Invest Fest comes back to Atlanta for fourth year in a row

Financial education conference Invest Fest is coming back to Atlanta in August — marking the fourth year the conference has been held in the city.

Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said it makes sense for the city to host the conference, because Atlanta is a place where people come “to secure the bag, as they say.”

“You can’t do any of that if you’re not financially literate,” Dickens said at a Thursday press conference announcing dates for the event.

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

Invest Fest is put on by the people behind Earn Your Leisure (EYL), a popular financial education platform with podcasts, online courses, events and a curriculum for schools. The EYL Instagram and YouTube accounts have about 1.5 million followers each.

But EYL has also been accused by some online critics of providing bad financial advice or giving a platform to scammers. EYL and Invest Fest co-founder Rashad Bilal said the company has hired someone to vet all potential guests.

Last year, Invest Fest attracted about 50,000 attendees to the Georgia World Congress Center over three days, according to Bilal. This year’s conference will be held at the same location Aug. 23-25. Bilal is expecting about 60,000 people to come out this year over the course of the weekend.

Though Bilal and two of Invest Fest’s co-founders are based in New York, they decided to hold the conference in Atlanta because of the city’s stature as a place for Black businesses.

“There’s really no other place in America that is similar to it,” Bilal added.

Past Invest Fest speakers have included billionaire investor and philanthropist Robert Smith, as well as Tyler Perry, Steve Harvey and Dan Cathy. EYL will announce some of this year’s speakers in April.

This year, the focus will be less on celebrities and more on the everyday people attending, Bilal said. He teased giveaways planned for the conference, with EYL giving a local Atlanta business, Head’s Plumbing, a $5,000 grant at the press conference.

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

Credit: Olivia Bowdoin

Tickets for the conference go on sale March 23 and will cost $250.

For some people, especially those who are not financially secure, $250 can be a hefty price to pay for a weekend of programming. Bilal said attendees will get education that he thinks can more than earn them back the hundreds spent on the conference.

“There’s a reason why people go to church, there’s a reason why people go on pilgrimages, right?” he said. “Being around thousands of people is more productive for you as far as on an inspirational, motivational standpoint than just being in your room by yourself.”

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