The impact of ethnic chambers of commerce like the GABCC is powerful. According to Tam Hawkins, the support the chamber can provide businesses is life-changing. “When these companies thrive, it literally allows people to send their children to college, it helps to eradicate economic disparities for people who look like me,” says Hawkins. After years of working in corporate sales, marketing, and real estate, she adds “there is no other work I can think of that could be more rewarding.”

We’d love to be put out of business, see disparities eradicated, and make this a “non-thought.”

Established in 1982, The Greater Austin Black Chamber of Commerce’s mission is to shift the pattern of Black-owned businesses from struggling to prosperous. Under Hawkins’ stewardship since 2015, the chamber offers tangible guidance through mentorship as well as intangibles such as networking. Community engagement is a priority and the chamber organizes and hosts events to serve as a bridge between Black-owned businesses and the larger Austin business, political, and social community.

These businesses generate high dollars for Austin. When they succeed, everyone succeeds. Hawkins’ vision to attract, inspire, develop, and promote Black economic success in Austin will hopefully, as she says, “put her out of business.”