It’s a family affair over at the Shaq Brand. Walking Away From Reebok As AFROTECH™ previously told you, Shaquille O’Neal had a multi-million-dollar shoe deal on the table from Reebok. However, he walked away from the deal in 1998 to launch an affordable shoe line in partnership with Walmart. This was prompted after a mother told him that his younger fans couldn’t afford his shoes being sold by Reebok . O’Neal recounts on “The Big Podcast” that he went to his mom in hopes she would counter what the woman had said. However, his mother not only agreed but she also reminded him about his hometown of Newark, NJ. “She’s like, ‘Remember, you ain’t never had no shoes that cost more than $40.’ So, I said to myself, ‘All right, I’m gonna start my own line.’ I called Reebok and said, ‘Hey, we’re not going to renew.’ I had like $50 million on the table. I had no idea what I was going to do. So, I was thinking about where do my people go. Walmart. Walmart is the best distribution in the world....

Uncle Nearest is reportedly attracting buyer interest. As AFROTECH™ previously told you, Uncle Nearest whiskey brand, founded by Fawn Weaver and her husband, Keith, has been opposing a court order that placed them under receivership in August 2025. This decision stemmed from claims by lender Farm Credit Mid-America that Uncle Nearest defaulted on more than $108 million in loans. In August, Tennessee attorney Phillip G. Young Jr. was named receiver by U.S. District Judge Charles E. Atchley Jr., so he now oversees Uncle Nearest’s assets, including its distillery in Shelbyville, TN, as well as “real estate holdings, intellectual property, affiliated ventures, and related entities,” according to Moore County Observer. The Weavers had placed fault with Uncle Nearest’s former chief financial officer, Mike Senzaki. They claimed he inflated the company’s whiskey barrel inventory, which resulted in a $24 million credit increase from Farm Credit, according to a separate article from...

Darrick Johnson and his team have launched a new software to put actionable insights at the fingertips of sports agents and teams. Johnson is a South Central, LA, native who knew technology would always be in his playbook. His father worked at various tech companies, including IBM and Intel, so Johnson always maintained positive sentiments toward the sector. In college, his undergraduate studies centered on business administration, marketing, and management. He then had a short nine-month stint as a professional football player in Canada, but he always knew there was more in store for his career. “I got back home from Canada and was sitting on the couch waiting around for phone calls. Phone wasn’t ringing. I was like, ‘You know what? I got a degree.’ So I literally looked up technology sales jobs and found an inside sales job … So I was making 100 calls a day for almost 18 months before I actually landed my first tech job at Dell,” Johnson told AFROTECH™. One year into his time at...

Being a good entrepreneur requires an understanding of how to build a lasting community. Will Lucas understands this. Becoming A Community Builder His formal introduction to community building began when he founded TEDxToledo, an event he has organized since 2012, according to information from his alma mater, the University of Toledo, where he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in organization technology. The decision grew out of frustration with the constant conversations about what his midsize hometown lacked. Instead of accepting a “little brother syndrome” mindset, he wanted to shift the narrative by gathering people who were genuinely optimistic about the city’s future. “A friend of mine was a TED speaker. I just happened to be talking to him on the phone. He was talking about TED, and I’m like, ‘That’s the kind of energy I need in my hometown,'” Lucas told AFROTECH™. “And then I found that you could apply for a license to host one of the TEDx conferences. That’s a great way to...

Joulenie Pierre had faith the size of a mustard seed and has watched her bakery grow to new heights. Pierre was a college student double-majoring in economics and political science on a pre-law track in Miami when she ventured into entrepreneurship. To support herself financially, she had a job working 30 hours a week at Lululemon, she shared on TikTok. Feeling stressed, she said she leaned into her passion for baking. “Baking was my way of having my own peace, my own clarity, and being as calm as I possibly can be. It helped keep me grounded. It was like my form of therapy essentially,” Pierre, 20, explained on TikTok. @therollanddough Part 2 out of 5 addressing the concerns ♬ original sound – Roll & Dough Roll and Dough With the help of her business partner, Jovan, she launched Roll and Dough. Pierre had just $100 in her bank account at the time and was waiting on her financial aid to come in to cover her rent. She went two months without being able to pay her rent, but she did...

Dawon Matthews created his own rule book, and it paid off. The Philadelphia native reached a turning point in college when he was expelled from school after receiving a felony charge for aggravated assault at a party. “That just led to me going down a hole of just going in and out of the system,” Matthews told CNBC. Matthews went on to secure an associate degree from Manor College and a bachelor’s degree in business from La Salle University, notes the outlet. Hoping to break into the corporate world, he applied to over 200 jobs. With no positive outcome in sight, he decided to bet on himself and jump into entrepreneurship. “Once they see a felony behind a person they don’t even care about what credentials you got. You’re just not accepted in that society,” Matthews told CNBC. Entrepreneurship has brought its share of highs and lows. His first venture, Wonderful Cleaning, was generating nearly $12,000 per month by the end of its second year. The success of the business allowed him to...

Like many entrepreneurs, Tracee Ellis Ross had to think creatively about how she launched her business. As AFROTECH™ previously reported, she is the proud founder of Pattern Beauty, a haircare brand that serves as a love language to the textured hair community with offerings including washes, treatments, styling tools, and more. View this post on Instagram She pitched the idea while she was acting on the TV show “Girlfriends,” and it was not initially understood, but her self-belief helped bring it to the market in 2019. “Nobody was interested. Nobody would understand why an actress would be making hair products. Nobody understood the difference between hair products that were for curly, coily, and tight-textured versus straight,” she explained during an interview with Self Magazine. “People were just like ‘I don’t get it.’ “So I heard all different kinds of nos and, from ‘Girlfriends’ into ‘Black-ish,’ not only was I gaining this larger platform, but I was learning how to express...

CurlMix Co-founder Kim Lewis says her business is on the verge of closing. As AFROTECH™ previously told you, CurlMix is a clean, natural haircare line founded by Kim and Tim Lewis in Chicago. The pair appeared on “Shark Tank” in 2019 and rejected a $400,000 offer for 20% of the company. Instead, they raised $1.2 million on their own in 2020 for 10% of the brand. By the following year, they had launched a crowdfunding campaign, raising more than $3.6 million in 30 days. The business launched a separate crowdfunding campaign in 2024, which led to $5.7 million from 9,248 investors, according to information from its Wefunder. With a mission to protect Black ownership, the business is now fighting to stay open. In an Instagram post, Kim revealed that 20,000 orders are needed to ensure the business’s survival. “This has been the most difficult year in business. This year in business was harder than COVID with tariffs and taxes and ingredient costs going up and shipping time slowing down,”...