A symbol of controversy

No Grease Inc., owned by twin brothers Jermaine (left) and Damian Johnson, includes barber shops, a barber school and various promotional events and materials, including a book and DVDs.

Damian and Jermaine Johnson, owners of No Grease Inc., have gotten plenty of feedback since Charlotte Observer business columnist Ron Stodghill called on them to abandon the black-faced minstrel logo that has branded their chain of barber shops for some 13 years.

Nearly all of the feedback has been supportive, the brothers said. Even Republican Rep. Sue Myrick sent word offering support.

Jermaine, a graphic designer, created the logo back in high school, and the brothers said they have no immediate plans to change it.

Earlier this week, they sat with Qcitymetro inside their newest location at the Time Warner Cable Arena to discuss their logo, the Observer column and the ensuing controversy. Along the way they touched on a few other hot-button issues.

Below is a transcript of that interview, edited for brevity and clarity.
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Q. Let’s start from the beginning. Was the Observer piece fair?
Damian: I thought it was fair in that it was his opinion. We all have a right to our opinions. Of course, we could have been given some say in it. If you are watching a story from one side, that’s the side you’re going to hear. So from that standpoint, it was fair.

Q. Did you know Ron was going to write the piece?
Damian: Yes. Me and Stodghill, we’re fine. We have enough of a relationship, we have enough respect for each other, that he did reach out to me before it came out.

Q. Has there been much feedback?
Damian: Yes. Most of our clients are saying: Stand your ground, stand your ground. We support you. Continue on.

Q. Why are you doing this interview?
Damian: We’ve been in business for 13 years, and we’ve never done an interview on our logo. There has never been anything publicly displayed or written about our logo that put us in a position where we had to speak on it publicly. So the Observer article has kinda done that. Ron, he had his opinion. I think the questions have always been there – those who said it verbally and those who didn’t say it verbally – why did they choose that logo?

Q. So why did you choose a minstrel as your brand image?
Jermaine: Being of my background, a background where you don’t have people showing you how to advertise or be politically correct, it was somewhat youthful and aggressive in its creativity. As an artist, creativity is very important. And then as a male, and as a black male, sending a message is even more important. The name itself – No Grease. It’s a pet peeve with barbers. We do not like grease in your hair when we cut it. That’s No Grease. Those are the words. The character is a minstrel from a time when some actors wore black grease on their faces. So, the parallel is, No Grease -- We don’t want grease in your hair. And then, No Grease -- We don’t wear black grease, we don’t wear black makeup, we don’t shuck and jive. We don’t do the things that are symbolized by this character. So if you put them together, it’s very aggressive. In marketing, you’re going to be aggressive or you’re going to be overlooked.

Q. Can you at least relate to people who might find it offensive?
Jermaine: Absolutely. If a person on the surface looks at it and thinks of the negative history behind images like that, I totally understand. I understand people taking offense or believing it’s demeaning, but to think that it’s demeaning toward them personally, they’re definitely not looking deeply enough into it.

Q. What do you mean by that?
Jermaine: If my initial thought was to offend somebody, that would be one thing. But why handcuff myself to a bunch of sensitive people who won’t grow up? How can the negative image (associated with the minstrel) ever be pertaining to me? I’m not saying be all the way desensitized to what our history is and what American history is when it comes to black and white, but I’m saying you can’t be so sensitive thinking everybody is out to get you or out to mock you or clown you or disrespect you. The question was never, why choose a logo that might offend? It was never meant to offend. So why not let me be me?

Q. Have any of your clients asked you to change it?
Damian: No. Never. None of my clients have ever even suggested it. They’re trying to figure out what we’re going to put it on next.

Q. How much of your success do you attribute to the logo?
Damian: We don’t know. All of our success for 13 years in business has been with the logo.

Jermaine: I would say the infrastructure of the business, the people who manage the business and the logo all have something to do with the success of the business. The people who love us and support us, they would love to have it everywhere. They know what it stands for. They know it’s deeper than the eye. I think it has something to do with our success also.

Q. In his column, Stodghill named other popular brands that have given their logos a facelift – Aunt Jemima, Google and Hertz. Do you think No Grease will ever change its logo?
Damian: Change is inevitable. Now, do we know what type of change might happen with the logo? I can’t say we’re going to change our logo into an updated version of a man with a shirt and tie on. I don’t know that. Some of the majority businesses out there, their plight is totally different than ours. We have a different way of going about dealing with our community and our business. This logo is something that has been used by us to positively affect the community. We go into high schools and grade schools and talk about images. We go into high schools and talk about entrepreneurship.

Jermaine: When you talk about changing a logo for Aunt Jemima and Uncle Ben, you’re talking about multimillion-dollar or billion-dollar companies where the authors of those logos are so far removed from whatever that image is. When you get to a corporate structure, they make those decisions. No Grease is held and is closely knitted to the people who originated the logo. It’s close to our hearts, and it’s close to what we stand for.

