Overview:
Miami-based Haitian-owned beauty brand Ébène, founded by Fayola Nicaisse in 1999, is in its third year of an initiative supporting Haitian entrepreneurs and artisans affected by ongoing political violence and economic instability in Haiti. The brand is hosting a series of U.S. pop-up events in partnership with Haitian diaspora organizations, with upcoming stops in Washington D.C., Miami and Boston.
As Haiti’s economy continues to struggle amid ongoing gang violence and political instability, one Miami-based beauty brand is doubling down on its effort to keep Haitian entrepreneurship alive on this side of the Atlantic.
Ébène, the Haitian-owned plant-based beauty company founded in 1999 by Fayola Nicaisse, announced it is continuing and expanding its initiative to support Haitian entrepreneurs and artisans, now in its third year. The brand kicked off its latest round of events with a pop-up in Silver Spring, Md., last month and has upcoming stops planned in Washington, D.C., Miami and Boston through the fall.
The initiative is organized in partnership with the Association of Haitian Professionals, the Embassy of Haiti, the U.S. Haitian Chamber of Commerce and the Toussaint L’Ouverture Cultural Center.
According to Nicaisse, the urgency of the effort has only grown as conditions in Haiti worsen. Participating businesses have had warehouses vandalized, lost employees to violence and, in at least one case, been forced to shut down entirely after being unable to ship inventory to the United States.
“As a business owner myself, it hurts me to watch them lose so much due to the instability,” Nicaisse said in a statement. “Despite these setbacks, the commitment to uplifting Haitian entrepreneurship remains unwavering.”
The World Bank reported earlier this year that Haiti’s real GDP fell 2.7 percent in 2025, with the economy declining across all sectors, and that nearly half the country’s population lives on less than $3 a day. It is that backdrop that has made the pop-ups an increasingly vital outlet for businesses that have few other options to reach customers abroad.
This year’s participating brands alongside Ébène include Kay Atizan, Café Rebo, Collection 1804 and Jiga Sweets, among others. Each event is designed to showcase Haitian craftsmanship across categories including art, natural beauty, traditional garments, confectionaries and cuisine.
Beyond the pop-ups, Ébène reinvests a portion of its proceeds into education and extracurricular programs for youth in Haiti, rooted in the country’s national motto, L’Union Fait La Force — “Unity Makes Us Strong.”
“I am deeply committed to supporting the Haitian community and my fellow entrepreneurs during these challenging times,” Nicaisse said. “We are not only creating opportunities for these businesses to thrive, but also celebrating the beauty, resilience, and cultural legacy of Haiti.”
That commitment tracks with how Nicaisse has long described the brand’s broader mission. “Ébène is more than a beauty brand,” she told The Haitian Times in a previous interview. “It’s about celebrating natural beauty while protecting good health and the planet.”
Nicaisse launched Ébène out of her home kitchen after struggling to find chemical-free products suited to Black skin and hair while working as a fashion model in Haiti in the 1990s.
“The beauty products made for white consumers’ skin tones and hair were of high quality,” she said. “However, those products didn’t meet the needs of Black and brown skin and hair types.”It’s a gap that customers previously told The Haitian Times they felt personally. Several South Florida shoppers described years of damage from chemical-based products before turning to Ébène, one saying the brand helped her hair recover its natural health after perms left it severely damaged, another crediting it with healing skin so dry it had begun to crack. That same sense of purpose now extends beyond her own brand.
