Tobi Oredein’s vision to tell the stories of Black women gave the world Black Ballad, a safe space for women of colour to elevate their voices through content, community, and commerce. Oredein talks to AMAKA about the inspiration behind the platform and why Black women should never accept no for an answer.
After working for a range of online and print publications, Oredein co-founded Black Ballad in 2014 to tell stories that discussed the issues Black women were facing. She has used her role as editor of the platform to give many Black female journalists their first opportunity to be paid for their work, in addition to helping thousands of women of colour create a community that does one thing – put Black women first. In 2016, the publication ran a successful crowdfunding campaign that raised over £10,500. This was to help it transition into a membership platform where members pay a monthly or annual fee to obtain full access to the content produced, making it the first women's lifestyle publication in the UK to transition from a free site into a subscription media company.
Seek out opportunities, and use the experience to get more opportunities
I’m a British Nigerian from East London. I wanted to be a journalist at a young age, and thankfully, my parents encouraged that. My dad bought me a subscription to Tune Magazine for my twelfth birthday, it felt life-changing, and I remember reading the magazines and falling more in love with how they wrote. When I got into King’s College London, I undertook American Studies because I was super interested in race in the USA. I found that America was ahead of the curve regarding race and culture. While studying race at the university, I also interned in different publications, which helped shape my media career.
Journalism is a competitive field, and based on who you ask, they might tell you succeeding in this space is dependent on who you know. Did you enjoy certain privileges in the early days of your journalism career?
Not at all. I had a part-time retail job at the university working at a clothing store, and the store had a fashion magazine, so I asked if I could contact the person who handled the magazine. However, I was told that they didn’t have any space for me, but they could offer me some work experience in their PR agency. I gained some work experience with the agency, and as it turned out, they liked how I dressed, and then when a certain magazine reached out to them saying they were doing a feature about interns that dress well, my agency put me forward. So I went for the shoot, and when I asked if I could gain some work experience with them as a journalist, they agreed, and by working with them, I could use that experience to get into other places and gain more work experience. This eventually landed me my first full-time job in journalism, and then I freelanced from there, but it all started from that retail job. So I used the opportunities that came my way and climbed up the ladder. That's my journey.
What were the daunting challenges you faced during your early journalism journey?
The biggest challenge during my career was that, when I was starting as an intern, people expected me to work for free, which is not viable, especially if you’re from a middle-class background. Another big challenge is that journalism is based on who you know, and the stronger your connections, the better your prospects of getting a job. And since I didn’t know anybody, it took me longer to get to places, and sometimes I had to take multiple steps. So I think these two issues, lack of money and connections, were my biggest challenges.
Black Ballad is an amazing platform for Black British women; what inspired you to co-establish it?
As I said, my university course was a massive driver for establishing Black Ballad. For my dissertation, I had to look at Black magazines, but I could not find any magazine that spoke intelligently to Black women in Britain and Europe about duty, politics, careers, and sex. I didn’t think such a publication existed. Also, when I was interning, all the offices were filled with white women, and it was weird to me how you’d say, “This is Britain’s best magazine”, but all the people making the decisions were white; I didn’t understand. So, I saw the market gap, and I had Black women friends from different walks of life saying to me, “I don’t know where to read something that speaks from a Black female’s perspective”. So the fact that I studied race and was in this industry, I could see a gap in the market and felt I could fill it, and that’s how Black Ballad came to life.
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In what ways has Black Ballad created opportunities for the Black British woman?
As a business, Black Ballad has really done well in giving Black women the opportunities they desire, the opportunities for readers to hear of their experiences in an unfiltered and honest way. We’re giving Black female writers and Black people the chance to write in a way that is not white-washed, and they can be paid for their talents, as well as giving our team the chance to be in an environment that doesn’t want to water their Blackness down in any way. And while we do not bother about what the white people think about us, we have forced the white media to look at the experiences of Black women and do better by them; so by trying not to be mainstream, we have still achieved that.
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Never be afraid to build your team
How can Black women in Africa who are yearning to be part of Black Ballad benefit from the platform?
I identify as British-Nigerian, and one of the things we do is that we have writers across the African continent and the African diaspora. We don’t shy away from commissioning writers not based in Britain, and we don’t shun issues that don’t affect us here. So we make sure to commission writers from outside the UK to write about certain perspectives, and we take responsibility by covering topical issues.
What advice would you give to the young Black woman aiming to have a successful career in whatever she’s doing?
I’ll tell her to utilise mentors or sponsors in her career; I don’t think I had a lot of guidance coming up. I’ll also tell her never to take “NO” for an answer; if someone tells you no, you’re probably talking to the wrong person. There is always a way, and sometimes you have to go out of the system because the system seldom works for Black women. As for this saying about Black women having a seat at the table, I was never interested in having a seat at the table, and I still am not. I have a table that I have built, along with chairs that I have built with the help of other Black women. Also, never be afraid to build your own team if you can; it is never easy for some people, but don’t always take what people give you. Don’t take the crumbs. If I’d taken the seat at the table, I’d never be able to say that I’ve paid over half a million pounds to Black women and Black creatives to work for Black Ballads, and I won’t have a team that is dedicated to serving Black women.