How Melba Wilson built a legacy business | Black Made
Melba Wilson, owner and founder of Melba's restaurants, opens up about her journey as a restaurateur for theGrio's series "Black Made."
Melba Wilson’s love for using food to bring people together and investing in her community produced one of the premier dining destinations in New York City.
Wilson is the owner and founder of Melba’s in Harlem. The restaurant opened in 2005 and Wilson hasn’t stopped there. Melba’s has expanded outside of Harlem: Melba’s at Wollman Rink in Central Park opened in 2022; Melba’s at Newark, New Jersey’s Prudential Center opened in 2023; Melba’s Grand Central is coming in October 2024; and a second Newark site is coming in 2025.
In this episode of “Black Made,” Wilson dives into her journey as a restaurateur in the city where she was “born, bred and buttered.”
“If you had told me in 2004 that I would be the sole owner of four businesses, I would’ve said ‘No,'” Wilson tells theGrio. “I could have never even dreamed that all of this would have happened.“
“This by far [is] one of the hardest things, if not the hardest thing, I’ve ever done,” Melba continues. “First of all, it’s one thing to work in a restaurant. It’s a whole other-other thing to own one and to own a restaurant in Harlem, and to be Black woman in a restaurant in Harlem.”
Wilson — who opened her restaurant in Harlem after saving $312,000 — shared some of the challenges she faced.
“You think that’s enough until you know that it’s not enough,” Wilson explains. “Being undercapitalized, trying to hire people that buy into your vision, your vision of comfort, your vision of hospitality. People are going to come in here and think, ‘OK, you’re a Black girl from Harlem, where’s the cornbread?’ I have one oven. There is no cornbread.”
“Or if you have it, why are you charging this amount,” Wilson adds. “So for me, the game is different. If you go to Red Lobster and those biscuits are not the same, guess what? You’re going to go back next month.”
“But if you come to Melba’s and my fried chicken ain’t flying, I’m going to get that review. So my life is not the same. It is not [an] equal footing, but guess what? I’m not complaining because I’m not here to complain. I’m here to always give it my best.”
Check out the full video and click here for more episodes of “Black Made.”
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