We spoke to Nnika Taylor, one of the co-founders of Plenty Black, about creating an app that promotes and showcases various Black-owned businesses worldwide and celebrates Black lives. Nnika and co-founder Jamar Taylor built the app on nights and weekends and needed a tool to help them build quickly. As an experienced user interface and product designer, Nnika found that Bubble's powerful no-code platform was "the ideal tool" because "it combines an easy-to-learn design interface with a powerful database and plugins."
Tell us about your app and what it does. How does your app work?
Plenty Black is a showcase of Black-owned businesses across the world. Visitors can browse hundreds of shops and services and add a business to their favorites by creating an account. Each business listing on Plenty Black contains a gallery, location, and information about the services and owner. A business can request to be added by submitting a short form, and we review each application to ensure the majority of Black ownership.
Tell us a little about your background and how you discovered no-code tools like Bubble.
I have been a UI/Product Designer for many years. I incredibly enjoy the journey from idea to reality and felt that it was important to use my skills to celebrate Black lives. We dedicated nights and weekends to Plenty Black and began searching for a tool that could get it off the ground as quickly as possible. That's when I discovered Bubble.
Why did you build your app on Bubble?
Bubble is the ideal tool for us because it combines an easy-to-learn design interface with a powerful database and plugins. We compared a few popular tools, but they either lacked the database configurations needed or weren't as flexible as Bubble's platform. Slugs are also important for our business pages and marketing, so it was great to see that Bubble now supports them.
What have been your milestones or successes so far?
Our major milestone was having over 50 businesses request to be added the first weekend Plenty Black went live. With other Black-owned directories existing, it was thrilling to see that much momentum that early on. It has been a pleasure connecting with people from around the world and becoming an extension of their team.
What are your future plans for your app?
There are quite a few exciting features upcoming. The next release will allow business owners to manage their own listings, and customers will be able to leave reviews with pictures to share their experiences. We've been working closely with our early beta users and look forward to growing together.
Learn more about Plenty Black: Website | Instagram | Twitter
About Bubble
Bubble is a leader in the no-code movement. Bubble offers a powerful point-and-click web editor and cloud hosting platform that allows users to build fully customizable web applications and workflows, ranging from simple prototypes to complex marketplaces, SaaS products, and more. Over 400,000 users are currently building and launching businesses on Bubble - many have gone on to participate in top accelerator programs, such as Y Combinator, and even raise $365M in venture funding. Bubble is more than just a product. We are a strong community of builders and entrepreneurs that are united by the belief that everyone should be able to create technology.
Do you want your app featured by Bubble? Reach out to us and tell us about your app. In addition to this series, we sometimes select our best apps to showcase on our website.
