(ThyBlackMan.com) Black people need to get their money right and get some sense as to who they’re spending it with because the one sided relationship with many of the companies that Blacks support are NOT mutually beneficial.
While I am very angry at the fact that out of the $390 Billion Dollars that will be spent in the next fiscal year on Newspaper Advertising, Black American newspapers will only receive – check this out – only 0.00001 percent of that money while the projected spending power in dollars of Black Americans is $1.1 Trillion by 2015 and $1.3 Trillion by 2017!
So the already dying medium of the printed daily is dying a faster death, especially the Black publications because these mainstream companies couldn’t care less about advertising in them because they are taking Black money for granted as we continue to spend with them!
So why purchase the cow when the milk is given freely?
When are Blacks going to stop making dedicated and loyal purchases to companies who will not support the press that brings them the independent and local news about their specific communities?
In several personal conversations of mine with close friends, many of us have come to the conclusion that too many Blacks are either financially illiterate on the basics of how money works or just don’t give a damn as their esteem is proportionate to the amount of name brand items that they can purchase.
Maybe it’s a combination of both.
Within that financial illiteracy that we spoke on we also mentioned that many Blacks just don’t see the importance of the Black Press to even understand how crucial it is to them to receive the advertising revenue in order to maintain a powerful voice that will definitely be missed once forever shut down.
It’s almost as though Blacks can only see a small part of the picture and these big corporations already know this.
Well since I’ve been speaking of the big corporations, let me start by naming one who right now has to be at the top of the list when it comes to the outright arrogance they display when thumbing their noses at the Black community after pocketing so much of their undesirable money in their deep pockets!
Let’s take Albers for instance, they’ve grossed over 160 million in revenue from Black consumers since they were taken over by Continental Mills on
October 1, 2008 from the Nestle Corporation.
We as Blacks will also go on to purchase an additional 25 million dollars worth of their products here in 2014 alone!
Kimber Kimber & Associates have made many shocking discoveries when it comes to Black consumer ad spending because of their foray into the newspaper business since 1967 which grew into them representing over 200 Black newspapers today.
So when they contacted Continental Mills President & CEO John M. Heilin to offer them a direct opportunity to reach out to their Black customers by supporting Black newspapers, they got the classic brush off!
…….and this was the statement made by Mark Kimber after their meeting:
“Despite having a huge income and product support from the Black consumer, Continental Mills and the Albers brand has made an infamous and historical decision to reject our proposals and not to market to and support their millions of African-American consumers nationwide,”
“It is an amazing fact that the Albers brand is proving to be one of the most discriminatory marketers in the history of our nation’s food product manufacturers, despite huge Black consumer support,” said Kimber. “It is almost unimaginable that the CEO of Continental Mills, who produces and markets the Albers brand, to state to Black newspapers that his company does not have any intention to even consider to advertise or purchase seasonal branding advertisement, such as Black history Month ads, directed to the Black consumer through Black newspapers.”
Understand that Continental Mills has bragged about how much money that they receive from the Black community without ever having to support the Black Media!
So for you who feel that we are living in a hand holding Kumbayah loving Post Racial America and that the knowledge of money doesn’t count, then you better think again.
I recently watched an episode of the New York City radio station Power 105.1 The Breakfast Club that did a recent interview with Kanye West and was so surprised that the panel just couldn’t understand why he kept on stressing that we all as a collective need to accrue and pool our money and that while he was definitely a man of means, all that he ever made was a drop in the bucket when compare to the truly wealthy!
He made 100% sense to me even if he somewhat explained it in an abstract manner. You have to be able to receive what an artistic type of person is saying because they think so different than most and will express themselves in an unpopular manner.
The panel told him that all they really wanted from him was good music and he was so far above their heads that I wondered if they had any sense of how this world can be toward the downtrodden and disenfranchised.
He didn’t have to share what he shared on the show as he has more money than all of them will collectively have in an entire lifetime so why not really absorb what he has to say?
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The bottom line is that we are not respected as a people in business because collectively we have no clue as to how to leverage our buying power to benefit us therefore we will always be the globally “taken for granted” laughing stock of the finance world until we get our acts together.
If Continental/Albers brags about how they don’t have to spend any money specifically in the African-American community in order to get those huge profits with no investment, then we need to be laughing hard as we stop spending our money with them to support something of our own that can replace that void left from Continental/Albers.
Ashley Furniture is another company that enjoys the support of the Black Community yet avoids spending any money with the Black Press while millions of dollars go into their White and Hispanic periodicals on a regular basis.
I guess they understand the formula with the Black people of America, that as a company and a brand, to distance yourself from them causes you to be more exclusive to them.
“In other words, Black people will spend MORE with you if you don’t want anything to do with them!“
Cadillac and Adidas are two other companies that enjoy the “you do me but I don’t have to do you” relationship syndrome.
While they have spent money to advertise in Black papers, they have fallen far short of the mark of what they should be spending when you see what they get out of us.
While it’s good business to continue to make a huge gain on a foolish people who have not the knowledge to execute a plan to utilize the power that we do have against the exploiter, I blame ourselves for allowing this to continue the way that it is and only we are the ones who can stop it.
Stop believing that we must wear someone else’s name on our sleeve or wrist in order to be viewed as a valuable member of society.
Michael Kors Watches & Black People
Stop taking your hard earned money and splurging every chance you get at the shopping mall while others bank their money to save for the goal of being in business to be the supplier and not the consumer.
Immediately rid yourself of any desire to continue supporting these companies who don’t give a damn about you except for the money you bring them with a loyalty that can only be matched from a pet dog.
It’s a very vicious cycle that must be attacked aggressively on all fronts, whether it’s to defend the Black press to receive more advertising or if it’s to receive more respect because of our spending power.
But to receive more respect we’ve got to respect our own dollars and maneuver our money in a way that lets the world know that we mean business!
Can we finally reach that place of respectability when the first thing we do is run right to the companies who will lay down with us for a quick financial booty call in the darkened parking lot of profit, but act as if they don’t know us when they see us in the daytime on the two way street named “advertising?”
This remains to be seen but always know that the power is in our hands!
