Kiylah O’Brien has dreamed of starting a beauty supply store since she was a senior in high school. She loved hair and makeup and studied fashion merchandising at Drexel.

After working a few corporate jobs for a few years, she decided she was ready to open her own brick and mortar beauty supply store — but there were a lot of start-up costs. In addition to rent, business fees, and the like, she needed shelving and stock: natural haircare products, cosmetics and accessories. Just getting the doors open would cost her tens of thousands of dollars that she didn’t have.

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Black women like O’Brien often struggle to access loans and other traditional forms of capital. Black founders of all genders face a three-times higher rejection rate compared to their Whi

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