Damian: I read somewhere that when it comes to African American history, white people feel guilty and black people feel ashamed. I don’t think it should be either way. If our history is properly taught, then no one should feel ashamed and no one should feel guilty. Today I should not feel ashamed of my ancestry going through what they went through, if it’s taught properly. It’s like a family hiding the secret of me being raped as a child. No one wants to discuss it, so I’ve got to live in this family or in his house where no one wants to discuss it because of the guilt and the shame this family has. It might offend someone in the family. And then there’s the artistic and business side. When you’re talking about art and business, you’re talking about creativity. You’re talking about creating something, birthing something. When you birth something, despite who likes it or dislikes it, it came from you. I have children, but if my child was ugly or cripple, that’s still my child. I birthed that child. It came from my wife’s loins. It came from my seed planting. So, because the world doesn’t agree with it or doesn’t like it because it might offend you... that’s a tough way for people to live.

Q. Would you have problems with a white entrepreneur who used a minstrel logo?
Damian: Me personally, no. But I’m cut from something different. I have an entrepreneurial spirit. I have an understanding of why certain people do certain things when it comes to business. I would not take offense. And I’ve never been the judgmental type. Maybe I would ask the owner or creator what the logo is about.

Q. So symbols like the Confederate flag – those symbols don’t offend you?
Damian: Honestly, no, they don’t offend me. I understand the history behind the Confederate flag and the Swastika. White men with white sheets over their heads don’t offend me. What offends me is what they did when they were under those white sheets.

Q. So would you eat in a restaurant called Coons Fried Chicken?
Damian: Again, I would sit down with the owner of Coons Fried Chicken and find out why he called it Coons Fried Chicken. I think if people patronize any business, they patronize it for a lot of different reasons. Being a business owner, there has to be something behind him calling it Coons Fried Chicken.

Q. Is this simply a generational thing?
Damian: Absolutely, it’s generational. I’ve had my elders take offense. No matter what my position is on the logo, they say, “Brother you just don’t know what that means.’ I believe they were saying, ‘I came from that.’ So no matter what my studying of the minstrel show was, their understanding was totally different than mine. Young people, they don’t even know what it is. They don’t even know the history behind it. So we use it as a teachable moment, to teach the young people what the minstrel show was and what it represented.

Q. Tell me about your conversation with Sue Myrick.
Jermaine: Sue Myrick is actually a client of my wife's at Modern Day Spa. She read the article in the newspaper and was talking to my wife. She said ‘Just tell him I like him. I’ve been watching him, and that they should stick by their logo. If they believe in it and it’s been working for them then stick by their logo.’ She told that to my wife while she was getting a pedicure. And I don’t even know Sue Myrick. At the end of the day, we’re in business, and anyone who’s in business for themselves know that it’s hard out here. So for someone from the outside to make judgments about your business, and they’re probably not even patronizing your business, it really has no weight.

Q. Does anything offend you as a black man?
Damian: I’ve thought about that. Look, I’m an African American man. My mom is black, my father is black, I grew up in a black community. I went to an historically black college. I married a black woman and have black children. I have tried to do everything possible that was positive as an African American black man. So nothing from the outside of who I am can offend me. From within myself I have done nothing but to try to exemplify a positive African American man. So from the outside, I couldn’t be offended.

Q. Do you regret this controversy?
Damian: For 13 years we thought we had gotten away from it. I think being on Trade Street, with a majority of our people being educated, it became controversial. But the majority of everyday people who are just trying to make it day to day, they didn’t have time to look at the logo and make it a controversy.

Q. So if you had stayed in the ‘hood, if you will, it wouldn’t have become an issue?
Damian: It wouldn’t have made front page. I’ve heard people say, ‘They should have upgraded when they came uptown.’ So you’re saying my hood didn’t deserve an upgrade, but when I come to Trade Street, you upgrade. A lot of us do that. When we move out of the hood we forget the hood. The same people who supported us in our communities will be the same people who support us on main street. If we forget that, just because we’re in the market of the majority, I think that would be an offense to our clientele.

Q. Any final thoughts?
Damian: At the end of the day, I think we have to agree to disagree and still live healthly around each other. I think we as a community, if we can ever get there – to agree to disagree – and still do business with each other… I don’t know if this interview will do that, but at least its on record now and we can move on. And we'll continue to do the things we have done as a business in terms of servicing our clients, servicing the community by way of reaching out and teaching young people to cut hair and teaching them about entrepreneurship, teaching them about the history of the minstrel show and how images do affect our society. Our goal has always been to do business at a level of professionalism that is respected and appreciated by our clients. I’m sure that if we didn’t have that logo and just called it No Grease, some people would be like, “Why you call it No Grease? Why didn’t you call it More Grease?” It’s hard to get everyone to agree on anything, really. So the logo is just another example of that.
 

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