Black Girl Ventures Comes Home: A Decade Later, the Movement Returns to the City That Raised It

Before the pitch competitions in New York, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia. Before the corporate partners, the fellowships, and the national headlines. Before any of it, there was a home cooked meal in Southeast Washington, a small crowd, and marbles dropped into coffee mugs.

That is how Omi Bell started Black Girl Ventures. Guests voted for the founders they believed in by placing marbles in a cup, and those marbles turned into real dollars for women who had been asked to wait their turn everywhere else. What began as a living room idea grew into one of the most trusted names in inclusive entrepreneurship, a platform that has put capital, capacity, and community behind hundreds of Black and Brown women founders across the country.

This September, it comes home.

BGV Homecoming takes over the District from September 10 through 12 at The Westin DC Downtown. Three days sitting right at the intersection of innovation, equity, and entrepreneurship, and a full decade of proof behind a simple belief. Under resourced founders build. They always have.

The theme says it plainly. Celebrating our legacy. Fueling our future. This is a milestone year, and BGV is treating it like one. The organization is bringing founders, funders, ecosystem builders, and policymakers into the same room to sit with one question. What future are we building together?

The weekend is built to feed the whole person, not only the business plan. There is a comedy night for the ones who know rest and laughter are part of the work. There is a morning of stretch, breathwork, journaling, and a sound bath for founders who rarely give themselves a moment to exhale. And there is the part that made BGV a household name in this ecosystem, the signature pitch competition on Saturday, where founders get three minutes, a panel of champions, and a room that votes with real belief.

For those of us who have watched this city raise founders from the ground up, this one carries weight. Black Girl Ventures did not start in a boardroom. It started here, in Southeast, at a table Omi set herself. Ten years later the reach is national, but the roots are DC, and the homecoming is exactly what it sounds like.

The invitation is open. Come home. Leave ready to go further.

BGV Homecoming runs September 10 through 12 at The Westin DC Downtown. The Saturday pitch competition is open to all on a first come, first served basis. https://www.bgvhomecoming.com/?utm_source=ig&utm_medium=social&utm_content=link_in_bio&fbclid=PAdGRleAUKjqhwZG9mAmZkaWQWUN7G4_0k-55fxTfH3VCFtiY-zX0JJmV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkDzEyNDAyNDU3NDI4NzQxNAABp7EFRRLlA3xJBTFyD1lYSHnuO7SEOqTAlH4_cMjP63HOSSd9W_JCHfc3PKFw_aem_irF851N_r_xSRWVxZ6BPqw