Today we’d like to introduce you to Jocelyn McCants, Cayela White, and Shunte McClellan.
A few years ago, Cayela (Melanated co-founder) decided to celebrate her 36th birthday with a camping trip to Red Top Mountain. Several of us in the group were nervous about being in the “wild” but because of our love for Cayela, we sucked it up. Once we arrived, pitched our tents, put meat on the grill, broke out a game of spades, started fishing….let’s just say we were hooked on this new chill and hangout experience. Cayela started planning other camping trips and the number of new campers grew. Cayela was the catalyst. During a camping trip near Helen, GA back in October 2018, Cayela, Shunte, and Jocelyn decided that it was time expand the camping experience to incorporate other potential “melanated” campers. Melanated Campout was birthed with the objective of providing a relaxing and fun environment for new and experienced campers. Imagine, an entire campground reserved for a private Melanated Campout experience where we celebrate and promote each other while relaxing and partying under the stars.
Has it been a smooth road?
Roads that lead to greatness are sometimes rocky. For Melanated Campout, we experienced a few challenges. We first attempted to do the social media management (Instagram and Facebook Page/Facebook Group), videos for YouTube, marketing, vendor selections all on our own while holding down full-time corporate jobs. Lucky for us we have a professional project manager on the team-Jocelyn. She realigned our duties, created a project plan and a social media plan, Shunte was able to reach out to her cousin to bring her on as the new Social Media Manager.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
Melanated Campout is not just camping. It is a Melanated experience! We incorporated tribal thinking and determined the best way to help black people get comfortable with camping, is to provide a weekend full of Melanated experience with 100-200 campers. The energy of the co-owners is contagious. We look forward to spreading this energy to new and experienced campers. We love minority-owned businesses…hey, we’re one! We allow minority-owned vendors to vend for free on Vendor Row when they purchase one of our value-add camping packages. What sets us apart from other outdoor group companies is that we focus on the enrichment of our Melanated people. We conclude the weekend of camping with “Empowerment Sunday” where we have an open forum to discuss how we can improve our community.
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Atlanta, being the birthplace of Melanated Campout, is the perfect city to create a business focused on the African American consumer. We cannot think of a city better than Atlanta that has a better representation of black wealth, black employment, black businesses, and black culture. If a new business has an interest to target the black consumer, here are a few tips: 1. Start and sustain excellent customer service. 2. Evolve based on customer feedback. 3. Create a budget that allows for profit and still add value to the consumer 4. Develop a sound business plan 5. Invest money back into the business.
Pricing:
- “I’m in the Building” tent space camp package (covers passes for 4 people) – $245 early bird pricing before March 15th
- “I’m in the Building” RV space camp package (covers passes for 4 people) – $260 early bird pricing before March 15th
- “We Work, You Relax” camp package (covers passes for 4 people) – $700 early bird pricing before March 15th
- “Glamp me Down” (covers passes for 4 people) – $1000 early bird pricing before March 15th
Contact Info:
- Website: https://melanatedcampout.com/
- Phone: 404-556-9528
- Email: info@melanatedcampout.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/melanatedcampout/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/162383991378456/?source_id=250803142225014
- Other: https://www.facebook.com/melanatedcampout/?modal=composer¬if_id=1548631682588343¬if_t=aymt_upsell_tip&ref=notif
Image Credit:
At First Sight by JM
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