I remember my first time visiting a black owned store.
I used to work construction, which took me to many areas around New Orleans. I was working a job at the Metairie Country Club, which is adjacent to a black neighborhood I had to drive through to get to the maintenance entrance of the club. As I drove through the neighborhood every black person who saw me tried to flag me down. The women were obviously prostitutes and the men were probably drug dealers. Needless to say I didn't stop.
At nine AM the work crew took a a break and the foreman wanted me to bring him to the store a few blocks away in the black area. I told him I didn't see any stores when I drove through but he insisted there was one. Off we went. To my surprise there was an old time corner store built into a house just a couple of blocks away.
The store didn't have any windows, so I couldn't see in from outside. I assumed the inside would be just like any other store I'd been to but I was wrong. As soon as I entered there was a fat short black woman with four kids running about. She smiled at me and said "You gonna buy my chir'rins some potato chips?" I smiled back as I walked by and said no.
The store was one large room with all the merchandise on shelves on the perimeter walls. Between the customers and the merchandise was a Jerry-rigged wall of chicken wire, plexiglass, chain link fence, and any other kind of material that keeps people's hands off the merchandise while still allowing them to see it.
In the center of this wall, opposite the entrance, was a sliding glass opening. An old black woman was standing on the other side waiting. I told her what I wanted and waited for her to go back and fourth behind the wall gathering my items. She totaled everything up and asked for the money while holding everything behind the sliding glass door. She gave me my items and change all at once by placing them in a special cylinder which allowed only one opening at a time. I picked up my things and left.
As a white man I had never been to a store where I couldn't inspect the items before purchasing them. I had never been to such an anti-theft store in my life. The neighborhood was all neatly kept houses with mowed lawns. It wasn't a graffiti covered ghetto dump. It was an all black neighborhood though, and I think that says a lot.
A few years later some Koreans opened a store in a black neighborhood. The TV news reported a protest by the black residents. The blacks accused the Koreans of racism because they always followed the blacks around the store and often accused blacks of stealing. The news showed the inside of the store. It was a traditional open shelf store. I couldn't help but think the Koreans needed to visit the old black lady's store I had been to and learn how it's done. If you're going to do business with blacks, certain precautions must be taken.
I remember my first time visiting a black owned store.
I used to work construction, which took me to many areas around New Orleans. I was working a job at the Metairie Country Club, which is adjacent to a black neighborhood I had to drive through to get to the maintenance entrance of the club. As I drove through the neighborhood every black person who saw me tried to flag me down. The women were obviously prostitutes and the men were probably drug dealers. Needless to say I didn't stop.
At nine AM the work crew took a a break and the foreman wanted me to bring him to the store a few blocks away in the black area. I told him I didn't see any stores when I drove through but he insisted there was one. Off we went. To my surprise there was an old time corner store built into a house just a couple of blocks away.
The store didn't have any windows, so I couldn't see in from outside. I assumed the inside would be just like any other store I'd been to but I was wrong. As soon as I entered there was a fat short black woman with four kids running about. She smiled at me and said "You gonna buy my chir'rins some potato chips?" I smiled back as I walked by and said no.
The store was one large room with all the merchandise on shelves on the perimeter walls. Between the customers and the merchandise was a Jerry-rigged wall of chicken wire, plexiglass, chain link fence, and any other kind of material that keeps people's hands off the merchandise while still allowing them to see it.
In the center of this wall, opposite the entrance, was a sliding glass opening. An old black woman was standing on the other side waiting. I told her what I wanted and waited for her to go back and fourth behind the wall gathering my items. She totaled everything up and asked for the money while holding everything behind the sliding glass door. She gave me my items and change all at once by placing them in a special cylinder which allowed only one opening at a time. I picked up my things and left.
As a white man I had never been to a store where I couldn't inspect the items before purchasing them. I had never been to such an anti-theft store in my life. The neighborhood was all neatly kept houses with mowed lawns. It wasn't a graffiti covered ghetto dump. It was an all black neighborhood though, and I think that says a lot.
A few years later some Koreans opened a store in a black neighborhood. The TV news reported a protest by the black residents. The blacks accused the Koreans of racism because they always followed the blacks around the store and often accused blacks of stealing. The news showed the inside of the store. It was a traditional open shelf store. I couldn't help but think the Koreans needed to visit the old black lady's store I had been to and learn how it's done. If you're going to do business with blacks, certain precautions must be taken.