Meet Tamara McNeil of Just Like Me! Box

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tamara McNeil.

Tamara, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I’m a 33-year-old wife and mom. The idea of Just Like Me! Box came from my personal experience in trying to find books for my young son with characters that look like him.

Like most moms, I was super excited to start and grow my son’s library but I noticed very quickly that there’s not a lot of diversity in the books carried in big box stores and book retailers.

After visiting multiple big box stores and libraries and realizing that finding children’s books with black protagonists wasn’t going to be easy, I took to the Internet. But even then if you don’t know specific titles or authors that could be time-consuming as well. So I found a children’s book subscription service but out of the 2-3 years that they’ve been in business, they’ve never once featured a black children’s book. That’s when I decided to start my own. I knew there had to be parents who shared the same frustrations I had.

We launched in May 2016. Just Like Me! Box is for parents who want their children to have a diverse library. Books are among the first representations of the broader world that we see and they are introduced at a critical time. The truth is everybody should read diverse and black children’s literature. In this current political climate, it’s extremely important that all children feel represented, especially from the companies we spend money with.

Has it been a smooth road?
It has not been a smooth road. One of our biggest struggles is capital. We are growing quickly but gaining access to capital to scale has been difficult.

So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Just Like Me! Box story. Tell us more about the business.
The purpose of Just Like Me! Box is to instill cultural pride and hope in our children. I hope that the books in the box encourage parents to spend quality time reading with their kids and to spark conversations about the storylines in the books.

Just Like Me! Box teaches young kids that they matter. I hope to inspire kids to dream big because the sky is the limit. When you never see yourself represented as someone normal, powerful or successful it’s hard to believe that you can obtain success and that you can be whatever you want to be. Often times African American kids are born with preconceived limitations of what they can be and what they can achieve. I hope Just Like Me! Box inspires kids to think beyond their neighborhoods and reach beyond the four walls that surround them and dream BIG.

I also hope to bring exposure to independent, African American authors by featuring their book(s) in our box. A lot of the authors I feature do not have big publishing companies to publicize their books and they are working with extremely low budgets but their books are amazing. I hope we can help them as much as we can.

So, what’s next? Any big plans?
I plan to disrupt the way major publishing companies market and distribute their books. And to continue to dispel and negative connotations about African Americans and reading.

Pricing:

• Subscriptions starting at $28 per month.

Contact Info:

• Website: JustLikeMeBox.com
• Instagram: @justlikemebox
• Facebook: facebook.com/justlikemebox
• Twitter: @justlikemebox

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