The Kwanzaa Edition

Seven Black-Owned Gifts for the Seven Principles of Kwanzaa

Kwanzaa is built on the Nguzo Saba — seven principles that center community, culture, and shared responsibility. For this edition of BuyBlack Fridays, we’re pairing each principle with a Black-owned brand or product that reflects its spirit.

These aren’t just beautiful gifts. They are everyday reminders of unity, self-determination, collective work, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity, and faith.

🕯 Umoja — Unity

To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation, and race.

Bright Black Candles — Diaspora-Inspired Fragrances

Bright Black Candles creates scents inspired by cities and cultures across the African diaspora. Lighting one is a small ritual that honors our shared story — a reminder that we are connected, even across distance and time.
Shop Bright Black Candles

✊🏾 Kujichagulia — Self-Determination

To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves, and speak for ourselves.

Topicals — Skincare That Honors Real Skin

Topicals builds products for hyperpigmentation, flare-ups, and textured skin — with messaging that centers real people, not perfection. It’s skincare rooted in the belief that we get to define beauty on our own terms.
Shop Topicals

🤝🏾 Ujima — Collective Work & Responsibility

To build and maintain our community together and make our brothers’ and sisters’ problems our problems, and to solve them together.

BLK + GRN — Marketplace for Black Artisans

BLK + GRN is a curated marketplace of all-natural products made by Black artisans across wellness, beauty, home, and more. Supporting one purchase here supports a whole community of makers and entrepreneurs.
Shop BLK + GRN

💵 Ujamaa — Cooperative Economics

To build and maintain our own stores, shops, and other businesses and to profit from them together.

shop.buyblack.org — A Marketplace Built for Us

Ujamaa lives at the heart of shop.buyblack.org. It brings together products from Black-owned businesses across categories so that every purchase helps circulate dollars within our own community. From beauty and self-care to home goods and accessories, it’s a one-stop way to practice cooperative economics during the holidays and beyond.
Shop the BuyBlack.org Marketplace

🎯 Nia — Purpose

To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.

Hanahana Beauty — Ethically Sourced Shea Butters

Hanahana Beauty sources shea butter directly from a women’s cooperative in Ghana, with a focus on fair wages, transparency, and community reinvestment. Their body butters and scrubs nourish the skin while advancing a clear, intentional mission.
Shop Hanahana Beauty

🎨 Kuumba — Creativity

To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.

Vontélle Eyewear — Bold, Pattern-Rich Frames

With vibrant patterns and silhouettes inspired by African and Caribbean textiles, Vontélle Eyewear turns everyday glasses into wearable art. Their frames are a reminder that creativity can live in the details of how we show up in the world.
Shop Vontélle Eyewear

☕ Imani — Faith

To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders, and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

Brooklyn Tea — Loose-Leaf Teas for Reflection & Ritual

A warm cup of tea can be a small act of faith — in rest, in the future, and in ourselves. Brooklyn Tea offers thoughtfully blended loose-leaf teas that invite you to slow down, reflect, and reconnect during the holiday season and beyond.
Shop Brooklyn Tea

However you celebrate Kwanzaa — or even if you’re just learning about it for the first time — these principles offer a powerful lens for how we buy, build, and support one another. Choosing Black-owned gifts is one more way to live those values out loud.

Thank you for being part of this first BuyBlack Fridays Holiday Guide. We’re just getting started.