I looked at the bigger picture. I knew that I wanted to launch a brand of my own eventually, so I took the opportunity to understand each aspect of running a fashion business. Read more>>

Ayana Campbell Smith

Personal finance and financial literacy has long been a major interest of mine and in 2019, I was looking for something to devote my time to as a creative outlet outside of my 9-5. One day I got a random spark of inspiration and started a list of money topics I thought would be worth sharing with others. It was a combination of things I wished I’d been taught about money when I was younger, things I’d read, helpful advice I’d heard, etc. The list quickly grew to 30+ topics so I knew it wasn’t something I should just sit on. This was valuable information for people my age who might be struggling to figure things out. The next day, I decided to start a monthly email newsletter and Instagram account to share this info with others and Millennial Money Guide was born. Read more>>

Mariana Pierce

A few years ago I attended my best friend’s wedding. It was a destination wedding held at a garden during springtime. My whole family was invited and among all that I packed – I decided to bring my old and fun point and shoot film camera. I had taken photography classes in high school and every once and then I still carried my camera with me. Read more>>

Todd Bailey

The idea of Brewtal started with my best friend Arie and I. We knew we loved talking about metal and we’re also interested in craft beer, so why not mix both together. We both knew there are other podcast doing the same but we wanted to create our own niche. Read more>>

Roshunda Allen

About 4 1/2 years we had a friend who needed assistance with opening up his mobile tire shop business. His main issue as a business owner was, he didn’t know what direction to take with starting his business. He also needed an affordable and reliable assistant. We put together a solid plan, and our unique business concept was born. We knew that serving the small business industry was in desperate need of help. Honestly, we knew we weren’t solving a problem because there are other VA’s and Content Creators out there, but to our knowledge there wasn’t a business that encompassed both. Read more>>

Kayla McDowell

In August 2019, I started Dallas Black Bloggers as a way to meet new bloggers. Upon attending local events, I noticed there was a void missing within the blogger community. The main thing was it was not welcoming for newcomers, and it was not a diverse crowd. I would sit at one table with bloggers/creatives who looked like me. They noticed how awkward it was, too. But we enjoyed being around each other and connecting. Read more>> 

Crystal Cauble

All of my adult life I worked 1 to 2 jobs was very happy with it. I was the main provider for my small family for many years and even though it was hard I loved it. Due to several issues that came up when I was pregnant with my second daughter, I had made the decision to become a stay-at-home mom. I had been a stay-at-home mom for 5 years and was really struggling to be something other than just a mom. Money was tight and it was hard that I felt like I wasn’t helping. I did a few small jobs. However not of them where a good long-term fit. My best friend Kim saw this and encouraged me to start my own business. Read more>>

Jared Rok

So the story is actually a pretty cool one. My grandpa came here from Cuba in 1967. Looking for work, he opened up a few retail stores in Downtown Miami and eventually did well enough to buy a few buildings, working his way up in the Real Estate industry. He started his own business and decided to hold an art competition here Downtown where the winning design would be the logo for his new company. He ended up choosing this logo because of his love for the ocean, sailboats, and ultimately the vibrant colors of the sails – which he thought represented the vibrancy of Miami itself. Read more>>

DeLisa Leonard

My business formed out of depression. My depression stemmed from a combination of being broke and not being able to afford my daughter a birthday cake and failing to find a job after finishing cosmetology school. I wasn’t sitting in a storm and my husband pushed me to walk through it. So, I got in the kitchen. Thats where I seen my dad and aunt find peace, so I thought I’d give it a go. When I first started, it was just home made candied apples and caramel popcorn . Read more>>

Dr. Amanda Hill

My journey started when I was a preteen, I would often invite my neighborhood friends to my house and teach them what was taught to me in my local church ( I was a youth leader in my church). As I begin to mature and understand more in depth of what I was actually teaching, women started to reach out to me requesting that I meet with them. During these meets I found myself giving advice. This occurred for over several years. It wasn’t until 2013 that I became a solidified Mentor. Read more>>

Carola Perla-Bartha

The idea for my picnic styling service is probably best described as a series of ‘lightbulb’ moments. It didn’t come to me all at once, but rather flashed like a string of little beacons being set alight along a crest of hills that makes up my life. Which does make it sound so much more monumental than a picnic service has a right to! But the truth is that my picnic events mean a great deal to me, in the way that one’s own business and all the risk and sweat and uncertainty and investment and creative exhaustion means a lot to any small business owner. Read more>>

Nami Milivojevich

After graduating from the Rhode Island School of Design, I worked for over two decades as a designer in the fashion industry for several brands including Moschino in Milan, Italy, Puma in Germany, J.Crew and several others in New York City… I was lucky enough to gain experience in so many fields of fashion design, from high-end evening wear, to technical sportswear, to denim, swim and lingerie.  You name it, I’ve designed it :)  I really loved being a designer, and being able to focus only on the creation of clothing, exploring a concept through form, textiles and colors. Read more>>

Noah The Great

BlazerMade is a marketplace that I created to showcase young black creatives and entrepreneurs in my community. It originally started as a project and grew into pop up shops and showcases. After our first pop up shop, the people in the community loved the idea of having a safe space specifically for us, by us. It became like a one stop shop for business owners looking to connect with like minded individuals and also for consumers looking to buy black and support the cause. Read more>>

Sadie Pegues-Hall

I have been in the event planning world for about 10 years. I have often held vendor events that brought small business owners and bloggers together in an effort to give bloggers products to talk about, but more importantly giving these small businesses a platform to be seen. I have always possessed a passion for making those genuine connections. While making those connections, I did however notice that there was a greater need for black women, small business owners to be seen. No one was really giving us any exposure unless we had already reached a certain level of notoriety, which can be discouraging to our community of women, who are simply wanting a chance to be placed in front of the right audience. Read more>>

