Founded in São Paulo in 2015, Alma Preta (Black Soul) set out with a clear mission: to cover Brazilian issues from the perspective of Black journalists. Not an easy task, considering the local and national media scene; Institutional Director Elaine Silva explains that these have historically operated within a corporatist and highly concentrated logic. Consequently, Alma Preta’s challenges were much more institutional in nature than related to journalistic recognition itself.
“At the beginning, the main obstacle was ensuring the project’s sustainability,” Elaine explains. “This involved structuring the organization, consolidating its institutional formation, and building a viable business model in a highly concentrated market that is not very accessible to independent initiatives, especially those led by Black journalists. Securing diversified resources was also a major challenge, since traditional media funding sources tend to favor already established outlets within the hegemonic system.
“In addition, there was the challenge of gaining visibility and positioning among other important independent media outlets, which also produce high-quality journalism and compete for space, attention, and funding. Therefore, the central issue was not just producing good journalism— something that has always been a strength of Alma Preta—but creating the structural and financial conditions for this journalism to be sustained, grow, and achieve relevance in public debate.”
Over time, Alma Preta developed a hybrid financial and organizational model: it has both a for-profit and nonprofit entity, thus aligning its mission-driven ethos and social impact with the need to generate revenue. In the early phase, philanthropy accounted for the vast majority of revenue: “At the beginning of our trajectory, between 70% and 80% of our revenue came from philanthropy. Today, that percentage is around 50%,” Elaine says, adding that the goal is to reduce this share further in favor of more predictable, self-generated, and recurring income.
To achieve the strategic goal of not relying exclusively on philanthropy, the organization has diversified its products and revenue streams: “We operate in the advertising market, provide services, develop new products, license content…and deliver talks, among other activities. This diversification strategy has always been central to ensuring greater autonomy and institutional stability.” Elaine explains that the organization also secures funding through parliamentary amendments, or “emendas parlamentares,” which are funds that individual legislators can allocate from the public budget to specific projects.
At the same time, audience revenue has remained a challenge: “Unlike countries such as the United States, Brazil still does not have a well-established culture of recurring individual donations to journalism,” Elaine notes. While the organization does promote this, it is not a primary focus.
If Alma Preta’s financial model has been one pillar of its resilience, its multidisciplinary approach to team structure has been another. When I watched Alma Preta’s promotional video, I was struck by one comment in particular from Editor-in-Chief Pedro Borges: “Elaine is good at business. I suck at it! I’m good at journalism.” Drawing on her 15 years of experience in major advertising agencies, Elaine introduced a more market-oriented perspective that contributed to “process optimization, greater professionalization of roles, development of new products, and strengthening of commercial strategies, as well as building and activating networks of contacts.”
Today, with approximately 35 collaborators, the team includes not only journalists but also professionals in advertising, public relations, design, administration, accounting and international relations.
“The composition of the team is undoubtedly one of Alma Preta’s key differentiators,” says Elaine. This diversity, she suggests, enhances the organization’s ability to think about language, positioning, distribution, and impact.
“We maintain an intense and committed journalistic production routine, but at the same time, we keep the business area in constant motion, thinking about innovation, new revenue streams, and creative solutions,” she says. “Alma Preta is not just a media outlet; it has also established itself as a hub for innovation in business models focused on journalism and the racial agenda. It is this combination of editorial excellence and business strategy that differentiates us in the market.”
The organizational evolution was closely tied to a broader transformation: Alma Preta’s shift from a collective of journalists and activists into a structured third-sector organization and journalism agency.
“I was hired precisely with this goal: to help structure the institution so that it could grow solidly and sustainably. From that point on, we began to renew roles, redefine functions, organize internal workflows, and professionalize strategic areas. We also started seeking new funders, investors, and partners to build a more robust institutional process that was less dependent on the informal structures typical of collectives,” Elain recalls.
Crucially, this shift did not dilute the organization’s original mission.
“This shift did not mean abandoning activism or the original mission,” she says. “On the contrary, it meant creating an organizational foundation capable of sustaining that mission in the long term. Alma Preta also began operating as a journalism and communication agency, offering services such as content production, branded content, anti-racist communication consultancies, institutional campaigns, training programs, lectures, and special projects for organizations, brands, and institutions aligned with the racial agenda.”
The transition was essential to expand Alma Preta’s impact and position it as a professional organization that can successfully engage with the field of journalism and with the market and the third sector. Part of that expansion includes the initiation of Black Adnetwork, now the largest network of Black creators in Latin America. Founded in 2020 during the pandemic, the network was designed to strengthen and fund independent communication initiatives. Today, the network includes more than 60 outlets led by Black professionals, with Alma Preta responsible for its structure and operation. The network also functions as a platform for redistributing advertising opportunities.
“In practice, I commercialize advertising proposals, and we organize the distribution of production and placements among the outlets according to each brand’s target audience. Payments are negotiated equitably: all outlets receive the same base amount, and what varies is delivery, especially in campaigns remunerated by metrics such as CPM, where each partner is paid proportionally to performance. We work with different branded content formats and have outlets distributed across various regions of Brazil. This allows brands to target their campaigns with territorial precision, reaching specific audiences through communicators who already have legitimacy and strong connections with their communities.”
Alma Preta’s ability to move between journalism, business, and creative communication became particularly visible last year, when it won a Silver Lion at Cannes for an anti-racist campaign featuring a striking slogan: “A white person running is an athlete, a Black person running is a thief.” The idea was developed in partnership with the agency Lew Lara (now LOLA TBWA), and the Alma Preta team facilitated the participation of a professional runner, making contact and extending the invitation.
“The initiative emerged from a provocation by a partner, who challenged us to reflect on the potential of journalism to generate impact on other platforms as well, such as social media. The central question was: how far can journalism go when it engages with the language of advertising and creative communication? From there, we decided to create something that went beyond the traditional reporting format, while maintaining the essence of our editorial stance.”
While Alma Preta regularly reports on “dangerous geographies” of black bodies, the campaign translated journalistic insights into a visually and politically impactful campaign.
“The result was a powerful, symbolic, and visually striking action that translated into imagery a daily experience of insecurity lived by many Black people in Brazil,” she says. “The campaign had a strong community impact. It spoke not only to Black people but also to broader anti-racist audiences by highlighting the structural racism present even in sports. The central message, about how Black bodies are frequently criminalized while white bodies are automatically legitimized, brought profound meaning to Black people who want to practice sports and feel safe, but often do not.”
Recognition came not only with Silver Lion but also other important awards in journalism and international communication. However, for Elaine, the impact mattered more than accolades: “More than the awards, however, what stood out to us was the campaign’s ability to expand public debate and contribute to a concrete discussion on safety, racism, and rights.”