In recent years, we’ve come to know event curation as a specialized field that orchestrates shared experiences that we the people are drawn to.
For Black culture, we’ve elevated the art of event curation to more than the average party or conference. Our niche gatherings have become vital parts of our social lives and have grown to be our preferred method of communing together.
However, through mainstream event and ticketing platforms, it has become increasingly difficult to find events specifically for us — that’s where Eventnoire comes in.
Eventnoire — the world’s latest, innovative event technology platform for event planners, organizations, and marketers — is a special online software designed with Black curators and consumers in mind.
The online ticketing platform — which prioritizes curators and consumers who wish to stay immersed in Black culture — offers much more than your average event management platform by benefitting both event planners and attendees.
Co-founders Jeff Osuji and Femi Masha shared that after working within the entertainment industry for over 15 years, they found that they were able to generate a sizable profit for other ticketing companies.
They then set out to establish their own event ticketing platform tailored to Black events and experiences to strengthen the community and keep consumers “in the Black.”
“With Eventnoire, you can rest assure that the events that are put on this platform are definitely culturally relevant,” Masha said.
The two created an innovative platform to not only highlight cultured Black experiences but provide economic solutions within the event industry for the Black community.
“We realized this was an opportunity to vertically integrate and launch our own ticketing solution that actually recycled dollars back into organizations that worked with us as well as other event curators,” said Osuji. “We’re all about not only economic empowerment, but also working to keep the dollars circulated within our community.”
What’s unique about Eventnoire is that the online platform provides both customizable templates for event curators to use and pricing power that allows them to control the event user experience. Thus, increasing the online platform’s efficiency for both parties.
In addition to being a resource for event curators to promote their events, both Osuji and Masha also wanted to be able to incentivize the event curation industry for those that invest so much time, energy, and money into bringing these events to life.
“This has given us the opportunity to create an extra revenue stream for organizations and event promoters,” said Osuji.
As far as the future of event planning goes, Eventnoire has been able to efficiently pivot their platform to easily support more virtual events in light of the coronavirus pandemic that has halted many industries in their tracks.
According to Masha, Eventnoire is well-equipped to support event planners and curators once the spread of COVID-19 slows down to help them increase their streams of revenue.
“We’re excited to be working with Polsky [University of Chicago Small Business Growth Program] as well as 1871 to continue to scale so that once COVID-19 dies down, we’ll be uniquely positioned to own the event market for our community and be a leader in the market in Africa and the U.K.,” Osuji said.
The online ticketing platform — founded in 2018 — has touched over 15 different markets in the U.S. as well as international markets including India, Nigeria, and Australia.
Since its existence, Eventnoire has generated over $1 million in gross ticket revenue with 90,000 active users. The platform has also had a chance to work with several well-known organizations such as Jack and Jill of America, Inc., Black Alumni Ball, Amazon, and many more.
Eventnoire is now gearing up to expand its platform to create a payment system that will allow them to support more events in the African and European markets.
“We’re creating a community of event curators across the country and helping us not only learn how to make more money, but super-serve the African-American community and the culture,” said Osuji.
Additionally, the platform is also launching its investment seed round in July to create more digital platforms.
“We’re really big on owning our own platforms,” said Osuji. “African-American media consumption is higher than anybody else’s, and we spend a lot of time on other people’s platforms, so we think it’s important to have our own.”
While the fate of event curation remains to be determined, Eventnoire is set on integrating more virtual events onto their platform to stay ahead of the curve.
Outside of growing their platform, Osuji and Masha also plan to seek out more Black event planners and talent in the event production industry to uplift these individuals on their platform.
Their ultimate goal for Eventnoire is to become the “BET of events.”
“We want the entire diaspora all over the country,” Osuji said. “We’re just so important to the culture [and] we want to make sure we own a piece of it.”
For more information on Eventnoire, click here.