Melissa Leonard

I started ML Tutoring during the COVID-19 pandemic after seeing and hearing about far too many students and parents struggling with virtual schooling. I wanted to facilitate a positive learning environment that is supportive, engaging, and unique to each student’s needs, an environment where students can thrive and build confidence in their own skills at a pace that is conducive to their learning. Read more>>

Kari Loth

I came up with the idea of becoming a wedding planner because, really, who doesn’t love weddings? I get to be with people on one of the happiest days of their lives! What could be better? I knew wedding planning would be sustainable because new couples are constantly getting engaged. The more people you meet at weddings, the more business you get! I felt I would succeed because I was an event planner in my corporate career before I started a family. And, my team and I are perfectly giddy when we meet brides and help bring their magical day to reality. Read more>>

Sean Afkhaminia

Footy Factory has transitioned a few times through our 8+ years in business. Originally, it was an idea for a state of the art soccer-specific training facility. Nothing like it existed at the time, and I wanted to create something that I always wanted as a college soccer player who needed somewhere to train during the off-season. Then, after working in that space for a little while I realized it may not be the most resourceful business idea to lead with because of the high operational overhead. This led me to begin building the substance to eventually put inside the facility down the line. Read more>>

Abid Abedi

I’ve always had an entrepreneurial mind, so one day when I witnessed a friend providing coding classes to kids out of her home, it piqued my interest. She had a steady flow of parents wanting their students to learn coding. I was shocked by this initially, but it made perfect sense! Our society is becoming more digital with each passing day, and we will need a trained workforce to maintain this new infrastructure. In addition, my experience in hiring thousands of technical workers over my career, I found that most technical folks lack soft skills such as teamwork, collaboration, and communication skills. That, coupled with the fact there has always been a shortage of technical talent in the US, lead me to launch iCode. Read more>>

Shay Ramsee

I recently launched my virtual assistant agency for wedding creatives July 2022 called Moxie Management. An extension of my wedding planning company Moxie and Luxe. When I launched Moxie and Luxe June 2021, my business rapidly grew and after just 5 months, I was already looking to hire help but I quickly found out that it’s way harder than it seems to find the right people. Ideally I wanted to find someone that already had wedding planning experience because I didn’t have the time to fully train someone new. That’s when I thought of the idea to create a virtual and wedding day assistant company to help other wedding creatives grow their businesses by taking over their admin tasks so they can focus on the tasks they truly enjoy. Read more>>

Janay Laing

I went vegan for the animals, but I still love good food as much as anyone else! I was lucky to work at 3 amazing vegan restaurants in Miami – Choices Cafe, Charley’s Vegan Tacos and Vegetarian by Hakin – where I learned the art and science of plant-based flavor. Yet when eating out, I encountered so many bland and boring vegan meals. Even at food trucks or food festivals, the food was almost always lacking something – whether it was proper seasoning, umami or a good sauce. I realized I had to create a class to teach people what I learned about the fundamentals of plant-based cooking. And my class “Make Plants Delicious” was born! Read more>>

Kishma Benjamin

As a teenager, I had bad skin: oily, acne prone skin, and nothing I used seemed to help. Once, I entered the Army, my skin started to clear up (who knows why) but I would still break out. After having my daughter, I was diagnosed with psoriasis and my daughter had eczema. We used the prescription ointments given to us, but I wanted something more natural and less harsh for us to use on our skin. After I retired from the Army in 2018, I started making body butters for me and my daughter. I gave some out to friends and family who encouraged me to start selling them. In 2019, I applied for and received my LLC for my business, Skinfully YOURS, where I hand make natural skin and body care products for women and men. Read more>>

Victoria MsVee Gray

In my role as a communications, community relations and educational consultant with Victory Group VG LLC, I am charged with developing ideas, programs or projects that will change lives. One of my passions involves our youth. As a former high school teacher, I witnessed first hand how students were overlooked for opportunities for post secondary preparation. I also noticed that very little focus was placed on helping students with exposure to Historically Black Colleges and Universities. I wanted to change that and created a pilot program called THRIVE and within 6 months, the program was formed into a non-profit organization-THRIVE Inc. Because I have a proven track record with my approach to education and helping students in and out of the classroom, I strongly believed that THRIVE would work and grow to become a national organization. Read more>>

Randall Garrett

For thirty years I have shown my work professionally as an artist. All of that time making art has been about being true to myself and my creation, to bring that to the world in as real of a way as I can. What is new for me, what has emerged from connecting with others, is the understanding that one doesn’t create in a vacuum. The work I make in my studio, and the videos I upload to my YouTube channel, go out into the world to have an impact of some sort. This realization, that artist and audience are both part of the same creative experience, has awakened in me the desire to start a Patreon page. Read more>>

Dominique Salley

I came up with the name Elevated Images because I wanted to Elevate my clients home to a more impressive level. I wanted to be accessible to everyone but more importantly people who looked like me. Being an African American Interior Designer I wanted to set a trend that we too can afford luxury and we don’t have to break the bank to do so. I always told myself never change who you are, let your work speak for itself and that it did. Normally you’ll see a business professional in a suit and tie, business causal attire to come off as someone who means business. I never wanted to take that approach. I wanted my clients to see who I really am. I wanted them to be able to speak to me as if we were friends, a neighbor, a cousin or just someone they could relate to. Read more>>

Yazmin Castaneda

Origin Mexico was born from a desire to help share the beautiful Mexican artistry while helping create economic opportunities for many artisan families in Mexico. Through our collaborations with many artisans in Mexico, we have created a platform and space for artisan families to share their beautiful creations with the rest of the world. This led to the creation of Origin Mexico and our mission to give back to artisan communities in Mexico Read more>>