Speaker 1: An illegal alien from Guatemala charged with raping a child
Speaker 1: in Massachusetts. An MS thirteen gang member from Al Salvador
Speaker 1: accused of murdering a Texas man of Venezuelan charged with
Speaker 1: filming and selling child pornography in Michigan. These are just
Speaker 1: some of the heinous migrant criminals caught because of President
Speaker 1: Donald J.
Speaker 2: Trump's leadership.
Speaker 1: I'm Christy nom the United States Secretary of Homeland Security.
Speaker 1: Under President Trump, attempted illegal border crossings are at the
Speaker 1: lowest levels ever recorded, and over one hundred thousand illegal
Speaker 1: aliens have been arrested. If you are here illegally, your
Speaker 1: next you will be fined nearly one thousand dollars a day, imprisoned,
Speaker 1: and deported.
Speaker 2: You will never return.
Speaker 1: But if you register using our CBP home app and
Speaker 1: leave now, you could be allowed to return legally.
Speaker 2: Do what's right. Leave now.
Speaker 1: Under President Trump, America's laws, border and families will.
Speaker 3: Be protected sponsored by the United States Department of Homeland Security.
Speaker 4: So when you get the first product or the next
Speaker 4: thing is how do you market it?
Speaker 5: Are you thinking that yourself? Do I need a break
Speaker 5: the mortar?
Speaker 4: Or is it's like I'm a solely ecommerceance thing and
Speaker 4: get it in the right hand.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: So in the beginning with Active Faith, there was two
Speaker 6: big Christian sports appeal I mean Christian retailers at the time,
Speaker 6: Family Christian LifeWay. I'm thinking, once I pitched them this idea,
Speaker 6: they picking me up, we launching were gone. They all
Speaker 6: told me they'd never heard of Christian sports appailal before,
Speaker 6: so they were like, this isn't gonna work. So I
Speaker 6: actually went the e commerce route by necessity, but it
Speaker 6: ended up being a blessing, you know what I mean.
Speaker 5: I utilized my existing network.
Speaker 6: The funny thing, the thing that actually put Active Faith
Speaker 6: on the map, that gave us our first big exposure
Speaker 6: was you.
Speaker 5: Guys remember Lynn Sanity.
Speaker 6: Yeah yeah, all right, So Jeremy's went a closer got
Speaker 6: of mind, yeah exactly, and he was wearing wristbands from
Speaker 6: my company. So I got these wristbands that said Active Faith.
Speaker 6: The tagline was in Jesus name I play instead of game,
Speaker 6: I pray to tag on JA my play. And so
Speaker 6: I was sending these wrist bands out to all the
Speaker 6: basketball players that I knew that would understand this concept
Speaker 6: of a faith based sports A Pearl.
Speaker 5: Brand Jeremy was one of them.
Speaker 6: He was in the D League at the time when
Speaker 6: I first got him the wrist bands, and the Rockets
Speaker 6: called him up. We met for lunch, gave him some wristbands.
Speaker 6: They cut him. The Knicks called him up. But he's
Speaker 6: at the end of the bench. Nobody, I mean nobody
Speaker 6: saw that coming. And it was it was two weeks
Speaker 6: after the Knicks had signed him. They came back in
Speaker 6: time to play the Rockets. We went to lunch again.
