Stay Connected
Atlanta Black Star/Business
BusinessFashion & Beauty

Amazon and Walmart Investigating After ‘N—– Brown’ Hair Cap Sparks Backlash

By | Published on July 17, 2017
CommentsComments (0) Add as a preferred source on Google i

Amazon and Walmart took some heat from customers after a third-party seller’s racist color description of a hair weaving cap went viral.

The Jagazi Natural’s accessory was sold by Pixnor on Walmart.com and by ThinkCreators on Amazon in a color described as “n—– brown,” which The New York Times columnist Charles M. Blow caught wind of in the early hours of Monday, July 17.

Since news about the racially insensitive cap blew up online, Amazon has removed the cap, while Walmart removed the n-word from the description before taking the item offline entirely.

Many have slammed the corporations for hosting the item; however, Walmart’s listing notes product information “is provided by manufacturers, suppliers and others, and has not been verified by us.”


“We are very sorry and appalled that this third party seller listed their item with this description on our online marketplace,” a Walmart spokesperson said. “It is a clear violation of our policy, and has been removed, and we are investigating the seller to determine how this could have happened.”

Atlanta Black Star reached out to Amazon for comment.

Subscribe To The ABS Newsletter — Get our stories in your inbox.

Independent journalism still matters.

We hope this story was worth your time. For over 14 years, Atlanta Black Star has stayed Black-owned and independently run. We didn't get here by waiting on ad budgets that were never built to prioritize us. Our readers did that.

Corporate support for Black media has always been thin. Outlets like ours get roughly 1% of the $170 billion spent on U.S. advertising each year, and that margin is shrinking further as advertisers walk back the DEI-linked commitments they made in 2020. That's the backdrop. It's not why we're asking.

The wider picture isn't any steadier. Newspaper ad revenue has fallen more than 80% since 2005, and local newsrooms are closing at a rate of roughly two a week nationwide. When outlets go under, it's rarely the ones built to center a Black perspective from the ground up that get to stick around.

We know a request for support isn't why you came here. But without readers choosing to fund this work directly, the depth of reporting we can do at home and abroad shrinks along with everyone else's. If you're not in a position to give, that doesn't change how much we value you as a reader.

If you are able to, a recurring contribution does more for us than a single one-time gift, because it lets us plan the next investigation instead of just the next invoice. It takes about 30 seconds, no long form, no account. Thank you for continuing to support independent journalism and freedom of the press.

Give once Give monthly Support another way

Latest from Atlanta Black Star

Back to top