With the NFL in its offseason, New England Patriots Safety Devin McCourty says he's focused on securing generational wealth for himself and other athletes through a new venture capital mission called Broad Street Ventures. Co-founded by Malcolm Jenkins of the New Orleans Saints and Ralonda Johnson, current president of the organization, the group looks to educate athletes while helping them gain financially.
"For us, we wanted to create a vehicle that would allow Black and brown investors to learn about venture capital but also have access to some of the best deals in the tech and consumer space," Johnson told Cheddar.
McCourty said that his close friendship with Jenkins is what spawned his decision to invest with Broad Street Ventures.
"We played in an all-star game coming out of high school and we do a lot off-the-field things together, and I think from there he started to talk about a vision of having NFL players having access to a different kind of wealth," he said.
Both grew up in New Jersey before going on to their collegiate and professional careers.
For NFL players, unlike in some other sports like the NBA and Major League Baseball, contracts are not guaranteed, the average length of a career is significantly fewer years, and as a result, players often have to find other means to secure finances for their futures. McCourty said that Broad Street Ventures allows all athletes to learn about venture capital investing.
Ralonda Johnson added that the group provides information sessions where potential investors can not only learn the ropes but also about emerging technologies.
"Not everyone [who] attends may invest or not, but just so that they at least have an understanding of tech investing. We'll go over from seed through late stage, just as much information that we can give them," she said.
For McCourty, Broad Street Ventures presents an opportunity for professional athletes to change the perception that the general public may have of them. He said with this opportunity, sports figures aren't limited to just making plays on the field. They can invest and lift up areas and industries that they are passionate about, offering fans a closer look at the human and not just the athlete.
Body odor is natural, but it’s not exactly welcome… Thankfully, we have all kinds of deodorants and antiperspirants to help eliminate the stink. But believe it or not, there was a time when people weren’t so ready to accept these solutions. In fact, it took a pretty savage marketing campaign to convince us we had a problem at all.
Cannabis World Congress and Business (CWCB) Expo returned to the Javits Center in Manhattan at a very decisive time for New York's cannabis industry. Chloe Aiello reports.
Vault, an NFT platform that allows creators to curate their own music and videos via an exclusive invitation, recently teamed up with independent artist Pip for the launch of his new album "Cotton Candy Skies." Nigel Eccles, the CEO of Vault, and singer-songwriter Pip joined Cheddar News to break down how the new platform works and why it's different from other blockchain concepts. "The way we've built it is we use the NFTs as keys that unlock the vault, and it's only the people who have those keys can actually see the contents of the vault," said Eccles. Pip added that he felt "inspired" to help with a new way of doing things in the music industry.
On this episode of ChedHER: Tiffany Johnson, CEO of Built for Launch, discusses the Black Founders Ecom Pledge that provides tools and resources for Black founders to build, launch, and scale a successful e-commerce business; Alexa von Tobel, Founder and Managing Partner of Inspired Capital, and Leoni Runge, Founder of Zaya, breaks down the state of maternal care and support for female founders in venture capital; Hannah Schwab, Global Co-Chair of Gender Expansive Council at JPMorgan Chase, explains the goal of the Gender Expansive Council and what kind of resources organizations can offer to support the LGBT+ community.
Tiffany Johnson, CEO of Built for Launch, joins ChedHER to discuss the Black Founders Ecom Pledge that provides tools and resources for Black founders to build, launch, and scale a successful e-commerce business.
Today is National Doughnut Day! Cheddar News celebrated with Steven Klein, the owner of Dough Doughnuts in New York City, who joined us with some delicious samples from hibiscus flavored to ube cheesecake. "It's a fun fest that people love doughnuts, and it's a way of celebrating doughnuts that people just want to try, and they want to try with their friends, their offices, their parties, their groups," said Klein. "So we get inundated in all our stores with lines of people coming to buy multiple doughnuts to celebrate the day."
U.S. employers added 390,000 jobs in May, extending a streak of solid hiring that has bolstered an economy under pressure from high inflation and rising interest rates.
