Google: Black Owned Friday
In 2020, Black-owned businesses were disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. In fact, 41% of US Black-owned businesses had closed by April 2020. So rather than asking for charity, we thought: What if we could reimagine the biggest spending day of the year into an annual event to support Black-owned businesses?
We partnered with Google and the US Black Chambers to establish Black-Owned Friday. It aimed to co-opt the biggest shopping event of the year - Black Friday - to funnel dollars towards Black-owned businesses.
To grab attention for the event, we reimagined the classic advertising jingle and teamed up with Wyclef Jean and Ari Lennox to create custom jingles for their favorite Black-Owned Businesses, which we turned into animated video odes as well as Spotify tracks. Wyclef also created an anthem for Black-Owned Friday, and helped us spread the word through press interviews. We helped followers to share their favorite Black-owned businesses on social via GIF & sticker packs as well as statements of support that consumers could download and share. We also provided resources to help businesses to ensure their Google Business Profile was up to date, and to make it clear they are a Black-owned business by adding the Black-owned badge.
The event helped to lead a 300% increase in online conversation of ‘Black-owned business’ and a 3000% increase in sales for Grounded - one of our featured businesses.
Role: Strategy lead
Responsibilities: Brand positioning and strategy, comms plan, campaign launch strategy, social strategy, influencer strategy