17581: Appealing To Black Consumers One Month—And One Holiday—At A Time.

 

Adweek interviewed The Gathering Spot Co-Founder Ryan Wilson, who was closing out Black Business Month and reflecting on brands appealing to Black audiences.

“The biggest mistake is treating Black businesses and Black consumers as a moment on the calendar instead of an important part of the economy and culture every day of the year,” Wilson opined. “Black Business Month can be a great catalyst for attention, but the goal should be to build relationships that extend well beyond August.”

There’s not much new to Wilson’s words, in terms of pointing out brands’ cultural cluelessness and dismal DEIBA+ dedication.

Black History Month, Black Music Month, Black Business Month, Juneteenth, and Kwanzaa are combining to create opportunities to collect crumbs all year long.

Just need nine more months of Black celebrations to complete the calendar.

Ryan Wilson On Why Many Brands Still Don’t Know How to Appeal to Black Consumers

“Manufacturing authenticity” will never capture the community’s $2.1 trillion in spending power

By Robert Klara

A recent study by the Brookings Institution found that Black-owned employer businesses have blown past the 200,000 mark for the first time ever, collectively accounting for 1.8 million jobs and $249 billion in revenue. 

But the growth comes despite persistent challenges. According to data firm WifiTalents, Black entrepreneurs start off with a third less capital than their white counterparts, receive just 1% of venture-capital funding, and often cite lack of mentorship as a growth impediment.

Few understand these dynamics better than Ryan Wilson. In 2019, the Atlanta native recognized the need for a club where Black entrepreneurs could convene, co-work, and make professional connections. Today, The Gathering Spot is an Atlanta institution “where business deals are made, ventures financed, and community initiatives take hold,” according to Black Enterprise.

Brandweek, ADWEEK’s three-day marketing summit, will host an evening social at RETREAT, The Gathering Spot’s rooftop venue, from 7:00 -10:00 p.m. on September 15. In advance of the function, we sat down with Wilson to talk about Black businesses, the Black dollar, and what major brands frequently get wrong about both.

ADWEEK: We’re wrapping up Black Business Month, when it’s common for major retailers and credit cards to spotlight Black-owned businesses and encourage people to shop with them. Do you have any thoughts on why these brands don’t encourage support of Black-owned businesses all year long? Are they missing an opportunity because they don’t?

RYAN WILSON: The biggest mistake is treating Black businesses and Black consumers as a moment on the calendar instead of an important part of the economy and culture every day of the year.

Black Business Month can be a great catalyst for attention, but the goal should be to build relationships that extend well beyond August. If a company only engages Black-owned businesses when there is a campaign or cultural moment attached to it, that engagement can start to feel transactional rather than authentic.

Yes, I think brands are absolutely missing an opportunity when they take that approach. Supporting Black-owned businesses isn’t simply a social-impact strategy; it can also be a smart business strategy. These businesses are creating products, employing people, building communities, and shaping culture. The brands that understand that will build deeper relationships and, ultimately, greater trust.

Why did you see a need for a networking hub like the Gathering Spot, and have you seen success stories emerge from it that have validated the concept?

When we started The Gathering Spot, we believed there was a need for a different kind of community. Traditional networking can be very transactional: you meet someone, exchange information, and hope something happens afterward. We wanted to build a place where connection was part of the infrastructure: a creative could sit next to an attorney, an entrepreneur could meet an investor, or someone with an idea could meet the person who helps turn it into something real.

One of the clearest validations has been watching that idea grow beyond a single clubhouse in Atlanta. We expanded physically to Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles and built membership communities in cities including New York, Detroit, Charlotte, Houston, and Chicago. 

There are countless individual relationships and collaborations that have come from people meeting at The Gathering Spot, but what validates the original vision most for me is that people continue to see value in intentionally being in community with one another.

According to 2025 Nielsen data, the U.S. Black community packs $2.1 trillion in spending power. Brands obviously know that on some level, and yet we still see examples of marketing that fails to reach that community effectively—and sometimes offends them. What do brand marketers misunderstand or consistently get wrong about Black consumers?

One of the biggest mistakes is trying to manufacture authenticity at the end of the process.

You can’t develop a campaign without meaningful Black perspectives in the room and then add cultural references at the end and expect that to create an authentic connection. Representation has to exist upstream. Who is helping develop the strategy? Who has decision-making authority? Who are your partners? Who are you listening to before the campaign ever reaches the public?

At The Gathering Spot, we’ve seen firsthand how powerful it can be when people are invited into genuine community rather than simply marketed to. The same principle applies to brands. If your first meaningful conversation with Black consumers happens when you’re trying to sell them something, you’ve probably started too late.

