By Fern Gillespie
In recognition of May’s Small Business Month, Our Time Press reached out to two veteran Black women-owned businesses that care for Black Brooklynites in health and death – PEACE Health Center and Sealy Cuyler Funeral Home.
When Dr. Shadidi Kinsey studied for her career as a licensed acupuncturist in the 1980s, the holistic practice was not recognized by mainstream medicine. Today, the PEACE Health Center she co-founded in Bedford Stuyvesant offers acupuncture, message therapy and holistic services. It has a list that includes all age groups, from children to seniors – even medical referrals.
The 2020 Annual Business Survey from the US Census estimated that nearly 30 percent of black-owned businesses were in health care and social assistance. But for Dr. Kinsey it was not easy to build the holistic practice, dedicated to the black community. “We are celebrating 33 years of struggle, service and healing for our community,” she told Our Time Press.
Dr. Kinsey, the first African-American licensed by New York State to practice acupuncture, studied acupuncture at the Harlem Institute of Acupuncture, the Institute of Traditional Chinese Medicine in New York City and became a certified acupuncturist at the International Institute of Acupuncture and Traditional Medicine in Canada.
“Now I have doctors advising on acupuncture,” she said. “Acupuncture is a non-toxic natural way to heal. The body’s own energy does the healing, we just direct that energy.” She has clients who use acupuncture for allergies, migraine headaches and arthritis pain. “I have worked with organizations dealing with alcoholism, drug addiction and AIDS. Acupuncture is used in hospitals for patients receiving chemotherapy and radiation. It helps with the side effects of the medication.”
PEACE Health Center is a frontline advocate for holistic health in Brooklyn’s Black community. “Black people are under the medical apartheid system from the holocaust of slavery to today,” she said. “Acupuncture heals on different levels. Not just the physical, but the spiritual and the emotional. Stress affects our well-being and our health.”
According to the National Funeral Directors & Morticians Association, there are about 3,300 black licensed undertakers and undertakers in the United States and about 2,000 black-owned funeral homes and services. Sealy Cuyler Funeral Home, founded in 2006 in Brooklyn by Maria K. Sealy and Renaye Brown Cuyler, is the only funeral home in New York State built from the ground up by two women of color.
“When we decided to go into business, we bought the land and built the facility because we wanted to have the independence and grandeur to create this funeral business for us,” Cuyler, a practicing attorney and licensed undertaker, told Our Time. Press. “Most of the women in the funeral field come into the business through family-owned businesses.”
“We both come from entrepreneurial backgrounds. Sealy grew up in the Bahamas where her grandmother owned a bike shop. She had entered the funeral business long before I did in the 1980s in Miami, where she was educated at a mortuary school,” Cuyler said. “My grandfather, George EB Tabb, was the first African American to own his own funeral home in Williamsburg Virginia in 1926. I have been an entrepreneur since 1986 with my law firm.”
Since opening 17 years ago, Sealy Cuyler Funeral Home has earned a reputation for superior quality with personal touches in funeral planning, burial and cremation. The customer base includes Prospect Park Bedford Stuyvesant, East Flatbush, other boroughs of NYC and around New York State.
“Sealy is very skilled in cosmetic work and she creates a life like look of the lovers,” Cuyler said. “We try to be compassionate and caring. I consider people’s finances and make sure we help them stay within their budget and provide quality service as well as compassionate service.”
New York City Mayor Eric Adams and New York City Small Business Commissioner Kevin D. Kim kicked off “Small Business Month” by announcing that the NYC Business Express Service Team (BEST) initiative has helped save New York City’s small businesses for more than $22 million by avoiding fines and violations. Since launching the free program, NYC BEST has helped more than 2,200 different businesses across the five boroughs by providing small businesses with one-on-one expert support to help business owners not only resolve or avoid fines and violations, but also save time and money navigating city government rules and regulations as well as speed up permitting and licensing processes.
“New York City is where dreams are made, and we want all small businesses to have their share of that dream,” said Mayor Adams
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