FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Alternate Access, Inc.
(919) 831-1860
Press@AlternateAccess.com
Raleigh, NC - 1 June 2004-- Adrienne Kelly Lumpkin, president of Alternate Access®, a converged communications company, was one of two featured guests on UNC-TV's popular Friday night program, Black Issues Forum with Mitchell Lewis. She discussed networking and how it has helped Alternate Access grow.
The program was an extension of a previous Lewis interview with George Fraser, author of "Success Runs in Our Race," and dubbed "Black America's #1 Networker" by Black Enterprise magazine. Mr. Fraser had posited that when African Americans effectively network and leverage their collective resources and intellectual capital, their actions are today as important as those of civil rights leaders of another era.
Lumpkin and Gerry McCants, President of Thomas-McCants Media, Inc., a 14 year old business that publishes Black Pages USA and implements Black Expos (tradeshows) in North and South Carolina, responded to Fraser's comments and individually described the importance of attitude in starting and building a company and also the types of activities they participate in to network effectively.
There are one million black-owned businesses in the United States, and North Carolina is among the top ten states for its number of black-owned businesses, according to the National Black Chamber of Commerce.
Other topics covered in the 30 minute discussion were the importance of higher education; the impact of
integration; and more general ways that black businesses can be strengthened.
About Alternate Access
Alternate Access empowers service businesses to dramatically boost their productivity and customer service
levels by delivering converged communications solutions—providing application development and
integration of software-based telephone systems, fax, interactive voice response, speech recognition, web
collaboration, call centers and Customer Relationship Management Alternate. Customers include banking,
real estate, construction, staffing, florists, auto dealers and other service businesses. Alternate Access
quickly gets to the core of how your business works and combines the convenience of your telephone with
the intelligence of your computer-for bottom line results. Converged Communications for Competitive
AdvantageSM. For more information, contact us at www.AlternateAccess.com or call toll free at 866-831-
9273.