The companies that will get this right are the ones that approach the Black community with curiosity, consistency, and respect—not simply because of the size of its spending power, but because Black consumers are helping shape culture, entrepreneurship, and the broader marketplace every day.

17372: BHM 2026—NADI Marketing.

 

 

NADI Marketing presents “9 Ways to Celebrate Black History Month: Campaigns & Partnerships Ideas for Sustainable Brands”—comprised of 5 BHM Campaign Ideas and 4 Strategic Partnerships for BHM.

 

It’s a cornucopia of competent creative conception for the culturally clueless—likely delivered for crumbs.

17371: BHM 2026—The UK.

 

In the UK, Black History Month will be celebrated October 1–31, 2026. Yet the official website already features lots of content.

 

The 2026 UK BHM Theme is: “Reclaiming Narratives”—which seeks to highlight untold stories, correct historical inaccuracies, and celebrate the contributions of Black people to British society.

 

According to the website, the festivities will include “Honouring Black Britain 2026”—an “initiative to formally recognise Black individuals whose lives, leadership, and service have made a measurable and meaningful contribution to Britain.”

 

Hey, Black history is British history too.

17369: Reverend Jesse Jackson (1941–2026).

 

From The Guardian…

 

Jesse Jackson, civil rights leader, dies aged 84

 

By Melissa Hellmann and Martin Pengelly

 

The Rev Jesse Jackson, the civil rights campaigner who was prominent for more than 50 years and who ran strongly for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1988, has died. He was 84.

 

“Our father was a servant leader – not only to our family, but to the oppressed, the voiceless, and the overlooked around the world,” the Jackson family said in a statement.

 

“We shared him with the world, and in return, the world became part of our extended family. His unwavering belief in justice, equality, and love uplifted millions, and we ask you to honor his memory by continuing the fight for the values he lived by.”

 

No cause of death was given.

 

Jackson had had progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) for more than a decade. He was originally diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. He was also twice hospitalised with Covid in recent years.

 

A fixture in the civil rights movement and Democratic politics since the 1960s, Jackson was once close to Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

 

In an interview with the Guardian in May 2020, Jackson said: “I was a trailblazer, I was a pathfinder. I had to deal with doubt and cynicism and fears about a Black person running. There were Black scholars writing papers about why I was wasting my time. Even Blacks said a Black couldn’t win.”

 

Twenty years after his second run for president, the first Black president, Barack Obama, saluted Jackson for making his victory possible. Obama celebrated in Chicago, also home to Jackson.

 

“It was a big moment in history,” Jackson told the Guardian, 12 years later. In an interview with NPR, Jackson said: “I cried because I thought about those who made it possible who were not there … People who paid a real price: Ralph Abernathy, Dr King, Medgar Evers, Fannie Lou Hamer, those who fought like hell [at the Democratic national convention] in Atlantic City in 64, those in the movement in the south.”

 

During the Covid pandemic, Jackson campaigned against disparities in care and outcomes, asking: “After 400 years of slavery, segregation and discrimination, why would anybody be shocked that African Americans are dying disproportionately from the coronavirus?”

 

He also said all past presidents had failed to “end the virus of white superiority and fix the multifaceted issues confronting African Americans”.

 

Born on 8 October 1941 in Greenville, South Carolina, Jackson became involved in politics at an early age as he navigated the segregated south. He was elected class president at the all-Black Sterling high school, where he also excelled in athletics. In 1959, he received a football scholarship to the University of Illinois. The Chicago White Sox offered the young Jackson a spot on their baseball team, but he decided to focus on his education instead.

 

During winter break his freshman year of college, Jackson returned home to Greenville and tried to obtain a book needed for his studies from the white-only Greenville public library, but he was turned away. The experience stayed with him. A few months later on 16 July 1960, Jackson and seven Black high school students entered the Greenville library for a peaceful protest. After browsing the library and reading books, the group later known as the Greenville Eight were arrested for disorderly conduct and later released on a $30 bond. A judge eventually ruled that they had the right to use the publicly funded institution, and the Greenville library system became integrated in September 1960.

 

Jackson did not return to the University of Illinois after his first year, and instead transferred to the historically Black North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College in Greensboro, where he played football as a quarterback, was the national officer for the Black fraternity, Omega Psi Phi, and was elected the student body president. While earning a sociology degree, he also continued his activism by participating in sit-ins at restaurants in Greensboro.

