Khalo Soro > www.VoodooMotel.com

Khalo Soro, Owner, Voodoo Motel.

What do you need to be an entrepreneur?
Creativity - tenacity - patience (i don't have the last one yet)

What did inspire you to start your business?
Music is the answer

How did you finance it?
With my work

Being Hispanic…Does it have any influence on your business?
No

In the face of adversity, how do you decide to keep going?
With creativity, fitting, working more and becoming detached in time if it went necessarily.

What is the biggest challenge your business has faced?
To keep valid up to date in a changing trendy market, working with partners who were only interested in making short time cash.

If you could change one thing about your business, what would it be?
Municipal permissions

What was your childhood ambition?
To be successful doing works that give me happiness

Tell us about three entrepreneurs that you admire?
Matt Groening
Bill Gates
Walt Disney

For business meetings: breakfast, lunch, or dinner?
Is not healthy to eat & work at the same

What sacrifices on your personal life did you have to make in order to become a business success?
Many sacrifices postponed moments with my family and carelessly for my health

What is your favorite quote?
Impossible is nothing

Is it difficult to be unconventional?
Not for me, but it is difficult for my people.

Biggest mistake made?
Trust in the word of the others. Lawyers and contracts support the agreements and the friendship.

Do you consider yourself an innovator? Why?
I do. I need to do new things all the time, to project not to get bored. Boredom makes me unhappy and I abandoned any business that makes me unhappy.

About the Company
My business dedicates to cocktails and gastronomy for entertainment & musical spaces. We also organize events, mainly socials and musicals.
http://www.voodoomotel.com/

Mike Periu > www.EcoFinMedia.com

Mike Periu, Principal, EcoFin Media, LLC

What do you need to be an entrepreneur?
Self-confidence. You are embarking on a path where most people fail and almost everyone around you will continually tell you that you are making a mistake. If you don’t have sufficient self-confidence, you’ll believe them and not yourself.

What did inspire you to start your business?
Frustration. I become frustrated at the limited availability of quality, unbiased, honest financial literacy information that was able to successfully and credibly establish a connection with Hispanic audiences. Without this information, you are at a tremendous disadvantage in life. I saw this is a huge problem that needed to be solved and I have the skills to solve it.

How did you finance it?
EcoFin Media is the third company I have founded or co-founded. I was able to finance the launch of this venture from the accumulated, retained profits generated from my previous companies.

Being Hispanic…Does it have any influence on your business?
Tremendous influence. Our mission is to empower individuals through financial literacy information. To date, 80% of our work has been directed towards Hispanics in the U.S. who are Spanish dominant. Our intimate understanding of the culture is essential in producing educational content that establishes a connection with the audience. This dramatically increases information retention rates.

In the face of adversity, how do you decide to keep going?
The ability to persevere in the face of adversity is a key trait of any successful entrepreneur. The only way to keep going is to have confidence in yourself and in your business. If you do, then moments of adversity will appear to you as temporary and surmountable. If you don’t have sufficient self-confidence, then the same adversity will appear impossible to overcome and you’ll quit. So how you perceive adversity is directly correlated to your level of self-confidence.

What is the biggest challenge your business has faced?
Our biggest challenge has been overcoming the stigma of being a for-profit company in financial literacy. I say stigma because many individuals and organizations are accustomed to interacting with non-profits in this sector. I believe there is a tremendous unmet need for superior quality information at a fair price. I also think that in many cases giving away financial literacy information is counterproductive. Its human nature to assume that there is a relationship between price and value. When you give something away, people tend to think it is not worth very much. Additionally, if the recipient of the information hasn’t given something up to acquire the information, they are less likely to use it. I see this regularly. It is better to charge someone for something that will help them if it increases the likelihood that they will use it. Finally, many individuals have been conditioned to expect a third party to make basic financial decisions for them, while they stay in the dark. That is precisely how you get into trouble. Our goal is to empower individuals to make decisions for themselves. Not everyone agrees with this point of view. It is an uphill battle sometimes.

If you could change one thing about your business, what would it be?
The length of our sales cycle. Its partially a function of the economy, but the longer it takes to close a deal the greater the resources that are tied up in the process of closing. Shorter sales cycles would allow us to do more and help more people.