Speaker 6: I was like, yo, let me give you these orange
Speaker 6: wristbands to match the Knicks uniform. And it was probably
Speaker 6: two weeks after that. I think Baron Davis got heard
Speaker 6: who whoever? The two point guards wherever in front of
Speaker 6: him got hurt and he was forced into this role
Speaker 6: and you know what happened when with insanity And so
Speaker 6: he's on the cover of Sports Illustrated Time magazine is
Speaker 6: everything you could think of, laying the ball up and
Speaker 6: you see active faith, and you see these wrist bands
Speaker 6: on his risks. I mean, you go look at it
Speaker 6: right now. Look up any picture, you're gonna see him
Speaker 6: wearing these wristbands. And Man USA Today reached out to
Speaker 6: do a story on it. Next thing, I know, my
Speaker 6: website crashing because everybody in America was trying to get
Speaker 6: these wrist bands that he was wearing. And then we
Speaker 6: were getting all this traffic from China and Taiwan. So
Speaker 6: first year out the gate after Faith, we did three
Speaker 6: hundred thousand in revenue off wristbands. Yeah yeah, so man,
Speaker 6: that's how it got started.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 6: And then you know, having that initial audience that saw
Speaker 6: the wristbands, when I introduced the apparel, it just kind of,
Speaker 6: you know, did his thing. We went from three hundred
Speaker 6: thousand to jumped from three hundred thousand to one point
Speaker 6: five million, to six million to eight and a half million,
Speaker 6: like it was something that was just moving at a
Speaker 6: speed that you know, to this day, it's hard to
Speaker 6: really put it into words what was happening. I mean,
Speaker 6: I had I had friends at my mom's house feeling orders,
Speaker 6: you know, my mom's house. I turned her my mom's
Speaker 6: house into an order for filming facility, you know what
Speaker 6: I'm saying, And was feeding my friends pizza to helped
Speaker 6: have them come over and help me feel orders.
Speaker 5: So yeah, that's that's how the first thing got off
Speaker 5: the ground.
Speaker 6: So all right, so you get that going yep, you're
Speaker 6: taking that money and then starting with Actively.
Speaker 5: Black Ause how that started? Man?
Speaker 6: So so, like I said, so, Steph was my business
Speaker 6: partner also, and at the time, you remember he wasn't
Speaker 6: the guy that everybody sees now you know what I mean.
Speaker 6: The lot of people don't realize those ankle injuries and
Speaker 6: the surgeries that he had that second year in the league.
Speaker 6: You could be looking at a Grant Hill trajectory with
Speaker 6: Steph versus what he's on. So, man, the people wasn't
Speaker 6: checking for him like that, but he was rocking with me.
Speaker 6: He was rocking with the brand. Same thing with him.
Speaker 6: He gets healthy, he wins multiple MVPs. To this day,
Speaker 6: he doesn't play a game without wearing his Active Faith
Speaker 6: Risbane and he still wears them every single game. But
Speaker 6: I was having some personal experiences that were challenging what
Speaker 6: I was doing with Active Faith, so I hid myself
Speaker 6: from people knowing who the founder of Active Faith was.
Speaker 6: In fact, my Instagram was private up until earners.
Speaker 4: What's up? You ever walk into a small business and
Speaker 4: everything just works like the checkout is fast, the receipts
Speaker 4: are digital, tipping is a breeze, and you're out the
Speaker 4: door before the line even builds odds are they're using Square.
Speaker 4: We love supporting businesses that run on Square because it
Speaker 4: just feels seamless. Whether it's a local coffee shop, a
Speaker 4: vendor at a pop up market, or even one of
Speaker 4: our merch partners, Square makes it easy for them to
Speaker 4: take payments, manage inventory, and run their business with confidence,
Speaker 4: all from one simple system. If you're a business owner
Speaker 4: or even just thinking about launching something soon, Square is
Speaker 4: hands down one of the best tools out there to
Speaker 4: help you start, run and grow. It's not just about payments,
Speaker 4: it's about giving you time back so you can folk
Speaker 4: what's on what matters most ready. To see how Square
Speaker 4: can transform your business, visit Square dot com backslash go
Speaker 4: backslash eyl to learn more that Square dot com backslash,
Speaker 4: go backslash eyl. Don't wait, don't hesitate. Let's Square handle
Speaker 4: the back end so you can keep pushing your vision forward.
Speaker 4: This episode is brought to you by P and C Bank.
