Three sisters from Buffalo, New York, have made history by launching the first-ever beauty supply store to be women by Black women.
Founders Brianna Lannie, Danielle Jackson, and Lauren Jackson launched The Hair Hive after becoming frustrated with the limited number of products available in stores in the area.
“A lot of times they’ll get the wrong thing or they’ll be led in the wrong direction, so I knew that it was a need,” Brianna told WIVB. They weren’t the online ones. Other Black women they spoke to had similar issues.
The lack of Black ownership in the beauty sector is increasing by the day but remains low.
The news outlet reports that Black women own only 7% of the industry. African Americans spend a mountainous $1.2 trillion each year on beauty products while the Black hair care industry raked in an estimated $2.51 billion overall.
Shine My Crown spoke to the store on Thursday morning, where she revealed that since opening, the products have been flying off the shelves.
“Since opening on March 7th, we have sold out of 70% of our inventory! Our local community has shown an outpouring amount of support for us and our mission. We are beyond grateful to be able to serve our customers with our business,” Lauren told us.
“We literally wear the hair. I change my hair like every month, so it’s good to see people who are actually using the products and using the hair,” said Danielle.
The description on The Hair Hive site says that the store “specializes in all of your beauty needs. From wigs to eyelashes, we have it all! Providing exceptional customer service you won’t want to look anywhere else for your beauty needs!”
“We have a lot of variety of colors, just a wide spectrum from glow in the dark hair, to sparkle hair, pretty much anything you can think of that’s different we have it in our store because we want to give something to our community that they can’t get anywhere else,” said Lauren.