What was your childhood ambition?
I have always felt blessed with many talents and gifts. From a young age I have always wanted to help others. I feel it is my duty to share my talents in a way that improves the lives of as many people as possible. From an early age, this has been my ambition. It is still a work in progress and will probably be for the rest of my life.

Tell us about three entrepreneurs that you admire?
Michael Dell – He took his company from a dorm room project to one of the largest and most successful companies in history. His ability to consistently execute his at times revolutionary business plan and deliver on his vision is admirable. After Dell ran into difficulties, he quickly rejoined the company to set it on the right path again.

Jorge Mas Canosa – While building MasTec into an industry leader, he used his business acumen, capital and contacts to further the cause of liberty for Cuba from the Castro dictatorship. While his dream has not been realized, he serves as a model of how successful entrepreneurs can leverage their resources for noble causes.

Craig McCaw – He is a true innovator. He revolutionized two industries: cable television and cellular communications. Where others only saw problems, he saw opportunity and he knew how to capitalize on it.

For business meetings: breakfast, lunch, or dinner?
Whatever the client prefers. I can (and all entrepreneurs should) adapt to whatever will give you a better likelihood of closing the deal.

What sacrifices on your personal life did you have to make in order to become a business success?
Coming from a conservative family, the choice to forgo a low risk traditional career path and instead accept a high risk entrepreneurial path was very difficult for them to understand. In the beginning, you are working 10 times as hard for very little reward. But you have to push through that. When you start to taste success, there is nothing like it!

What is your favorite quote?
“No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable.” -Adam Smith

Is it difficult to be unconventional?
This varies from person to person. I have always been somewhat unconventional and frankly you have to be to go into business for yourself and stick it out during the difficult times. For other people, it is very difficult or impossible. It’s not something you learn. Its either part of your personality or it isn’t.

Biggest mistake made?
I have made many mistakes so it’s difficult to judge the “biggest” of them all. Perhaps the biggest was not seeking out a mentor in entrepreneurship when I made the decision to go into business for myself. Starting a business is something you have to learn by doing. I should have found the most successful business owner within my reach and insisted on being his or her shadow for a year. That would have saved me a great deal of time, money and effort.

Do you consider yourself an innovator? Why?
I consider myself an innovator because I am packaging information in a new way to maximize its benefits. I am doing this for a market where many established players don’t see or refuse to see the opportunity.

About the company
Founded by Mike Periu ( www.periu.com ) EcoFin Media, LLC ( www.ecofinmedia.com ) develops high quality financial literacy content for print, television, radio and online. We work both in English and Spanish, providing culturally relevant content that speaks directly to target audiences. We market our own products –including the leading financial literacy blog in Spanish DINEROyCREDITO.com ( www.dineroycredito.com )- and also develop private-label content.
Our mission is to empower individuals to make sound financial decisions for themselves. Our content is developed with a friendly, engaging style that informs but does not intimidate.
http://www.ecofinmedia.com/
http://www.dineroycredito.com/

Ivan Cevallos > www.ethosagency.com

Ivan Cevallos, CEO & Founder, ethosGROUP Inc.

What do you need to be an entrepreneur?
One of the core qualities of an entrepreneur is the gift of a vision and the ability to execute on it every day. When you run a business, you are exposed to many distractions that can take you on different directions. When you stay on track you are closer to success.

What did inspire you to start your business?
Before starting my business, I was running all kinds of business for other people, from restaurants to film production and distribution companies. I had none or very little supervision and was able to build up from zero to several millions in sales. One day I asked to become a partner and was told no. I thought about it, analyzed the situation and after a couple of days decided to go on my own.

How did you finance it?
The business was financed organically in the first years and with personal credit cards and lines of credit as it grew.

Being Hispanic…Does it have any influence on your business?
My first business ventures were in the general and Asian markets where I was the only Hispanic. It had its pros and cons but always required that I validate my capacity to run the business. That disappeared after I closed a few deals. When I went on my own, I went through a retro acculturation process where I asked myself if I should continue to work in the Asian/Anglo markets or consider the Hispanic. Since 2003, the Hispanic market is part of my business.

