Hala Maroc is a badass advocate, and her goal is to make you one too.
The entrepreneur, wellness expert, and media personality founded #BADASSBOOTCAMP a few years ago, her venture dedicated toward teaching individuals to embrace holistic self-care and providing them with resources to manifest their dreams. In this endeavor, Hala has become a known presence both internationally and in her hometown of Staten Island, leading workshops all over the world. She hosts her own weekly radio show We Exist on Maker Park Radio, delving into diverse and untold stories from musical artists, previously hosted the podcasts Only On the Corner and Kitchen Talk, and has been featured in national media from The Drew Barrymore Show to the Black culture docuseries HERstory.
What Happened To Hala Maroc's #BADASSBOOTCAMP Retailer At Empire Outlets?
Yet back in Staten Island, Hala can also speak to an injustice perpetrated upon her and several other small business owners: On this past Easter, during the last week of March 2024, she was one of a number of tenants unceremoniously evicted from their storefronts at the borough’s Empire Outlets Mall. At the time, her #BADASSBOOTCAMP retailer was a popular spot for New Yorkers seeking a mental health oasis. For three years, she had operated within the mall, just steps from the Staten Island Ferry terminal. First successful in the mall’s Learn and Grow kiosk program, she then signed a lease for a brick-and-mortar location, offering guests wellness experiences like massages and meditation, as well as a unique co-working space for creative brainstorming. And in a move that attracted many of the Empire State’s cannabis enthusiasts, she also made the brand’s numerous pop-up activations 420-inspired.
“We made it a one-stop shop,” Hala says. “It was a place where you can glow and grow, and your business can glow and grow. People would come co-create and co-work there, but also have all their wellness needs there like spa treatments. We had a fit club, yoga, vision board events, anything within that realm. And it was a lot of fun. Honestly, I feel our heart is really in the stuff we did in the space, so that space closing was a heartbreak. But it showed me, ‘You’ve actually built something that people are looking forward to, and you can still do it.’”
Join The #BADASSBENEFITCONCERT On August 10, 2024: Help Hala Maroc And Friends Rebuild
Fans of the store can join Hala and Maker Park Radio at 450 Front Street in Staten Island, 4-8PM on August 10th for the #BADASSBENEFITCONCERT. This donation-based event is FREE to attend, but guests are encouraged to give what they can, as a percentage of the proceeds will go toward funding the opening of the new #BADASSBOOTCAMP space.
The festivities are centered around hip hop, healing, and high vibrations. Attendees can enjoy live music, an open bar freestyle cypher, activations by local vendors, raffles and exclusive merch, food, and much more. A stacked artist lineup includes appearances by Abby Jasmine, Chey, Infinite Coles, Tyrone Briggs and the Jazztronauts, plus the lady of the hour herself!
“Since our closing, we have been overwhelmed by the community’s love and support in helping us reopen and transition smoothly,” the entrepreneur states. “Now it’s time to celebrate with our tribe and give us one last push!”
How Did Hala Maroc Start #BADASSBOOTCAMP?
Hala started #BADASSBOOTCAMP for herself, after sustained years of hard work building her career in media took a toll on her health. “It was bigger than burnout,” she describes. “In that moment, I realized how much we associate who we are with what we do. And when we don’t have that thing we do - if you get fired or sick or you can’t sing anymore - we realize how much we haven’t been [cultivating] the self-care, self-awareness, and self-development that we need. I felt that void; I personally couldn’t find a tribe or a safe space or a place to get resources. Where do we as adults go to make new friends in a positive way? I didn’t know, so I created it.”
#BADASSBOOTCAMP began with workshops and retreats that Hala conducted in cities across the country, and in nations from Canada to Colombia. Soon she discovered that her approach to wellness was inspiring budding entrepreneurs to use her retreats as mini business incubators, all looking to collaborate on a larger holistic journey.
Hala Maroc On Cannabis And Her Healing Journey
“Cannabis was a big part of that,” the founder states. “Not just smoking weed, but finding healthy ways to smoke. I’m always encouraging mixing other herbs with it, and exploring other things to roll up, this or that, for different sensations. It became something we did at the store… We offered herbal and CBD products, did 420-inspired events and experiences. We had accessories and cute things… In New York City, a lot of us resonate with marijuana.”
But she doesn’t think the cannabis connection is actually the reason for her ouster from the mall. The visionary notes that in the history of her business being at Empire Outlets, she never experienced a single complaint from either management or visitors about her cannabis-friendly events. However, she recalls that if someone from management smelled smoke, “they would definitely profile us, which was annoying, but we never had a conflict about it.”
Why Did Empire Outlets Terminate The #BADASSBOOTCAMP Lease?