 

“My leadership skills came from the athletic arena,” Jackson told the Washington Post in 1984. “In many ways, they were developed from playing quarterback. Assessing defenses; motivating your own team. When the game starts, you use what you’ve got – and don’t cry about what you don’t have. You run to your strength. You also practice to win.”

 

During college, Jackson met his future wife Jacqueline, whom he married in 1962 and later had five children with – Santita, Jesse Jr, Jonathan Luther, Yusef DuBois, and Jacqueline Jr. He would later go on to have a sixth child, Ashley, during an extramarital affair with Karin Stanford in the early 2000s.

 

Jackson first met King, who would become his mentor, at an airport in Atlanta in the early 1960s. King had followed Jackson’s student activism from afar for several years.

 

In 1964, Jackson enrolled at the Chicago Theological Seminary, as he continued to be involved in the civil rights movement. Jackson travelled with his classmates to Selma, Alabama, to join the movement after he watched news footage of Bloody Sunday, where nonviolent civil rights marchers who crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, were then beaten by law enforcement officers. Impressed by Jackson’s leadership at Selma, King offered him a position with the civil rights group that he co-founded, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).

 

After a couple of years, Jackson put his seminary studies on hold to focus on SCLC’s Operation Breadbasket, an economic justice program that harnessed the power of Black churches by calling on ministers to pressure companies to employ more Black people through negotiations and boycotts. In 1967, Jackson became Operation Breadbasket’s national director, and was ordained as a minister a year later.

 

“We knew he was going to do a good job,” King said at an Operation Breadbasket meeting in 1968, “but he’s done better than a good job.”

 

Tragedy struck soon after Jackson gained a leadership position at SCLC. On 4 April 1968, Jackson witnessed King’s assassination from below the balcony at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.

 

The experience stayed with Jackson for the rest of his life. “Every time I think about it, it’s like pulling a scab off a sore,” he told the Guardian in 2018. “It’s a hurtful, painful thought: that a man of love is killed by hate; that a man of peace should be killed by violence; a man who cared is killed by the careless.”

 

Following King’s death, Jackson continued to work for SCLC until 1971, when he created his own organization to improve Black people’s economic conditions, People United to Save Humanity (Push). The organization hosted reading programs for Black youth and helped them find jobs, and also encouraged corporations to hire more Black managers and executives.

 

In 1984, Jackson ran as a Democratic candidate for president, becoming the second Black person to launch a nationwide campaign following Shirley Chisholm more than a decade earlier.

 

“Tonight we come together bound by our faith in a mighty God, with genuine respect and love for our country, and inheriting the legacy of a great party, the Democratic party, which is the best hope for redirecting our nation on a more humane, just, and peaceful course,” Jackson told an audience at the 1984 Democratic national convention in San Francisco, California.

 

“This is not a perfect party. We’re not a perfect people. Yet, we are called to a perfect mission. Our mission to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to house the homeless, to teach the illiterate, to provide jobs for the jobless, and to choose the human race over the nuclear race.” He lost the Democratic nomination to former vice-president Walter Mondale, with the incumbent Republican president Ronald Reagan ultimately winning the election.

 

After his first presidential run, Jackson created the National Rainbow Coalition to push for voting rights and social programs. In the mid-1990s, Jackson merged his two organizations together to form the multiracial group Rainbow Push Coalition, which focuses on educational and economic equality. Throughout the years, the coalition has paid more than $6m in college scholarships, and gave financial assistance to more than 4,000 families facing foreclosures so that they could save their homes, according to their website.

 

Jackson ran for the Democratic nomination for president a second time in 1988, performing strongly but losing out to Michael Dukakis, the Massachusetts governor, who was beaten heavily in the general election by George HW Bush.

 

In 2000, the then president, Bill Clinton, awarded Jackson the nation’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his decades of work focused on increasing opportunities for people of color.

 

Jackson took King’s work forward, staying to the fore in the worldwide civil rights movement through a tumultuous half-century of American history, through to the election of Donald Trump and the rise of Black Lives Matter.

 

“Dr King believed in multiracial, multicultural coalitions of conscience, not ethnic nationalism,” Jackson said in 2018. “He felt nationalism – whether Black, white or brown – was narrowly conceived, given our global challenges. So having a multiracial setting said much about his vision of America and the world, what America should stand for as well as the world.

 

“The arc of the moral universe is long and it bends towards justice, but you have to pull it to bend. It doesn’t bend automatically. Dr King used to remind us that every time the movement has a tailwind and goes forward, there are headwinds.

 

“Those who oppose change in some sense were re-energised by the Trump demagoguery. Dr King would have been disappointed by his victory but he would have been prepared for it psychologically. He would have said: ‘We must not surrender our spirits. We must use this not to surrender but fortify our faith and fight back.’”

