Black Business Month - A Time for Action

 

Black Business Month (August) is almost here, and it’s not only a time for celebration, it’s a time for action. Black-owned businesses are a vital component of society — driving innovation, creating jobs, contributing to the community, and in the case of publishing — sharing and preserving important stories, history, and culture. When Frederick E. Jordan and John William Templeton founded Black Business Month in 2004, their goal was not only to recognize Black-owned businesses and their contributions but to “drive the policy agenda” given the unique challenges Black business owners face.  For Jordan, one of those big challenges was lack of access to capital, which continues to be a hurdle today. Add to that budget cuts, book bans, growing opposition to inclusive books and history, and a strained economy and indeed it’s a challenging time. To continue making an impact, Black businesses need sustained investment. As we navigate this climate as entrepreneurs at Just Us Books, we’re also doing all that we can to uplift our fellow Black businesses, including: -More intentional spending. We prioritize Black, small and local businesses for everything from printing for our books to catering for our events. -Growing our networks. We want to be able to find the businesses we need and recommend them to others, even if we don’t require their products or services at the time.  -Use our platforms to amplify. We post businesses on social media, highlight them in every newsletter, and use our events and other channels to spread the word. What’s an action you’re taking to invest in Black owned businesses? We’d love to hear your ideas. For more suggestions, check out: 9 Ways to Support Black-Owned Businesses  Pictured above: Just Us Books founders Wade and Cheryl Hudson with fellow publishers, Haki Madhubuti, founder of Third World Press Foundation and Paul Coates, founder of Black Classic Press, at the Havana International Bookfair in Cuba.

Book and Bookish Gift Ideas from Small Businesses and Creators

In the spirit of cooperative economics, we’re spotlighting book and bookish gifts from independent creators and small businesses. There’s something for everyone, adults included!

And remember, when you shop small, you’re not just giving unique and meaningful gifts — you’re supporting talented creators and making a real difference in independent businesses. 

Here's our list:

King of Kindergarten Tonie based on the award-winning picture book by Derrick Barnes and Vanessa Brantley-Newton 

I’m Still An Afro-Bets Kid sweatshirt

Shirts featuring the Afro-Bets Kids, who helped launch Just Us Books 36 years ago. (Available in kids and adults sizes)

Charlie Drew and His Missing Stethoscope

By Dr. David C. Miller, illustrated by Cameron Wilson - a picture book about an 11-year-old genius who attends Howard University Medical School as the youngest student in the United States in medical school.

Leverage Everything In Life journal 

Designed to help you map out your next big idea, organize daily tasks and everything in between.

Just Us Books pom pom beanie 

Sisters of the Sidewalk by Shadra Strickland

A digital print from Shadra's picture book Jump In. 

Good Books Make A Difference canvas tote

A stylish carrier for books and more.

On My Own: Vision Board Guidebook for Young People by Patrick Oliver guides young people through an interactive process that will help them with goal setting. 

Black Children’s Book Week tee

Celebrate the global event that spotlights Black children and their representation in children's books and other media. Plus: Save the date for the 2025: February 23 - March 1, 2025

Black Collection shirts 

A collab between Just Us Books and creative brand From the Xrt celebrating Black book publishing and some of the many people who make it possible. 

Good Books Make A Difference mug

Enjoy your favorite books with your favorite beverage.

Brave Enough to Be the Light

One thing we love about this time of year is the focus on community. If your social media feeds are anything like ours, it’s full of people asking about recommendations for Black owned businesses, local shops, and community organizations to support. As we navigate a challenging climate where more book are being banned, there’s increasing pushback on diversity, equity and inclusion, and people are preparing for what the new administration will bring in 2025, it’s encouraging to see so many people take action to ensure the work and institutions that we say are important can continue to operate and even thrive. 

We need that supportive community. So do our children.

During a recent Family Literacy Month event in Little Rock, author and Just Us Books co-founder Wade Hudson, asked students to come up front. He had a message for them.

"Each of you is blessed with a gift or gifts that you will use to make your unique contributions to the world,” he said. “Each of you is special. You must believe that. You must have faith in yourself. No matter what challenges may come, you can overcome them. You must overcome them. Our country and our world need you more than ever now.” 

While there may be lots of uncertainty, we know there’s so much power in community. And there may be no more crucial time than now to identify what we can do — individually and collectively— to support the people and causes that are most important to us and our future. 

As Amanda Gorman, the youngest Inaugural Poet in U.S. history reminds us:

“There is always light. If only we’re brave enough to see it. If only we’re brave enough to be it.”

Just Us Books to Host Writing Our Future: A Celebration of Black Children’s Literature

In honor of our milestone 35th anniversary and Black History Month, Just Us Books is proud to present a program that will bring together a dozen acclaimed Black children’s book authors and illustrators. 

