Who We  Are

The Ke’nekt was born out of a statistic we've known to be true in Atlanta for a while: large infrastructure projects and economic engines like the Beltline have accelerated not just residential gentrification and displacement, but also the displacement of legacy Black businesses. If there is such a thing as economic genocide, it is happening as we speak, and is being furthered by the economic impacts of a global pandemic that is disproportionately affecting Black folks.. The result is a loss of economic, political, and cultural power for Black communities.

The Ke’nekt Cooperative was born to repair and remediate this loss.

We envision a future where our community reclaims power by disrupting the deeply rooted capitalist and racial economic disparities in commercial real estate. Through collective action and shared cooperative principles, we are creating an economic empowerment ecosystem that fosters ownership, sustainability, and generational wealth. By prioritizing equitable access to resources, opportunities, and decision-making, we aim to break cycles of economic exclusion and build a thriving, self-sufficient community where prosperity is shared, not concentrated. Our work is driven by the belief that economic justice is the foundation for true empowerment, and together, we are reshaping the landscape of commercial real estate to reflect our values of unity, equity, and resilience.

Kiyomi Rollins is the founder of The Good Hair Shop that was a space of communal gathering — where Black folks routinely got together and shared laughs, challenges, joys and tribulations. Like so many Black-owned small businesses, it was an important cultural space that was important to the SW Atlanta community. In 2019, as the neighborhood of  gentrified, The Good Hair Shop received an Intent to Evict notice and had to close down their shop .

When she received the eviction notice, Kiyomi did what Black folks have done for centuries in the face of institutional and systemic harm: she worked to not just alleviate her own challenges, but to help prevent other Black entrepreneurs and community-based organizations from dealing with the disruption and displacement she had to deal with. She acquired a long term lease on a commercial building and founded The Ke'nekt: a cooperative retail space for Black-owned businesses to grow and build wealth