 

This article was amended on 16 February 2026 because an earlier version incorrectly suggested that the first Selma march, known as Bloody Sunday, was led by Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

17367: BHM 2026—Canada.

As mentioned in a previous post, Canada celebrates Black History Month in February too.

 

The Canadian 2026 BHM theme reads, “30 Years of Black History Month: Honouring Black Brilliance Across Generations—From Nation Builders to Tomorrow’s Visionaries.”

 

Explore more at the Government of Canada website, which includes a digital toolkit to help promote BHM content and activities.

17365: BHM 2026—Book Club Toronto.

 

Book Club Toronto presents Black Influence In Advertising: Black History Month on February 26, 2026, at Sheeep Studio in Toronto, Ontario.

 

Incidentally, Canada also celebrates Black History Month in February. The 2026 BHM theme in Canada reads, “30 Years of Black History Month: Honouring Black Brilliance Across Generations—From Nation Builders to Tomorrow’s Visionaries.”

 

According to the Government of Canada website: “The theme celebrates three decades of Black History Month in Canada by highlighting the enduring contributions of Black Canadians across time. It acknowledges the foundational role of nation builders—those who fought for civil rights, advanced social justice, and shaped Canada’s cultural and political landscape. At the same time, it looks forward to tomorrow’s visionaries, the emerging leaders, innovators, and changemakers who are redefining excellence in every field.”

17361: BHM 2026—Netflix.

For BHM 2026, Netflix takes the standard “Black history is American history” approach, hyping the standard Black movies and shows promotion.

17353: BHM 2026—The New Press.

 

The New Press presents a new twist on a standard BHM line: Black History Is Living History.

 

Buy any Black History titles and receive 30% off—along with a free Lift Every Voice eBook.

17351: BHM 2026—USA TODAY.

 

USA TODAY offers Special Edition Black History Month 2026, inviting readers to take a 100-Year Journey for only $4.95. At least the publication didn’t declare Black History is USA TODAY History.

17347: BHM 2026—The White House.

 

A Proclamation from the President of the United States of America takes the standard “Black History is American History” approach.

17342: BHM 2026—Shutterstock.

 

For all your Black History Month royalty-free image needs, visit Shutterstock.

17340: BHM 2026—History.com.

 

Celebrate Black History Month via History.com.

17336: BHM 2026—Simon & Schuster.

 

Simon & Schuster celebrates Black History Month by promoting Hope through Black History 2026 Calendar by Danielle Coke Balfour—so everyone can salute Black History beyond February.

17246: On Veterans Day, Say Their Names.

 

The International African American Museum presents the following:

 

November 11 @ 11:00 am – 12:00 pm

 

Honoring the United States Colored Troops: Veterans Day Reading of the Names

 

Honor. Memory. Legacy.

 

This Veterans Day (November 11, 2025), the International African American Museum’s Center for Family History is honored to join voices from across the nation for the National Reading of the Names — part of the Grand Reopening of the African American Civil War Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C (@afroamcivilwar).

 

Thousands of United States Colored Troops (USCT) names will be spoken aloud to commemorate the Black soldiers and sailors who fought for freedom, equality, and the promise of America. Each name is a story of courage, family, and sacrifice.

 

Join us online as we honor their lives and reclaim the space they deserve in our shared history. Hearing these names isn’t just remembrance. It’s a reminder of the generations who helped build this nation and defended its ideals.

 

Don’t miss this powerful national moment. Tune in, listen, and help keep their legacy alive.

 

For more information about the live stream, please visit: https://afroamcivilwar.org/national-reading-of-the-names

 

Live broadcast link: https://youtube.com/live/yZZJrb3klcc

17075: Saluting Memorial Day 2025.

Black Enterprise spotlights 7 Sites That Pay Homage To Black Military Soldiers On Memorial Day—which is seven more sources recognizing Black soldiers than the average White advertising agency—or White House—will acknowledge.

17007: Monitoring Multicrumbtual Marketing Massacre.

Digiday published content on how diminishing, dismantling, and disrespecting DEIBA+ impacts multicrumbtual marketing agencies.

 

For major brands, mega-retailers, and White advertising agencies, it’s no problem.

 

For non-White advertising agencies, it’s no crumbs. And that’s a problem.

 

‘Just don’t say DEI’: Brands sit out advertising around Black History Month, other heritage months this year

 

By Kimeko McCoy

 

This year, Black History Month brand campaigns in February were quieter than normal. Amidst the diversity, equity and inclusion reckoning, expect Women’s History Month in March and Pride Month in June to strike similar tones. 

