Yvonne “Bonnie” Garcia fell in love with the promotions and marketing business while spinning tunes as a disc jockey in San Antonio fresh out of the University of Texas at Austin. In addition to her on-air duties at KTFM radio, she was responsible for producing the station’s commercials, as well as conducting promotional radio remotes.

I was intrigued by the creative advertising, promotions, and community outreach aspects of radio and that was the beginning of my career in marketing,” Garcia recalls.

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At Customized, we believe your health and safety always come fi rst, therefore having a clean space to work in is a basic human right,” Velez says. “This is why, through our company, we strive to surpass expectations of what it means to have a clean building and help our customers maintain the health-iest work environment possible for their employees, all while helping them not break the bank.”

Customized is Green Seal-certifi ed and pro-vides science-based environmental certifi ca-tion standards that are credible, transparent, and essential to helping manufacturers, purchasers, and consumers make responsi-ble choices that positively impact business behavior and improve quality of life.

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When the Trump Administration released its proposed budget in March, there were several items in it that could spell trouble for small and diverse businesses. The Minority Business Development Agency, which has supported minority-owned businesses for almost a half century, will be defunded under the President’s proposed budget. And, the Small Business Administration is targeted with a 5 percent cut for the next fi scal year. With news such as this, the via-bility and work of diversity advocacy organizations on behalf of diverse businesses is more important than ever.

We asked several organizations to outline their advocacy efforts in the development and growth of diverse businesses and in ensuring that these businesses continue to receive equal opportunities to participate in the corporate supply chain.

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New York City is one of the largest and most diverse cities in the world with a vibrant mix of race, ethnicities, nationalities, and cultural infl uences throughout its fi ve boroughs. As the city has had to build and develop through the years in order to keep up with its population, it granted billions of dollars in contracts to vendors. Yet, when Mayor Bill de Blasio took offi ce three years ago, the contracts awarded to those vendors did not refl ect the city’s diversity.

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Although supplier diversity and inclusion is a well-established business strategy in the U.S., most corporate programs focus on domestic suppliers. In fact, according to a recent Hack-ett Group study, 75 percent of U.S.-based procurement organizations’ diversity programs are domestic only. However, the study also showed that nearly 40 percent of those organizations are planning to expand globally in the next two to three years.

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