The 2024 Well Black Woman Market will be held Saturday, July 27, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. at The Foundation for Black Women’s Wellness on Madison’s West Side.
The Well Black Women Market bolsters the visibility, connectivity, and sustainability of Black Women entrepreneurs to achieve financial and whole-life wellness. The event was first hosted in June of 2021.
“This is our fourth year of hosting Well Black Woman Markets at The Foundation For Black Women’s Wellness, and we’re so happy to continue what we started on Saturday at our Black Women’s Wellness Center,” Lisa Peyton, founder and CEO of The Foundation For Black Women’s Wellness, tells Madison365. “Our Well Black Woman Markets are an extension of our work to empower a generation of well Black women and families through economic security and building the economic power of Black women-led businesses and enterprises.”
The inspiration for the event came in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic when many businesses and entrepreneurs were going through difficult times.
“We recognized that Black women were so heavily impacted by the economic fallout, by the loss of employment, by the strain on local businesses and what that was doing to very small, Black women-owned enterprises … women who all have day jobs and who are mothers and breadwinners,” Peyton says. “We saw an opportunity to really galvanize the community and to invest in Black women-owned businesses so they could survive the pandemic. And we reached out at that time to partners and True Stage, formerly CUNA, really stepped up and helped us make some really powerful initial investments in about 29 local Black women-owned businesses across Dane County.”
Peyton adds that since 2022, FBWW has distributed nearly $65,000 in micro-grants to 29 businesses.
“Those dollars have really helped those businesses build stability, and it has helped a core of them really exponentially grow in their operations and their infrastructure and their product offerings,” Peyton says. “This Saturday’s market is really an extension and a continuation of that work to continuously support these local Black women businesses and new ones that are popping up and emerging every day.”
Amira Caire is the special projects coordinator for the FBWW who helps to put together the markets. There will be 20 vendors at the event, she says.
“It’s really an intimate market. We never really have more than 25 [vendors] just due to spacing. We really just gather women who run Black-owned businesses who may want people to know that they’re here,” Caire tells Madison365. “We have pretty up-and-coming businesses that join into this event, too.”
The women sell things like body products, clothing, African garbs, hair products and accessories and there is information available for services around health and wellness. “It’s just really diverse … all of the offerings from the women at the market,” Caire says. “We also have a few artists that bring their paintings, so it’s just a really nice time to come see a variety of different things that many Black women are selling.
“Personally, it was very important to me to witness this event the first times I was able to, knowing in Madison, you don’t really know of many Black-owned businesses that are here, especially Black woman-owned businesses,” Caire says. “It’s just something that makes me feel really good. We really shine light on some great businesses that are often going under the community radar.”
The 2024 Well Black Woman Market is open to the entire community.
“It is important to note that here in the Black community in Madison, we’re very aware of our businesses and we are patronizing those businesses all year round,” Peyton says. “But the Well Black Woman Market also gives the broader community outside of the Black community the ability to meet these businesses, get to know them, and this really opens a broader customer base.
“The entire community is welcome to come support and stop this event,” Peyton continues. “It is promoting Black women vendors, but it’s open to every single member of our community because Black women businesses only thrive when our entire community supports them, and I think everyone who has shopped our markets before and who supported these Black women businesses know that they’re getting quality products — top of the line, hand made, professionally produced with care.”
There will be indoor and outdoor vending at the Well Black Woman Market along with free parking.
“We know that each dollar we spend is investing back in our local community and building not only these Black women enterprises, but it’s building our local economy. So it’s a win-win for Black women and a win-win for greater Madison,” Peyton says.
“Many times at this event, we’ve had women sell out of all their items … everything on their table. Last year, we had 17 booths sell every single thing they had,” Caire adds. “It was amazing to see. Women love this event and so do the attendees. We are very much looking forward to this Saturday.”
The 2024 Well Black Woman Market will be held Saturday, July 27, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. at The Foundation for Black Women’s Wellness, 6601 Grand Teton Plaza, Suite A2. To RSVP, click here.
