Is every black-owned business badge honest on Amazon?
BlackTechLogy: The hair supply company that made me raise an eyebrow about some Amazon merchants
I’ve been an Amazon shopper for decades — way back when I was selling my college textbooks on Half.com and looking for book discounts as soon as I got my syllabus. I left. I came back. I left again. It’s news to no one that Amazon is an addictive site and full of products we rely on for everyday use.
But being in the Amazon Affiliate program has made me dissect the site even more carefully than I did when I was in the Amazon Vine program. I’m continuously buying, testing and promoting products that I would be proud to post alongside my articles. And recently, I’ve paid more attention than I used to in the “Small and Underserved Business” category (which Donald Trump will probably try to get rid of, along with any other DEI program). In this category on Amazon, shoppers can look up woman-owned, Black-owned, military family-owned and a few other categories.
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As an Amazon Affiliate, I earn a percentage from each purchase with my referral links.
Yesterday, Iwas looking for a very specific ingredient for a hair product to promote and knew it was common within African-American hair products. I came across a company that would’ve been perfect to promote — until it made me raise an eyebrow.
Recommended Read: “My president was black, and my beauty supply store owner was too ~ The unspoken challenge of being a black beauty supply store owner”
While the product was readily available, I noticed all of the marketing photos were of white people — for a company with a black-owned business badge. While I wanted the product, it didn’t make much sense to me to bother getting that Amazon black-owned business badge only to ignore showing black people in the advertising. I looked the company up. The entire site is full of white people. Not one black model on any product for “black hair.”
That led me to the “About Us” page, where I saw a photo of a man who was clearly not black and from Paris. (Yes, I realize there are the Idris Elbas and Daniel Kaluuyas of the world, but this was not someone who looked like them or was even racially ambiguous. Clearly not black at all. Not even light-skinned. I flagged the company.)
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As long as they work well, I don’t mind non-black companies selling their products to black people. I do, however, have a bone to pick with companies that claim to be part of a niche that they are not.