The effects of racism and racial discrimination on minority business development: the case of black manufacturers in Chicago's ethnic beauty aids industry

Journal of Social History, Spring, 1998 by Robert Mark Silverman

This strategy can be contrasted with the marketing approach adopted by larger mainstream firms. Typically, a larger mainstream firm marketed their products through drug stores owned by mainstream corporations and Jewish merchants in the black community, and the challenge would be to get black consumers into the drug stores to buy those products. Advertising was the principal mechanism used to facilitate this type of consumer behavior. Mainstream firms targeted black consumers with advertising campaigns featuring black celebrities, who regularly endorsed their products. The products and the celebrities became synonymous. The association between products manufactured by whites and a black spokesperson was strong; however, these companies did not mobilize informal networks in the black community. Although many black-owned firms lacked extensive advertising budgets and found it difficult accessing the shelves of drug stores owned by mainstream corporations and Jewish merchants, they tended to compensate for these structural disadvantages with the direct sales approach. This approach was beneficial for a number of reasons, particularly in allowing smaller black companies to access informal networks in the black community and get feedback from black customers. While the larger mainstream companies had limited information about the demand for ethnic beauty aids in the black community, black firms were privy to the pulse of the black consumer. As a result, most of the major innovations in the ethnic beauty aids industry came from these smaller black firms.

Direct contact with black customers was the key to getting information and tapping new markets. Murray's Superior Products Company is a perfect example of how these innovations occurred. Claude A. Barnett described how Murray's Superior Products Company got started in a letter he sent to A. L. Holsey, the Secretary of the National Negro Business League in 1933:

The reason I say that periodically a new product will succeed is best illustrated by Murray's success. The preparations for women had enjoyed a vogue for some years. Men disdained them. Suddenly some ten or twelve years ago, men began to show a desire to have their hair slicked. Murray, as an expert barber in one of the shops frequented by these young fops saw the virtue of a preparation which might do it better than the alkali products then in use. He was not the first to make a wax preparation but his was the best, and using barber shops as a medium, the growth of his concern was rapid.(33)

Even as other companies followed suit, Murray's Superior Products remained the top manufacturer of hair pomade for men. Charles D. Murray founded the company and operated it until his death in 1955.(34) The success of Murray's company resulted from his ability to access informal networks in the black community, and the ability to promote it as a "race business." In these ways, Murray followed a business formula similar to that of his peers.

In addition to maintaining contact with black customers, Murray developed a national market for his products through a sophisticated advertising campaign in the black press. For example, Murray featured endorsements from Joe Louis, the World's Heavyweight Champion, in advertisements for his products that appeared in The Crisis.(35) Of course, this is a clear representation of the positive style of advertising that Claude A. Barnett pioneered with Kashmir. However, Murray went a step further, featuring himself in an advertisement in The Crisis.(36) This type of advertisement conveyed a more sophisticated set of messages than found in the standard celebrity endorsement. With Murray the focus, this advertisement portrayed him as a successful black businessman. The advertisement included photographs of his factory, its executive suites, and the black executives and employees who worked there. It was designed to alert black consumers to the connection between purchasing Murray's products and supporting black-owned business. It was in sharp contrast to white-owned companies that used black celebrities to promote their products, since the black faces on Murray's billboard also reflected the company's board room.