Mahisha Dellinger, founder and CEO of natural hair care company Curls, is calling out workplaces that refuse to let women of color style their hair naturally and rock their Afros.

“We understand the European standard of beauty is in our face. We can’t escape it,” Dellinger told Yahoo Finance. “The straight flowy locks that you see all over TV and the media and then also the men that like and clamor to those women really impact a young woman’s self-esteem if you have kinkier textured hair.”

The U.S. hair care market is about $47 billion and expected to grow to over $50 billion by 2025.

The pressure to fit into office culture in order to earn a living has left many women of color “feeling the need to assimilate in corporate America,” said Dellinger. “Some industries don’t accept natural hair. Think of...reporters. People can’t just go in and change a norm. It’s hard to actually come in and rock your Afro and feel like you’re going to be received and respected as much as your colleague with the straight tresses.”

Pete Buttigieg, who was recently confirmed as President Biden’s Transportation Secretary, has also previously sounded off about hair discrimination in corporate America. “You’re not free if you can be kicked out of school or lose your job if somebody says your hair is a distraction. Hair discrimination is racial discrimination,” he said in 2019.

In 2019, California, New York and New Jersey passed legislation to protect individuals from race-based hair discrimination in the workplace and at school. Several more states introduced or advanced similar bills in 2020.

These moves have come amid actions by companies who fired or rescinded job offers to workers who refused to change their hairstyles. Chastity Jones, a woman from Alabama, was told by an HR manager that her dreadlocks were against workplace policy because "they tend to get messy." Her job offer in 2010 was rescinded when she refused to cut her hair. In 2017, Destiny Thompkins, a Banana Republic employee in New York, was disciplined and told she wouldn't be scheduled for more shifts unless she got rid of her box braids, which her manager called "too urban" and "unkempt" for the retailer. After a public uproar, that manager was fired.

Helping women-owned small businesses

Dellinger left a marketing job at Intel to start “Curls,” her own hair care product brand in 2002. Six years later, she inked a deal with Target to sell her products at their stores, which helped her product line become a multimillion-dollar business. Curls products are sold in hair salons and major retail stores, including Walmart (WMT), Amazon (AMZM), Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY), CVS (CVS), Rite Aid (RAD), and Walgreens (WBA).

Subjecting women to a requirement to have straight hair and resort to chemicals that may cause permanent damage to their natural hair is unfortunate, said Dellinger. “My performance in my job should be solely based on my output, not my kinks,” she said.

Dellinger started hosting “Mind Your Business with Mahisha” on the Oprah Winfrey Network in 2018 to help women-owned small businesses. “The main challenges I see in our community for Black female-based businesses [are] lack of resources, lack of information, and lack of access to the right people, to the right seats at the right table,” she said.

Dellinger said she was denied a small-business loan when she tried to launch her business in spite of having stellar credit. Undeterred, she devoted her personal savings and every bonus she received to the launch of her business.

Only half of small businesses survive after five years, according to the Small Business Administration. “It’s a real challenge. So we have to become really creative and think outside the box to find ways to finance your company. And maybe that’s doing a GoFundMe for those in local communities,” said Dellinger. “I think one of the biggest pieces that will take women of color over the top is to have that grit to get it done.”

Dellinger, who was raised in poverty by a single mother, has little patience for excuses. “This is the harsh reality,” she said. “What we have to do as women of color is take the lemons that we were dealt and make the best tasting lemonade money can buy. That’s what I did.”

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