Turn capital into businesses that last.
One million Black businesses formed. Most support for Black-owned businesses arrives after they've survived the hardest part; StartedBlack invests at the foundation — where a few hundred dollars and the right help decide whether a business ever gets off the ground.
What your money actually touches.
We're early, so we'd rather show you real numbers than a pie chart. Volunteer professionals donate the expertise. Funding covers the hard costs that stop founders before they start — the fees that have to be paid in cash, to the state, on the day.
4.4 million Black-owned businesses in America have no employees. About 201,000 do.
Black-owned firms are 14.4% of every U.S. business that runs without employees — and 3.4% of the businesses that employ people.
That drop-off is where we work. It is not a talent gap. It is a foundation gap, and closing it is the one thing we know how to do.
U.S. Census Bureau, Nonemployer Statistics by Demographics and the Annual Business Survey, 2023 reference year. The Annual Business Survey is conducted with the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics.
Filing fee verified against the North Carolina Secretary of State schedule. We will share our full budget and unit economics with any funder in a live conversation — we would rather do that than publish projections.
Fund the foundation.
Every filing we cover is one more of the million — a Black business that gets to start on ground that holds.
Support StartedBlack