The Moonlighters' Club and the Boston Ujima Project came together to create a podcast series that featured members of the Ujima Good Business Alliance.
The Boston Ujima Project (BUP) is a democratic, member-run organization building cooperative economic infrastructure in Boston, with a mission to return wealth to working-class communities of color.
The Boston Ujima Project has an impressive network of 36 member businesses in their Ujima Good Business Alliance (UGBA). UGBA is organizing neighbors, workers, business owners and investors to create a new community controlled economy in Boston. These individuals are business owners who believe that everyone has a voice and people should work together to take care of each other.
We showcased the founders of these businesses by crafting stories that broke down their lives as employee-entrepreneurs while also highlighting their contributions to their local communities and the city at large.
Through our work, we were able to show how these businesses came to be, the amount of work that goes into operating them successfully and how these businesses support the well being of their customers and their local ecosystems.
The Challenge
The Boston Ujima Project came to ua with a clear but complex challenge: they wanted to create a content series that would simultaneously serve member businesses, demonstrate the value of their network, and educate the broader community about the solidarity economy.
Breaking that down, we were dealing with three core problems:
The Strategy
Our approach: Strategic Storytelling Meets Full-Service Production. We have produced enough content to know that the magic isn't just in the final product, it's in the process. So we designed a comprehensive approach built on four key pillars:
The Production Journey
The project followed a structured, six-phase process from initial discovery through final production—ensuring strategic alignment, collaborative planning, and seamless execution. Let us walk you through our creative process, phase by phase.
We started by holding a kickoff call with Ujima’s leadership team. We discussed creating a podcast and video series, established why highlighting Good Business Alliance members mattered strategically, and aligned all stakeholders on project vision and desired outcomes. We then established project infrastructure for smooth collaboration We created a list of deliverables and set up a shared documentation system to capture running meeting notes, decisions, and evolving ideas—serving as our single source of truth throughout the project.
Then we focused on content design. We developed the interview format and question flow and we defined visual style including camera work, lighting approach, and editing aesthetic that would reflect the authentic, community-centered nature of the series. The final step in the pre-production process was to prepare for filming, logistically. We set dates and prepped our interview subjevts through notes and pre-interviews.
The Results:
By investing time upfront in discovery, planning, and framework development, the actual production phase ran smoothly with minimal client burden. Ujima leadership stayed informed through regular check-ins but didn't need to manage day-to-day execution. The collaborative planning ensured the final product aligned perfectly with organizational goals while Moonlighters Agency's complete ownership of production logistics ensured professional quality and on-time delivery.
Once filming concluded, All audio and video editing was handled in-house, ensuring consistent quality and cohesive storytelling across the entire series. We delivered draft versions to the Ujima team for review, incorporating their feedback and edit requests to refine each episode until it perfectly aligned with their vision and messaging. We collaborated with Ujima's team to develop compelling copy and episode descriptions that would resonate with target audiences. We published with optimized titles, descriptions, and tags and coordinated social media announcement campaign across Ujima's channels to drive awareness and engagement.
Several months post-launch we reconvened with Ujima leadership for a comprehensive retrospective session. We gathered qualitative feedback from Ujima team, featured business owners, and community members about series impact. Analyzed what resonated most with audiences and identified opportunities for future content initiatives. This feedback loop ensured the project delivered lasting value and provided actionable insights for Ujima's ongoing content strategy.
The Deliverables
Yours, Mine and ours produced seven complete 1-hour episodes, each featuring a different member of Ujima's Good Business Alliance. Every episode included comprehensive audio and video production, strategic content optimization, and professional photography.
Each episode delivered one-hour long format in both audio and video versions, providing Ujima maximum flexibility for distribution across platforms. All content was professionally edited in-house by The Moonlighters Agency and shared directly with the client for review and approval before public release.
EXAMPLES
We ventured to Nubian Square in Roxbury to interview Kai Grant, founder of Black Market Nubian. Black Market Nubian is one of Boston's premiere spaces to gather, meet, and shop. We set the interview in the middle of their shop with paintings from local artists hanging on the wall to show the inclusive and colorful nature of Black Market as a brand and community experience. We finished with an episode that explored Kai’s journey as a founder Black Market's journey to become a hub for Black cultural and economic vibrancy in the city, and how they help micro-business founders develop the business acumen and literacy needed to move towards sustainability.
We made our way to Cambridge to interview Marcus Johnson-Smith of cannabis accessory business Kush Groove, established in 2011 as an expression brand for city stoners. We shot on location at his shop, one month before the opening date. During the interview we discussed Kush Groove’s journey to becoming Boston's hub for cannabis style and culture and Marcus’ journey as a founder who was on the cusp of owning a business down the street from where he grew up.
We traveled back to Roxbury to interview Nia Grace and Turahn Dorsey of Jazz Urbane Cafe, a new arts and restaurant venture which will soon open in Boston's Nubian Square neighborhood. We held the interview at a former Boston staple, Darryl’s Corner Bar and Kitchen, to discuss the story behind the music and what Jazz Urbane hopes for a more joyous and creative Boston. Jazz Urbane is an urban arts venue that spotlights local and national artists who define and celebrate Boston's diverse cultural traditions.
The Results
The podcast series delivered measurable value across multiple stakeholder groups:
Zero Staff Burden
Turnkey solution from concept to final edit—Ujima staff had no production responsibilities, allowing them to focus on core mission work while still gaining professional content assets.
Evergreen Content Library
Created lasting promotional assets serving multiple purposes: member recruitment, donor engagement presentations, community education, and business promotion across social media and websites.
Tangible Member Value
Demonstrated concrete benefits of Alliance membership through professional media exposure—each featured business received hour-long spotlight content they could use indefinitely.
Replicable Model
Established framework and process documentation enabling Ujima to produce future content series independently or with minimal external support, creating sustainable content capability.
Long-Term Impact
Beyond the immediate deliverables, this project created a content infrastructure for Ujima. The podcast format proved that member stories could be powerful recruitment and education tools. The production process became a template for future content initiatives. And most importantly, the series demonstrated to both current and prospective members that Ujima provides real value—not just networking opportunities, but professional platforms that amplify their voices and missions.
The Value
This project showcases our ability to translate an organization's strategic goals into compelling content experiences that serve multiple stakeholders.
This wasn't just about producing a podcast. This was about creating member value, demonstrating network impact, and building educational content infrastructure. The content strategy aligned with Ujima's organizational goals at every level.
We successfully balanced the needs of the organization (impact demonstration, member retention), member businesses (visibility, credibility), and the broader audience (accessible education about solidarity economy principles).We transformed complex economic justice concepts into relatable human stories without losing the substance or mission.
We worked with the Boston Ujima Project and the Ujima Good Business Alliance to create compelling, informative and clean content that tells their story to clients, prospective customers and the community at large. This also gives The Boston Ujima Project finished assets that they can share immediately as well as repurpose and reuses for later campaigns.
We didn't just produce a podcast, we designed a thought leadership vehicle that simultaneously served members, elevated Ujima's mission, and created lasting stories for their network.