BLCK Street® in the Press

BLCK Street® is a Richmond, Virginia based nonprofit supporting Black business owners in their formative years of building. This page includes organizational background, key facts, photos for editorial use and press contact information.

By the Numbers

2020

Year Founded

500+

Businesses Supported

78

Incubator Alumni

5+

Years of Press Coverage

Our History

Where We Started

BLCK Street® didn’t begin with a strategic plan. It began with a question: What would it look like if Black business owners in Richmond had a real home?

In September 2020, Rasheeda Creighton, Kelli Lemon, and Melody Short launched the Jackson Ward Collective®, a membership-based community built for Black business owners in Richmond to learn, grow, and own. The timing wasn’t accidental. The country was reckoning with racial inequity in ways it hadn’t in decades, and Richmond’s Black business community needed more than a moment. It needed infrastructure.

The Jackson Ward Collective launched with more than 150 Black business owners as members, rooted intentionally in Jackson Ward, Richmond’s historic Black Wall Street. Within months, Richmond Magazine had named JWC one of its “People & Places to Watch in 2021.” The story was just getting started.

Building the Foundation

By 2021, it was clear that the Collective model, while powerful, was only part of what was needed. Black business owners weren’t just looking for community. They were looking for tools, curriculum, and real support to build businesses that lasted.

That clarity led to a significant expansion in 2022. The organization formally incorporated as The JWC Foundation, a nonprofit built to sustain and scale what the Collective had started. Two new programs launched alongside it: the Community Business Academy, a 12-week curriculum built in partnership with Rising Tide Capital; and the BLCK Street Conference, created because no conference existed that truly centered main street Black business owners.

By the time Black Enterprise covered the organization in March 2022, JWC had raised $690,000 and supported more than 175 member businesses, with 150+ Black-owned businesses having opened or expanded with JWC’s help.

Going Bigger

The BLCK Street Conference became its own signal. In its second year, it moved to the Greater Richmond Convention Center, drawing 300+ attendees and earning recognition from Rolling Out, Visit Richmond VA, and others as a first-of-its-kind event for Black business owners nationally.

Programming continued to grow. The Community Business Academy welcomed its third cohort in 2023. The JWC Foundation deepened partnerships with VCU, Activation Capital, Run Richmond 1619, and the Greater Richmond Partnership. The three original co-founders were honored by the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts as RVA Community Makers in early 2023.

Becoming BLCK Street

In 2026, the organization made a decision that had been a long time coming: to fully become what it had already been building.

The JWC Foundation rebranded as BLCK Street, honoring Richmond’s legacy as America’s first Black Wall Street while stepping into a bigger vision. Richmond will always be home. But the work we do has always been bigger than Richmond.

Under the BLCK Street name, our programs are sharper and our structure is clearer: the BLCK Street Business Lab (our 9-month intensive program), BLCK Street Exchange (open recurring programming), the BLCK Street Summit (our annual conference), and BLCK Owned by BLCK Street (a growing national directory of Black-owned businesses). The rebrand isn’t a departure. It’s a declaration.