Six Black-Owned Businesses in Queens
Black-owned businesses in NYC increased at four times the rate of white-owned businesses during the past five years, thanks in large part to a 44% increase in Queens. Let’s support our Black-owned small businesses, today, tomorrow, and every day after. Here are a few to start with:
Named after Roy Wilkins, the ‘Senior Statesman' of the Civil Rights Movement and former leader of the NAACP, Roy Wilkins Park hosts the 425-seat Black Spectrum Theatre. Black Spectrum Theatre is the recipient of ten AUDELCO Awards and three National Black Theatre Festival Awards for excellence in African-American theatre. The mission of the Black Spectrum Theatre is to create theatre and film productions targeting issues in the African-American community, particularly topics relevant to youth, provide children, youth, and adults with life skills and artistic experience through training in theatre and film, bring theatre, film, and performing arts to southeastern Queens and underserved communities nationwide, and highlight emerging African-American directors, playwrights, performers, and designers.
But the theater isn't the park's only innovation—a four-acre vegetable garden gives local kids and adults the opportunity to grow their own produce, an exceptional space in a city as crowded as New York.
'Twas the night before Kwanzaa' at Black Spectrum Theater
Paige’s Candle Co. is a small, black woman-owned business that makes and ships vegan soy wax candles with phthalate-free fragrance and essential oils and biodegradable shipping materials. Their fragrance blends are hand crafted in the Queens and Brooklyn boroughs of New York City. A portion of sales are donated to offer free craft classes to New York City non-profit organizations.
“I help create artistically stimulating environments for low-income New York City residents who want to explore creative outlets and generally do not have access to them. I am most proud of my ability to develop unique vegan candles and share my craft with others. When you purchase from Paige’s Candle Co, you’re helping to invest in equity and accessibility to art education,” owner Paige Graham says.
A portion of all sales are currently donated to City Harvest, a non-profit helping to feed hungry New Yorkers in need.
Founded by jewelry designer Morgan Thomas in Astoria, Queens in honor of her late mother, who gifted her a jewelry-making book as a young girl, Yam sells affordable jewelry that draws from nature and nostalgic aesthetics and has been featured in Lizzo’s “Good As Hell” music video. Yam centers on local artists, working with family-owned vendors and production houses, and uses upcycled materials to maintain environmental sustainability.
Each piece is handmade.
Domino Earring at Yam
Open the doors to see 190 years of history in action in a still-operating bar that has appeared in multiple films, ranging from Tower Heist and New York Originals to Goodfellas. In a testament to its lasting impact on its neighborhood, the street that it resides on is now named Neir’s Tavern Way.
Although the bar was slated to close in 2009, Gordon, an immigrant from Jamaica, saw how the community came together to support his family when they were new and sought to give back, buying this piece of Woodhaven history. This sense of community has never failed him, as customers have created a GoFundMe to support Neir’s workers in the midst of the pandemic, helped set up outdoor dining, and bought gift cards.
Try their Mae West Burger (Screen star and singer Mae West was rumored to hold performances at Neir’s before she made it big and in fact, lived a couple of blocks away), Goodfellas burger, and their fish & chips.
Mae West Burger at Neir’s Tavern via Yelp
Milk & Pull is a black-owned coffee chain and love letter to New York City. The owners of Milk & Pull, Joe and Angela Austin, met while working part-time jobs at H&M and are now married. Their first dates were consumed by developing business plans because they were not only in love with each other, but with New York City. Owning their first coffee shop was their way of “contributing something that was a true part of the city.”
Milk & Pull is all about balance -- the balance of milk and espresso in their coffee, the balance of hominess and escape in their interior design, and the balance of conversation and quietude in their atmosphere. Pair any of their coffee drinks with their Roasted Bush sandwich.
Coffee from Milk & Pull Ridgewood
Camille at the Wheel is a collection of handmade, wheel-thrown ceramics with a bent towards beautiful utility.
Camille practices pottery at a shared studio in New York City. She loves this artform because it is a chance to make something out of nothing, and the learning opportunities are endless. Plus, for a perfectionist like her, it’s an important reminder to take nothing too seriously, hold on to nothing too tightly, and to occasionally let one’s senses take the lead over one’s brain. At the end of the day, it’s just mud, after all.
Put your flowers in the Red Wood Bud Vase from Camille at the Wheel