What seems to have caused the expulsion, according to Hala, is more a sense of corporate greed. She explains that of the tenants that Empire Outlets kicked out in the past six months, all have been women-owned small businesses, mostly helmed by people of color. Her lease agreement, reviewed by a number of different attorneys, was deemed “very predatory,” including a clause that allowed the landlords to evict tenants for no reason.
“You either had a choice to have a permanent lease, which is five years where you’re paying a crazy amount of money for a place that doesn’t have built-in foot traffic, or a specialty lease, which is one or two years,” the creative recalls. “That’s what most of the small businesses opted for. But the thing about it is that you can be terminated at any time with no reason, and the reason we later on found out [for our eviction] was that they found tenants who could pay more. To get us out, they ended up lying to the owners of the outlet, saying that we owed money, which we never did. There’s proof of that… What was crazy is, if you just wanted tenants to pay more for their space, I could have gotten a better space and I’d been asking for one for the longest time. If you saw my space, it was very in the cut. But I felt like they just never wanted us to be visible. They never wanted us to succeed.”
All of this information Hala and her fellow small business owners have had to uncover through their own investigations. Their landlords never explained why they chose to exercise their right to termination, and most of the businesses expelled from the Outlets had owners who chose to stand up for themselves. Hala mentions that her former neighbor, who operated the souvenir shop New York Is My Happy Place, would often question the landlords about her rights as a tenant and discuss valid points about her business. Apparently the owners then chose “to make her last few months hell until she was ready to leave… and then they opened a souvenir shop just one level up, but a big-box store instead of a small business.”
Battling Injustices Against #BADASSBOOTCAMP
Content creator Eric Bryan Stone actually took up Hala and her colleagues’ cause, calling out Empire Outlets on his sizable social media channels. After contacting the Outlets pretending to be a prospective tenant, Stone made a video detailing what he heard and saw based on potential leases. In the video, he proceeded to show how the landlords lied to their investors at Goldman Sachs about how much the evicted tenants owed. (For example, Hala’s #BADASSBOOTCAMP was said to have owed $22,000 which is simply untrue.) As the video went viral, Stone then connected with the NAACP and several activists and lawyers seeking to be of help with the case.
“I’m hoping that justice is served,” Hala asserts. “I’m not expecting [the landlords] to do right by me, but I would just love for them to be held accountable. The right questions need to be asked and the right resources sent to me and all these small businesses, to recoup from it being such a scam.”
Remembering the mall as a “revolving door” of small businesses, where #BADASSBOOTCAMP was one of the longest-surviving entities, she continues, “I had bookings till June that I had to send money back to, and pay people out. A lot of things got messed up because they gave me two weeks’ notice to leave. So now it’s making people aware of the situation… In New York, it’s an influx of [corporate greed] but at the same time there’s such a robust, amazing, colorful community of creatives and entrepreneurs buzzing and doing their thing. Our spaces are being taken away and made into a place for the rich. But what made New York City was the artists, the wellness advocates, the people with a cause.”
What's Next For Hala Maroc And #BADASSBOOTCAMP?
One pathway Hala sees to healing is to grant more people access to financial education. She believes that if small businesses have more avenues to connect with one another, and with organizations that can help raise awareness of all their options to funding and legitimacy, it can carry into a new future. A town hall about how to get Minority / Women-Owned Business certification, she suggests, would be a fantastic way to stop the pattern of corporate abuse.
As she looks toward the future, Hala remains active in all her creative endeavors and workshops. She keeps important conversations alive in public discourse through her radio show, and she strives to invite more aligned voices into these crucial discussions.
“We have to acknowledge the heartbreak that entrepreneurs and creatives face,” she states. “Yes, pivoting and building your business is a journey and you have to be flexible. But don’t let anybody fuck with you. At the end of the day, your business is your baby. You have to protect it at all costs, keep the faith, and keep growing, because one loss or rejection won’t make or break you.”
Once a badass, always a badass. Whatever the fight, we’re betting on Hala Maroc.
Support Hala Maroc and #BADASSBOOTCAMP by attending the #BADASSBENEFITCONCERT on Saturday, August 10, 2024, 4-8PM at Maker Park, 450 Front Street, Staten Island, NY. The event is FREE to attend but donations are suggested.
For more about Hala and #BADASSBOOTCAMP, visit thebadassbootcamp.com or follow @halamaroc and @thebadassbootcamp on Instagram.
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Featured image: Hala Maroc, founder of #BADASSBOOTCAMP, stands outside the brand's retail space in Empire Outlets Mall in Staten Island, NY in 2023. (C) #BADASSBOOTCAMP