Writing Our Future: A Celebration of Black Children’s Literature will be held Saturday, February 17, 2024, 12 - 2:30 pm at the Montclair Public Library, 50 South Fullerton Ave. in Montclair. It will also be streamed online.

Sponsored in collaboration with the Montclair Public Library and local independent bookstore Watchung Booksellers, the event will feature panels, book readings, autograph signings and literary performances. 

Guest authors and illustrators include: Rita Williams-Garcia (One Crazy Summer), Valerie Wilson Wesley (Willimena Rules series), Denise Lewis Patrick (Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson), Sharon Dennis Wyeth (Something Beautiful), Eric Velasquez (Schomburg: The Man Who Built a Library), Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich (Operation Sisterhood); Torrey Maldonado (What Lane?), George Ford (The Story of Ruby Bridges), author-illustrator-educator Toney Jackson who will deliver a spoken word performance, as well as authors and Just Us Books founders, Wade Hudson and Cheryl Willis Hudson.

“Books play such an important role in preserving and sharing Black history and culture. We can’t think of a better way to commemorate Just Us Books’ 35 years in publishing than by bringing together a talented group of authors and illustrators for a Black History Month literary celebration,” said Wade Hudson, CEO of Just Us Books.

“We’re hoping to reach the entire community with this event,” explains Cheryl Willis Hudson, Editorial Director of Just Us Books. “It’s a great opportunity for children to meet published authors and illustrators; for aspiring creators to learn about building careers in publishing; and for parents, educators and readers of all ages to get some wonderful books.”

Panels include:

·       Our Literature’s Legacy, a conversation about the path to more diversity in children’s publishing and how we continue the progress

·       Putting it All Together: Creating Books for Young Readers about the author and illustrator creative process, developing your craft, and how to break into and succeed in the industry

·       The Power of the Pen highlighting the power of children’s literature to inspire change

The event is free and open to the public, including children of all ages. 

Registration is encouraged for in-person attendance: https://montclairlibrary.libnet.info/event/9975696 and is required for virtual attendance: https://montclairlibrary.libnet.info/event/10147473 

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Embracing the Past, Empowering Our Future: Reflections on Just Us Books’ 35 Years

by Wade Hudson and Cheryl Willis Hudson
founders, Just Us Books

Thirty-five years ago, we sat at our dinner table contemplating starting our own children’s book publishing company. We had already self-published two books, the AFRO-BETS ABC Book and the AFRO-BETS 123 Book and our success with them in the marketplace prompted a serious discussion. Should we strike out and expand our venture to publish works by other Black book creators?

Wade and Cheryl Hudson present the AFRO-BETS Kids at the
Portsmouth, VA Public Library to an audience that includes their son Stephan in 1987. 

There was clearly a need. There were few books for children and young adults that featured Black characters and that drew from Black history, culture and experiences. And we knew there was a demand. We had had trouble finding for our two children, books that featured characters who looked like them and stories that reflected their experiences and heritage. We knew other Black parents and teachers faced the same difficulty. 

It wasn’t a long discussion. We decided to step out on faith just as our ancestors had done before us.  Just Us Books was born. We chose that name because, simply, it was just the two of us.

The Just Us Books staff poses for a photo in 1992

Much has changed over these 35 years. We entered an industry in the 80s when only a handful of Black book creators were widely recognized such as Virginia Hamilton, Tom Feelings, Mildred Taylor, Walter Dean Myers, Eloise Greenfield, George Ford and James Haskins. Black editors, art directors and marketing professionals were few and far between. There were very few in-person book tours by children’s book authors or illustrators and making a national best-sellers list like the New York Times was a far-off dream. 

Over time, however, we have seen more Black and other book creators of color enter the industry. There has been an uptick in the number of BIPOC people in publishing positions. Black and book creators of color have won major industry awards and the bestseller lists are no longer nearly all white. We would like to think that Just Us Books has played a role in helping to achieve this progress.

Dr. Loretta Long reads her book Courtney's Birthday Party at a school visit

But so many challenges still remain. Books by Black creators are still a small percentage of the total number published every year. There is still a disparity in advances and royalties paid to Black and BIPOC authors and illustrators versus what’s paid to those who are white. Nearly 80 percent of the publishing companies staff are white. Most books by BIPOC authors and illustrators are not marketed as vigorously as those of white authors and illustrators. The myth that books by Black creators don’t sell is still a major barrier.  And most recently, book banning, and the closing of school libraries have added to the list of challenges as efforts to undo the progress that has been made intensify.   

We face these issues as we have done in the past. With resolve. Advocating and agitating for inclusion, diversity and equity ─ and doing the important work of sharing good stories that reflect a full range of experiences that center Black children, children of color and others who are marginalized. That same determination still drives us even as we must prepare to pass the baton to the next generations. We will do so assured that the struggle to create an industry and a world that is more just and equitable will continue.