Speaker 4: A lot of people think podcasts about work are boring,
Speaker 4: and sure they definitely can be, but understanding a professionals
Speaker 4: routine shows us how they achieve their success, little by
Speaker 4: little day after day. It's like banking with P and
Speaker 4: C Bank. It might seem boring to save, plan and
Speaker 4: make calculated decisions with your bank, but keeping your money
Speaker 4: boring is what helps you live or more happily fulfilled life.
Speaker 4: P and C Bank Brilliantly Boring since eighteen sixty five.
Speaker 4: Brilliantly Boring since eighteen sixty five is a service mark
Speaker 4: of the PNC Financial Service Group, Inc. P and C
Speaker 4: B Bank National Association Member FDIC.
Speaker 1: An illegal alien from Guatemala charged with raping a child
Speaker 1: in Massachusetts. An MS thirteen gang member from Al Salvador
Speaker 1: accused of murdering a Texas man of Venezuelan charged with
Speaker 1: filming and selling child pornography in Michigan. These are just
Speaker 1: some of the heinous migrant criminals caught because of President
Speaker 1: Donald J.
Speaker 2: Trump's leadership. I'm Christy Noman, the.
Speaker 1: United States Secretary of Homeland Security. Under President Trump, attempted
Speaker 1: illegal border crossings are at the lowest levels ever recorded,
Speaker 1: and over one hundred thousand illegal aliens have been arrested.
Speaker 1: If you are here illegally, your next you will be
Speaker 1: fine nearly one thousand dollars a day, imprisoned and.
Speaker 2: Deported, you will never return.
Speaker 1: But if you register using our CBP home app and
Speaker 1: leave now, you could be allowed to return legally.
Speaker 2: Do what's right. Leave now.
Speaker 1: Under President Trump America's laws, border and families will be protected.
Speaker 3: Sponsored by the United States Department of Homeland Security.
Speaker 6: I launched Actively Black my personal instagram over sixty percent
Speaker 6: of my customer base for Active Faith of Evangelical Christians,
Speaker 6: which in this country could be synonymous with racist. I
Speaker 6: didn't want them to know that it was this black
Speaker 6: man who was behind the brand, and.
Speaker 5: So you couldn't find my name on the website. I
Speaker 5: wasn't on the.
Speaker 6: Social media, none of that, and that started to bother
Speaker 6: me internally, you know what I mean. My mother and
Speaker 6: my father raised me to be proud of my blackness.
Speaker 6: That's something that was taught to me at a very
Speaker 6: early age. And here it is. I. You know, I
Speaker 6: bounced back from an injury that ended my NBA career,
Speaker 6: built a multi million dollar business out of my mom's house,
Speaker 6: and I'm afraid to even show that this is me,
Speaker 6: you know what I'm saying. And I had instances where
Speaker 6: customers will call you know, entreprene or in the beginning,
Speaker 6: you're wearing all the hats I'm doing customer service. A
Speaker 6: customer is like, you sound like you black, and I
Speaker 6: was like I am. They immediately asked for a refund.
Speaker 6: I had experiences where there were people wanting to invest
Speaker 6: in Active Faith and.
Speaker 5: Would write in go back and forth over email.
Speaker 6: We were set up in person meeting, and I'll never
Speaker 6: forget like walking into that room and seeing the looks
Speaker 6: on their faces like, oh damn, he's black.
Speaker 5: You know what I'm saying, Like I saw.
Speaker 6: It in their faces, and all of a sudden, those
Speaker 6: conversations about investing in the brand completely went quiet, you
Speaker 6: know what I mean. And so I was I was
Speaker 6: already having this internal struggle with who I am as
Speaker 6: a black man and how I was hiding myself from
Speaker 6: this brand. So I started having this idea, if I
Speaker 6: could build this brand for this faith based community, can
Speaker 6: I do the.
Speaker 5: Same thing for my people, for black people?
