I’m about to do something uncomfortable. BUT, the whole point of being a doula is supporting y’all as you do uncomfortable things, so… my turn!
Let’s talk about money. Specifically, what it means to “buy Black”, shop small, and support a Black woman owned business.
For the last few years, there’s been more of an effort to support small businesses, and keep our money in our local community, or within the Black community.
As a Black doula, I’ve benefited from this. I’m thankful.
What we haven’t done well though, is come to understand what that means, in practical terms.
Periodically, I see a thread by a colleague saying “pay your doula, so she doesn’t have to chase money down.” And this morning I saw a thread of consumers who were unhappy because businesses need them, and yet wouldn’t do more than a 30% discount.
These conversations stress me out so much that they make my armpits itch.
I feel for the business owners, deeply. Thankfully, I have very rarely felt more like a bill collector than a doula. Our clients see our worth and value us as we value them. I’m so glad! Because the problem with deep discounts is this:
A small business simply cannot mass produce like Walmart. Most Black businesses don’t have the room in our bank accounts to produce a whole bunch of stuff, or do a bunch of work, and not get paid the full value.
Say we’re talking candles- a handmade candle requires not only the time the artisan took to learn to make it, but every time she pours one, she’s involved. There are no widgets, robots and machinery. Handmade literally means it’s not done in mass quantities, so when she does a discount, she pays herself less.
As a provider of a service, I cannot clone myself or the doulas that work with me. If I slash the price of our doula packages by 50%, I would have to cut someone’s pay (and not just mine).
I am not paying the doulas who work with me minimum wage. To me, part of being a Black woman owned business means demonstrating that I care about my doulas more than Jeff Bezos cares about Amazon workers.
In businesses like mine, if we were to do the big discounts that Target, Walmart or Amazon does, we would actually feel the hit, hard.
The challenge of discounting is especially true for something like doula work.
When we go to a birth, we do not know when we’re headed back home. We have been on call for months or weeks, and show up as soon as you need us in labor. The nurses, midwives, and doctors with you in the hospital tend to leave based on their shift. But we’re there.
When we come to your home postpartum, we’re not only there for the cute parts- holding the baby is great, but handing her back so you change that first poop may not bring you relief. A thousand folks will line up to tell you how they raised their babies. That is easy. But how do you know what YOU want? That comes from your doula, often during a 3am feed.
We simply cannot mass produce that bond.
Another thing to acknowledge: doula work is also an industry that traditionally hasn’t been paid work.
For Black birth in the US specifically, during segregation, the community took care of the midwives. And the people giving birth took care of one another. (We were all always taking care. After all, we had a lot more babies and fewer of us had resources.)
It’s just not that way anymore. The same system that leads us to be alone at 2 am with engorged breasts and one last work assignment to turn in has made it so that there is no singular community to take care of us.
We have to create this community, and show how much we value one another.
As doula, we are working hard to show you that we value you:
- Pivoting and learning and staying safe in a pandemic so we can serve you.
- Showing up on time no matter what time it is.
- Ensuring that we are present and focused and bringing an open heart, years of knowledge and options.
- Becoming experts in Black maternal health and postpartum mental health.
I ask that you value your doula with money because here in the US in 2020, that’s just how it’s done.
We thank you for supporting small business, and this Black woman owned business in particular. You give us the opportunity to do the work we love! You also let us pay our bills, and even have nice things.
May more of us have nice things. You deserve them. So do your doulas.
If you’d like to work with us, it all starts with a phone call with me. Fill out our contact form!
And if you are looking for all the knowledge, info and goodness I could “mass produce”, it’s in our course, Attain. You can even play the videos in the middle of the night, and get closer to the doula experience.
