Indigenous business owners and professionals will get together for networking, inspiration and accountability in a new monthly event for Tamworth.
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The first Black Coffee was held last week at Long Gully Cafe, attracting entrepreneurs in creative arts, graphic design, cultural education and tourism, and teaching.
Organiser Bonnie Cochrane said the breakfast group had discussed business goals and committed to actions to achieve them.
The Tamworth woman, originally from Walgett, is an experienced teacher, and the founder of Teaching Indigenous Perspectives in the Australian Curriculum (TIPIAC).
She said she'd read of the success of Black Coffee and thought, "we need this in Tamworth, because there are so many other deadly Indigenous owners here".
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"In amongst all the networking I've done in the last couple of years, I ran into a post that was about Black Coffee, and Indigenous business owners getting together and sharing stories and encouraging each other to grow and expand," she said.
"I thought it would be a wonderful opportunity to start a Black Coffee here."
Mrs Cochrane said one cultural challenge for many Indigenous business owners was "speaking up about ourselves".
"It's that tall poppy syndrome: we tend to not speak highly of ourselves in front of people," she said.
So for her, action items after the first Black Coffee will be uploading two new products to her website per week "and also stepping into an uncomfortable area for me and making cold calls - six to 12 for the month".
The plan is to hold the sessions on the last Thursday of every month, but the details are yet to be confirmed.
Mrs Cochrane said future Black Coffees could include guest speakers "and maybe even calling up on other Indigenous business owners to share their strengths so we're building each other up".
"It's to help us become more self-sustainable, so that we're taking the financial gains from owning a business back into the community and helping our brothers and sisters up," she said.
"It's also being a role model to those up-and-coming youngsters and knowing it's not just Indigenous athletes that are successful, there are many other entrepreneurs and business owners that are also important."