Speaker 6: And you know, to this day, I get I get
Speaker 6: emails from Active Faith customers who were going through chemotherapy
Speaker 6: and they were saying, I felt like giving up, but
Speaker 6: I wore my Active Faith risk band. I wore my
Speaker 6: Active Faith hoodie to chemo today. And they gave me
Speaker 6: the strength to keep fighting. That let me know that
Speaker 6: what I was building was bigger than just another apparel brand,
Speaker 6: Like this meant something to somebody intrinsically, this was having
Speaker 6: an effect on somebody's life, and so I wanted to
Speaker 6: do that same thing for black people. And really the
Speaker 6: catalyst to me finally deciding to do it. Twenty eighteen,
Speaker 6: the movie Black Panther comes out, and I remember walking
Speaker 6: out of the theater for the first time, and I
Speaker 6: just remember that feeling that I felt.
Speaker 5: Man, it was unbelievable to see like the diaspora come together.
Speaker 5: You know what I'm saying. You saw African black jamake it.
Speaker 6: Whatever you were, if you were black, you felt something
Speaker 6: the first time you saw that film. And I was like,
Speaker 6: you know what, I'm gonna create that brand and I
Speaker 6: want people to have the feeling that I had walking
Speaker 6: out of the theater watching Black Panther for the first time.
Speaker 6: I want them to had that feeling when they when
Speaker 6: they interact with this brand.
Speaker 5: Active faith kept me plenty busy.
Speaker 6: I moved out to LA six months before the pandemic
Speaker 6: shut the whole city down, and so I told myself,
Speaker 6: I'm not gonna let this time pass without burthening something new.
Speaker 6: And you know, we all witnessed the murder George Floyd
Speaker 6: and the aftermath and everything that happened after that, and
Speaker 6: so I started to see all these brands. I saw Nike,
Speaker 6: you know, indeed, it's everybody make these declarations about what
Speaker 6: they were going to do for the black community after
Speaker 6: the murder of George Floyd, And to me, it.
Speaker 5: Felt very performative.
Speaker 6: It felt like this was just part of their new
Speaker 6: marketing strategy because outside of the pandemic, the stuff that's
Speaker 6: been happening and black people has been happening for centuries,
Speaker 6: for decades, and none of these brands had ever said anything.
Speaker 5: So why a y'all saying something now?
Speaker 6: And finally that's when I decided I wasn't gonna put
Speaker 6: this idea on the shelf anymore. Ink Magazine called me
Speaker 6: to do a story on Active Faith for Juneteenth. They
Speaker 6: were looking for a black founder to do a juneteen
Speaker 6: story on, and I said, I'll do the story, but
Speaker 6: I want to talk about this new thing that I'm
Speaker 6: going to launch, And so I announced it in that
Speaker 6: article that Ink Magazine article on Juneteenth, and on Black
Speaker 6: Friday twenty twenty I've launched actingly black.
Speaker 1: An illegal alien from Guatemala charged with raping a child
Speaker 1: in Massachusetts. An MS thirteen gang member from Al Salvador
Speaker 1: accused of murdering a Texas man of Venezuelan charged with
Speaker 1: filming and selling child pornography in Michigan. These are just
Speaker 1: some of the heinous migrant criminals caught because of President
Speaker 1: Donald J.
Speaker 2: Trump's leadership.
Speaker 1: I'm Christy Noman, the United States Secretary of Homeland Security.
Speaker 1: Under President Trump, attempted illegal border crossings are at the
Speaker 1: lowest levels ever recorded, and over one hundred thousand illegal
Speaker 1: aliens have been arrested. If you are here illegally, your
Speaker 1: next you will be fine nearly one thousand dollars a day,
Speaker 1: imprisoned and deported, you will never return. But if you
Speaker 1: register using our CBP home app and leave now, you
Speaker 1: could be allowed to return legally.
Speaker 2: Do what's right. Leave now.
Speaker 1: Under President Trump, America's laws, border and families will be protected.
Speaker 3: Sponsored by the United States Department of Homeland Security,