ZEPHYRHILLS, Fla. — A company promising to help Black people run their own beauty supply business is leading some to bankruptcy instead.
Beauty Supply Institute (BSI) based in Mableton, Georgia, has books, videos, and conferences to market its start-to-finish service.
Being a business owner was a dream for Pauline McLaurin, but the Tampa Bay Area woman says she is fed up with the amount of time it’s taking to set up her business, and now she wants a refund.
“I always had an entrepreneurial type of mindset,” McLaurin said.
The mother of six says she needed more time with her family, so she left the corporate world and decided she and her husband would take up a new career path together. She realized the lack of beauty supply stores in the Tampa Bay Area and learned quickly that could be their new venture.
“I was just like looking into things. And then I came across BSI,” McLaurin said.
In the three years since McLaurin signed her contract, she says all they’ve provided are headaches and stress.
“I mean, it's been devastating,” McLaurin said.
Pauline’s husband Ronald McLaurin echoed her sentiments.
"It's sad for me and sad for my wife," he said. "So just seeing her go through it and just constant emails and no response.”
Back in June 2023, Pauline McLaurin signed the lease on a Zephyrhills storefront and moved her family from Hillsborough to Pasco County, while hoping to turn this former cell phone store into her moneymaker.
She has spent more than $125,000 to get her store open. About $50,000 of that is for the products that are not at the store.
“I've spoken to them. I've cried," McLaurin said. "I've said all these things, and nothing happens. They'll just say, ‘Oh, I'll see what I can do.’ When I reach out to them I'm always speaking to someone that has no authority has no say so in anything, so they always give me the same runaround.”
10 Investigates teamed up with investigators at 11 Alive in Atlanta who talked with ten other people from across the country who signed contracts with BSI. They too are waiting on their products.
“Basically, their responses to everything is, I don't know,” BSI client Erick Wright said.
“They give, like, vague answers. Nobody knows anything,” another BSI client, Esther Arabome said.
After calling, sending an email and making a visit to each of BSI’s metro Atlanta locations — the company founder Devin Robinson agreed to talk to 11 Alive, but only audio could be recorded.
“It is not all on us, and none of it is a nefarious act like it's, it's business,” Robinson said.
Robinson added his company simply grew too fast for demand.
“We had to implement new technology. We just had to do certain things to be able to handle certain scale, so our schedule also becomes an issue,” Robinson said.
So much of an issue, the founder says, it can take a year after a store is ready to get a team out to set it up with products.
“I was borrowing money from right to left so I can keep my store," BSI client Aida Gueye said. "I was calling them every single day with tears, crying, crying. I have no money. They ruined my credit. Like, I can't even speak right now. Can't even speak."
“We've exhausted everything with BSI,” Arabome said.
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11 Alive shared those frustrations with Robinson.
“That is a very hurtful thing for me,” he said.
“And for them,” 11 Alive Reporter Rebecca Lindstrom said.
“Yeah. Yeah. It's not something that I'm walking around proud of,” Robinson said.
“So why not give them some of their money back if you can’t fulfill and deliver,” Lindstrom asked.
“That could be an option that we're weighing and looking at,” he said.
“But why not just do it now if you know that they're in financial hardship,” Lindstrom asked.
“Some of these people are not as clear cut as they may make the story seem,” Robinson said.
McLaurin says the one thing that is clear, the promises in the contract were not kept.
“I received the document where it states you know, day one through day five you do this day this, and then it goes all the way to like day 150, and that's when your store is supposed to be open,” McLaurin said.
Now this Wesley Chapel mom has taken a job as a second-grade teacher at her kids’ school and works at Dunkin Donuts on weekends, hoping this nightmare ends soon.
10 Investigates asked McLaurin what she wanted to tell BSI or Devin Robinson.
“I would just say, please get my store open, or give me my money back, you know, just do what's right, you know that you're setting, you're setting us up for failure,” McLaurin replied.
“We put up everything you see in the store,” Ronald McLaurin said.
McLaurin says she received gondolas to hold merchandise back in December 2023. After 10 Investigates visited the storefront, the couple decided to go ahead and put the gondolas together and discovered some were missing as seen in the diagram.
On April 12, McLaurin received an email that BSI was processing her shipment of wigs. About three weeks later, she received five boxes with about five to seven wigs in each of them. That, she says, isn't enough to open the store with.
She has gotten behind on rent payments at her storefront since the store isn’t open. The family hopes if someone wanted to help, he or she would check them out online.
The Georgia attorney general is investigating the company because it is headquartered in the Atlanta metro area, although they would not confirm how many complaints they have received.
This story started off as a tip. If you have something we should look into, email 10 Investigates at tips@10tampabay.com.