Town Social founder engineered a movement across New Jersey — one shuttle, one Black-owned business, and one intentional experience at a time.
SaKarra Fite figured out what most entrepreneurs spend years and thousands of dollars trying to learn — and she did it on bed rest, grieving her father, eight months pregnant with her second child.
Town Social was born in the eye of the storm.
“I had to figure out my path of least resistance,” Fite said. “What do I already have? Instead of focusing on all the things I don’t have.”
She had a decade in event marketing, a gift for reading people faster than most read themselves, and a frustration of watching our community get less than it deserved.
The lack of parking at events was the initial catalyst. She consistently watched people skip events because they didn’t want to deal with it. She saw Black-owned businesses pour everything into a grand opening, only for the crowd to thin out by week three, wondering what went wrong. After years handling their social media accounts and building their websites, SaKarra could no longer ignore the actual problem.
The Date Analogy
People stopped coming back because the relationship ended at the register.
“You have to date me,” Fite said. “Call me. Text me. Check in on me. Rihanna texts me every single day.”
Savage X Fenty runs email campaigns like clockwork. That consistency is the product. Most small businesses launch, go quiet, then wonder why the room is empty. Fite built Town Social around the opposite instinct — stay in contact, then, make the experience undeniable.
The model is straightforward on paper. She shuttles groups to Black-owned businesses, handles the content creation, negotiates discounts and complimentary items for her guests, and the owner comes out and addresses the room personally.
“Rich white men get chauffeured everywhere. They get complimentary wine. The owner comes to their table,” Fite said. “How do I make that experience for my people?”
Town Social members — she calls them Socialites — know what it feels like to walk into a space that is closed down just for them to shop a room privately. To be greeted by the owner like they’re expected. Experiences that raise the standard. And once you know what the standard can be, you can create a new reality for yourself.
Within months of launching, the Instagram page reached 5,692 followers. The TikTok account pushed those numbers past 10,000 combined. Tour videos are pulling 30,000, 50,000, 100,000 views. Her first stop was a cafe crawl — three Black-owned cafes and Source of Knowledge Bookstore. Everyone exchanged numbers. They’re still in contact.
Know Your Brand
All of it was intentional.
“Know your brand,” she said. “Everything you do should repeat the brand. Every post, every color you wear, every word you say. Is it on brand? Then do it.”
Snoop Dogg. Michael Jackson. She used them both as examples — for their consistency. You can break either of them down to five things. Their brand travels with them everywhere they go.
“Break him down to five things and the whole brand is right there,” Fite said.
Snoop Dogg:
- – Crip affiliation / street credibility
- – Marijuana
- -Drawl — the slow, melodic delivery
- -Fashion — the long chains, the fur, the laid-back flex
- -Loyalty to the West Coast
Michael Jackson:
- -The glove
- – The socks
- – The moonwalk
- – The Shamone
- – The hair
Fite’s point was sharp: most small businesses are iffy about the brand. They think being Black-owned is a brand. It’s a value. The brand is something you build on top of it.
She also pushed back on something the entrepreneurship world treats like scripture.
“I don’t want to hear ‘build it and they will come,'” she said. “That’s a line from a movie. Stop saying it. You can build something beautiful and nobody will come.”
She knows. Her first event series — game nights, before Town Social — failed three times in a row. Zero people. Two people. Two more. She’d done events professionally for years and still couldn’t fill a room. Eventually, she let it go. That failure was information.
“If I do something right and everybody comes, I might not know what the key thing was,” she said. “But if I do something wrong and nobody comes, I can start tweaking. You can fail. You can’t give up.”
The Camel and The Horse
This is where the entrepreneur and the woman become the same person. She talked about the difference between a camel and a horse — pulled straight from The Alchemist. The camel goes long without water but dies without warning. The horse has limits. It signals you when it’s tired. Push it right and it gets you to the end of the journey.
She had been a camel for most of her career. Giving everything, setting nothing aside for herself, burning out before the destination.
“I should have been a horse,” she said.
As a result, she built Town Social as a horse operation — sustainable, solid boundaries, built on reciprocal exchange. The businesses invest in the experience. The experience invests in the businesses. The members invest in both. The money moves in a circle.
And everybody has money, she said. That’s a market observation.
“There was a Great Depression. Businesses still thrived. There was a pandemic. Businesses still thrived. Money doesn’t disappear. It just moves.”
Build an offer compelling enough and your customer finds a way. Fite invests in connection over reach. She measures success by who got on the shuttle.
MochaCrawl 2026
Today, she’s scaling the proof.
Over 100 days, the Town Social network engaged 75 participants across New Jersey, supported 40 Black-owned cafes, and put more than $18,000 directly back into those businesses. That’s infrastructure.
Now the movement expands. MochaCrawl 2026 is a series of cafe crawls across New Jersey, stopping exclusively at Black-owned cafes — starting Saturday, April 18. Tickets are available now at townsocialtours.com where you can also cast a vote for your favorite NJ Black-owned cafes. Voting for the People’s Choice Award is open through Thursday, April 16. Limited-edition exclusive merch will be available while supplies last.
The shuttle is moving. The only question is whether you’re on it.
