After much preparation for a big day anniversary event at the Westfield Shopping Centre on Saturday 25th June 2022, Black Pound Day founder Swiss was in his element as he stood among his proud store tenants.
Photo courtesy CaribDirect
Originally launched in 2020 as Swiss’ brainchild dedicated to providing a permanent home for Black-owned homegrown UK businesses, the Black Pound Day Store has grown to become the UK’s biggest black-led economic movement in history.
Vendoror Barbara Acheampong and Friend. Photo courtesy CaribDirect
In spite of the obvious socio-economic reasons for launching this initiative and the attendant benefits to the Black community, the political motives are not self-evident. Swiss on founding the BPD was determined to resist the pervasive racism that exists in Britain while showing solidarity to the Black Lives Matter movement both in the United States and Britain.
A busy Swiss at the tills. Photo courtesy CaribDirect
His vision was to usher in a productive solution-based response to racism by allowing Black entrepreneurs to come together to form an inter-connected, symbiotic and sustainable ecosystem for shoppers with strong ethical values. His is the view that if Black businesses work together, they can grow together thereby increasing the economic strength of the community as a whole.
An asortment of African books and things. Photo courtesy CaribDirect
The celebratory event at Westfield was an incredible display of fashion, beauty, jewellery, books, cosmetics and more from at least 80 Black stall holders.
Vendor Natalie Vincent of Embrace Body Skincare showing off her skincare products. Photo courtesy CaribDirect
Swiss originally from Battersea and a member of the So Solid Crew took time out to speak with CaribDirect and described the anniversary as “A momentous and beautiful moment”. He said the idea was born some 14 years ago when he realised the Black and Caribbean businesses were dwindling and he though he could do something about it by creating the Black Pound Day that would encourage Black people to continually support Black businesses. Though he had not implemented the idea for many years, the murder of George Floyd reignited the spark of the idea and he took it public.
Card and wrapping paper vendor. Photo courtesy CaribDirect
Support has been tremendous he says from government agencies having worked with Harringay, Birmingham, Camden and Islington Councils. Their popularity throughout the London community has got them 50, 000 followers on social media which allows them an avenue to reach prospective buyers.
The store buzzing with business. Photo courtesy CaribDirect
The proud Swiss says he is very pleased with the progress his idea has made and the fact that Westfield have partnered with the Black Pound Day to open up huge opportunities for his tenants and the BPD brand.
D Fitz-Roberts is a multi-talented writer on socio-economic issues having worked in journalism across the Caribbean (Grenada, Guyana and BVI) in the 90s. He has worked in London with Black Britain Online, New Nation Newspaper and Caribbean Times. An academic with a passion for research on distributed ledger technologies in emerging economies he is keen to see the Caribbean embrace bitcoin and blockchain technologies to keep pace with the west. He writes periodically for mainstream publications and is the founder of CaribDirect.com. He is also the author of Caribbean children's book LifeSucks! available on Amazon.