Just Us Books’ 35 years have been quite a journey. As with any business endeavor, there have been periods of exciting milestones, disappointments, economic challenges, and many peaks and valleys. We have seen far too many other publishing ventures close their doors. Thankfully, as the Langston Hughes declared in his 1957 poem, we’re “Still Here.”

A parent reads the AFRO-BETS A B C Book to their child,
 decades after the title's initial publication

We are so grateful to the many Just Us Books authors, illustrators, publishing industry professionals and dedicated Just Us Books staff members who have partnered with us on this journey. We appreciate all the parents, teachers, administrators, librarians, booksellers, young readers, and other supporters who have been such an important part of this history too. In so many ways, we are all like family. There would be no Just Us Books, and certainly no 35 years, without you.  

Wade and Cheryl Hudson celebrate the publication of
We Rise, We Resist, We Raise Our Voices with contributors and 
author and illustrator friends at the Celebrating Our Voices event
held at North Carolina Central University.

And so, we’re still here and we continue, embracing the journey ahead. Creating good books that make a difference in the lives of children everywhere.

Just Us Books founders Cheryl Willis Hudson and Wade Hudson

Just Us Books, Nation’s Leading Black Owned Children’s Book Publisher, Celebrates 35th Anniversary

(West Orange, NJ) September 22, 2023 ─ The average life span of a small business is eight and a half years according to The New York Times. As Just Us Books prepares to celebrate 35 years in business, it’s not only beating the odds, it’s also continuing to blaze a trail, publishing children’s books that center and celebrate Black stories, history and culture.

“Just Us Books’ 35th anniversary is not just a celebration of our company,” says Wade Hudson, CEO and co-founder. “It’s a recognition of 35 years of children reading, learning, growing, and being affirmed through stories that reflect the richness of Black culture and history, which is especially important in today’s climate of banned and challenged books.”

The company plans to celebrate the milestone throughout its 35th year, which begins October 1, 2023, with special content and events, including a bookfair being planned for spring.

“We’re reminded every day ─ by teachers, librarians, parents, readers of all ages ─ that our work, our books are needed,” says Cheryl Hudson, Editorial Director and co-founder of Just Us Books. “Their support has been such a big part of Just Us Books’ journey. So we’re looking forward to celebrating this milestone with our extended community throughout the year.”

The Just Us Books journey began in the early 1980s. Wade Hudson and Cheryl Willis Hudson, who live in East Orange, NJ, were parents in search of children's books that reflected the diversity of Black history, heritage and experiences. Disappointed by the number they found and their limited availability, the couple embarked upon a mission: to create the kind of positive, Black-interest books that they wanted for their own two children.

Combining their experience, Wade’s in writing and marketing, Cheryl’s in art and publishing, they developed ideas for books that shared universal children’s themes from an Afrocentric perspective. The couple presented manuscripts to publishing houses but they were repeatedly turned down ― several publishing professionals even doubting the viability of a market for children’s books featuring Black characters. So the Hudsons decided to publish the books themselves. The AFRO-BETS A B C Book was released in 1987 and Just Us Books was incorporated a year later.

The success of the small press soon proved doubters wrong. Titles including Bookof Black Heroes From A to Z and Bright Eyes, Brown Skin became classroom and library staples. And larger publishing companies followed Just Us Books’ lead, publishing and widely distributing more children’s books featuring diverse stories and characters.

The company’s 35-year history has been marked by numerous accomplishments including a production partnership with Crown, an imprint of Random House, which produced the three anthologies including the award-winning We Rise, We Resist, We Raise Our Voices; a 1999 marketing partnership with General Mills and the UniverSoul Circus; and the publication of In Praise of Our Fathers and Our Mothers, a book about the Black family that brought together celebrated authors and artists, including Gwendolyn Brooks, Virginia Hamilton, Walter Dean Myers, Jeanne Moutousammy-Ashe, Leo and Diane Dillon, Fred and Patricia McKissack. Its books, including From A Child’s Heart; The Secret Olivia Told Me, I’m A Big Sister Now and Kwame Nkrumah’s Midnight Speech for Independence, have earned numerous awards. Just Us Books has won multiple honors, including Small Business Pioneer of the Year, the Children’s Book Council Diversity Award, and its founders have become recognized leaders in publishing and the push for diversity in children’s literature, with the couple being awarded the prestigious Carle Honor for Mentorship in 2022. 

In 35 years of operation, Just Us Books has become more than a children's book publishing company; it's become an institution. It also remains one of the nation's few Black-owned publishers. And the company continues its mission grounded in the same belief that helped launch the company three and a half decades ago: Good books make a difference.

Just Us Books’ titles can be purchased wherever books are sold and via its website: justusbooks.com. Connect with the company on social at @JustUsBooks across all platforms.