Kwanzaa Crawl Supports Black-Owned Brooklyn Businesses

BROOKLYN, NEW YORK -- A black-owned bar crawl is about to bring thousands of revelers to celebrate Kwanzaa in the streets of Brooklyn.

More than 4,000 people are expected to join the third annual Kwanzaa Crawl to celebrate and support black-owned businesses in Brooklyn and Harlem on Dec. 26, organizers said.

Revelers will be divided into 40 teams going from bar to bar on the first day of Kwanzaa, "singing and dancing, dressed in whatever makes them feel unapologetically Black and beautiful," according to the event website.

Tickets start at $25 and previous Kwanzaa Crawls have raised more than $100,000 in a single day, said organizers. A portion of this year's proceeds will go to Barbershop Books, a nonprofit literacy organization in New York City.

Twenty-five Brooklyn bars, restaurants and lounges, including Bed-Vyne, Five Spot Soul Food, Mo's Fort Greene and Tilly's Bklyn, will be hosting Crawlers.

Kwanzaa Crawl was founded in 2016 by sisters Kerry Coddett, a comedian and activist, and Krystal Stark, the owner of the talent management company Stark White Entertainment.

The sisters launched Kwanzaa Crawl in response to increasing gentrification, which, according to a New York City Comptroller's office report, has caused the number of black-owned businesses to decline steadily across the five boroughs.

"The Crawl embodies the seven principles of Kwanzaa while aiming to harness Black buying power and bring awareness to Black businesses," according to a press release.

"Part of what makes the event so successful is its partnership with other Black stakeholders within our community — showing the world what it looks like when like-minded people put their minds together."

For more information about the crawl, visit the event's website.

Photo: “A Great Day of Kwanzaa”courtesy of Rayon Richards