About Us

Founder: Ashley Barnes 

Vice President: Hanan Barnes 

Secretary: Latilda Owens 

Board Member: Taylor Brown 

Black Entrepreneurs Alliance (BEA)

“Black Advocacy for Black Legacies”

Our Founder: Ashley Barnes founded the Black Entrepreneurs Alliance because government officials are failing black communities across Virginia. If you look around the Commonwealth, black prosperity is still a rarity in the tapestry of American dreams. Not only do most black business owners fail to reach wealth, many don’t even own their own home. It’s because that prosperity is limited to the quality of education a child has received, the relationships they had to help them out, and finding an affordable opportunity to pursue the dream they have. Did you know that in 2017 the Brookings Institute published that only 43% of black business owners owned their own home compared to 73% of white business owners? This is why black prosperity isn’t realized as it could be – because most black Virginians are redlined into a bad school. The reach of relationships are limited to communities where the powerful people only visit when they want our vote. In many cases it is too expensive to get a dream started and even more expensive to keep it going. In short, black communities are victimized by government-created wealth barriers limiting opportunities in our communities while incentivizing opportunities for everyone else. By limiting the quality of our education, our kids are less likely to become successful entrepreneurs. Without giving our kids a network to rely on, they will not have the social support system to succeed. Without giving our kids a community to do business in that has low taxes and low crime, our businesses will have to go somewhere else. Thus, this organization exists to unite Black entrepreneurs together to tear down these barriers, open the doors of opportunity, and have something to leave our families when our time here is done. Rise up. Lift up.

To achieve our goals, we will: