The pandemic crisis has seen a boom in Black women – ‘so often entrepreneurs of necessity’ – setting up on their own.
Known as “The Cookie Lady” around Washington DC, Lacey Fisher is famous for her British/German-inspired alcohol-infused confectionaries. Fisher launched Cookie Lane during the economic crisis of 2008, after being laid off from four different jobs as a mortgage auditor.
“I ran through my six months of savings and rent was due,” Fisher says.
Eventually Fisher returned to her full-time job but continued to work on her fledgling cookie empire “part-time”, baking her popular pecan and chocolate boozy Southern Gentleman, New York Oatmeal and Big Daddy Chocolate Chip. She decided to solely focus on Cookie Lane after a work commute turned into a five-hour nightmare while her three-month-old baby was at home. And in November 2020, the cookie lady quit her day job.
Fisher is just one of many Black women who left the workforce during the Covid-19 pandemic. In May 2020, Working Mother Research Institute reported that 52% of Black women were debating leaving their companies in two years.
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