 

That’s according to three marketers Digiday spoke with for this story who said brand clients have either paused marketing around days geared toward honoring historically marginalized communities or tweaked language away from anything that could be deemed DEI. 

 

As more companies retool their commitments to DEI, multicultural marketing around holidays and heritage months have come into question. 

 

“It’s almost like, ‘just don’t say DEI. Whatever you do, don’t say DEI,’” said Gary Williams Jr., chief creative officer and co-founder at Creative Theory ad agency.

 

The agency has maintained its roster of clients. However, the ripple efforts of DEI dismantling have reached Creative Theory. One client in particular, a tech company that Williams Jr. declined to name, has seemingly pulled back efforts around multicultural marketing moments. In the past, Williams Jr. said, the agency produced the tech company’s campaigns for those holidays. This year, at least by press time, the company has made no plans for those months.

 

Creative Theory isn’t alone. Another agency spokesperson, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said their own agency is seeing a similar trend, in which the influx of clients looking to launch multicultural campaigns has dwindled. In 2023, the agency saw anywhere from 20 to 30 requests for those cultural month moments. Last year, there were just an estimated 15. “This year, we’ve seen a real slowdown and pause,” said the agency spokesperson, without specifying campaign requests for 2025.

 

The marketing and communications agency works with state and city governments as clients, many of which have concerns about funding overall with the President Donald Trump administration’s significant cuts to government funding.

 

As far as marketers are concerned, it’s a mix of fear of public backlash and potential lawsuits as well as economic uncertainty causing advertisers to hold dollars closer to the chest. Call it a “risk mitigation trend”, said Steve Gorski, head of strategy at Forsman & Bodenfors NY, a creative collective and advertising agency. 

 

Brands have a fear, Gorski added, of finding themselves caught in the crosshairs of the so-called cultural wars, which has thus led to a downtrend of those targeted cultural holiday campaigns. The head of strategy said anecdotally that client interest in Black History Month, Women’s History Month and related multicultural holiday moments have decreased by about half from 2023 through this year.

 

“We still see companies standing behind [DEI],” he said, “but we’ve seen less people asking for ad campaigns in this climate, we’ll call it, still showing that they value diversity, equity and inclusion, and still support these communities.” Some companies, he added, are retooling their approach, highlighting female founders and companies stories rather than speaking directly to a historically marginalized community.

 

And perhaps for good reason. It wasn’t so long ago that brands like Adidas, Miller Lite, and most notably, Bud Light, served as cautionary tales for marketers after facing public backlash to what was deemed “woke” advertising with themes of inclusivity. 

 

That trend continues even into this year. This week alone, creative agency Notorious111 said a healthcare provider client got pushback to a sponsored Meta ad for language around women’s health, encouraging screenings for breast care.

 

“It was not controversial,” said Katie Hooper, co-founder and CEO of Notorious111, “and what we started to see pretty quickly was we started to receive what I would call social trolls coming at us, essentially [saying], ‘Why do you have to make everything into a DEI initiative?’”

 

President Trump’s executive order aimed at dismantling government DEI has likely been a catalyst for some companies that have walked back their own diversity initiatives. However, the writing was on the wall even before Trump walked into the Oval Office. 

 

Last July, farm equipment manufacturer John Deere announced changes to its DEI policy, which seems to have spurred a domino effect for others like Ford Motor Co, Molson Coors, Walmart, McDonald’s, Target and the list goes on. It’s a stark contrast to the commitments and marketing efforts that date back to 2020 and 2021, on the heels of the murder of George Floyd.

 

“We knew those commitments weren’t going to last. It’s just the nature of the business,” Williams Jr. said. “I don’t think we realized how abrupt the stop would be.”

 

Notably, while some companies are going quiet for these cultural moments, others have continued efforts. For example, Rare Beauty, a makeup brand founded by Selena Gomez, launched its “I See You” campaign in recognition of Black History Month. Meanwhile, Code.org, a nonprofit that offers free computer science lessons and resources for K-1 students recently launched a spot showing young women using computer science and artificial intelligence in time for International Women’s Day. 

 

While there have indeed been shifts in brands’ approach to diverse communities, both on an organizational and consumer-facing level, there’s still a commitment to honoring multicultural moments. 

 

In an emailed statement to Digiday, Danisha Lomax, head of client inclusivity and impact at Digitas, said, “The data continues to reinforce what we’ve always known: that investing in diverse communities is the right thing to do and a powerful driver of brand loyalty and growth.”