In the face of adversity, how do you decide to keep going?
I think it is all about attitude. When you start the day, you decide to see it as adversity or a challenge that you must overcome. I arrived to the U.S. at 18 and did not speak English, I slept in the streets a few winter nights in New York, I did not have parents to help me or support me. Those were my first challenges. I had to develop a plan to learn the language, get a job and a home. You always have options; you either sink or move ahead based on what you choose.

What is the biggest challenge your business has faced?
I think the availability of additional funding has been a major challenge.

If you could change one thing about your business, what would it be?
I would look for funding at the initial stage.

What was your childhood ambition?
I wanted to be a film director

Tell us about three entrepreneurs that you admire?
Richard Branson, Michael Dell and Oprah Winfrey

For business meetings: breakfast, lunch, or dinner?
Breakfast, lunches, happy hours and dinners. We are always open for business.

What sacrifices on your personal life did you have to make in order to become a business success?
I tried to maintain balance between personal and business life but there were times in which I was not at home as often as I would have liked.

What is your favorite quote?
A hundred years from now it will not matter what my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in, or the kind of car I drove... but the world may be different because I was important in the life of a child. -Simone Weil

Is it difficult to be unconventional?
It can be difficult because you do not go with the flow and humans tend to stick with groups that have things in common. That puts you in a position in which you also gravitate to other people that are unconventional. In my case it has been creative people.

Biggest mistake made?
Not saying no to clients.

Do you consider yourself an innovator? Why?
Yes, I am always looking for alternatives that are not in the market. I am also an early adopter of ideas and technology. When you adopt new technologies or ideas, new rules are being made. It is part of my strategy to be current and look for new opportunities.

About the Company
ethosGROUP Inc. is a marketing communications company that guides clients with strategy and the execution of those strategies to meet specific clients’ needs and objectives across traditional marketing, digital & social media and branded content.

Much as our name implies, the ethosGroup combines its understanding of cultural distinctiveness with the most sophisticated usage of the entire spectrum of media to create brilliant marketing communications/advertising campaigns that go wherever your consumer does. Online, on their cells, on branded television programs, to events, even to their homes via grassroots activities.

The ethosGroup devises relevant marketing and advertising strategies that position your products both culturally and targeted to that segment most important to you and your goals.
http://www.ethosagency.com/

Patricio Quezada > www.hispanicslearn.com

Patricio Quezada, CEO & Founder, Hispanics Learn.

What do you need to be an entrepreneur?
You need persistence and execution. Without those 2 key elements you’ll find yourself wasting time and energy.

What did inspire you to start your business?
Being able to grab control of steering wheel and drive myself to where I want to go.

How did you finance it?
Personal finances, Friends and Families

Being Hispanic…Does it have any influence on your business?
Yes. Speaking both languages fluently and being involved in the Hispanic community helps me a lot with my demographics.

In the face of adversity, how do you decide to keep going?
Envisioning the finish line and how good it’s going to feel once I reach it.

What is the biggest challenge your business has faced?
Looking for outside help.

If you could change one thing about your business, what would it be?
I’d definitely like to have more employees that I can talk to about ideas.

What was your childhood ambition?
I wanted to be a scientist but over the years physics and beakers weren’t my favorite toys anymore.

Tell us about three entrepreneurs that you admire?
Pharrell Williams is truly my number one. He’s a very artistic and unique individual. He has a drive, persistent, and execution that is uncanny.

Roger Velasquez is another of the influential entrepreneurs in my life. Besides the fact that he is a family member of mine doesn’t take away the fact that even though he doesn’t have a wall of master degrees he still managed to start his business and overcome all obstacles put in front of him at an early age.

Tony Hsieh is my number three after much debate. I met him at an Underground Teleseminar and did not know anything about his company or his prior entrepreneurship expenence. After listening to his presentation and then following his company endeavors on a daily basis I started to see that his entrepreneur approach is really the key to his success.

For business meetings: breakfast, lunch, or dinner?
I like lunch.

What sacrifices on your personal life did you have to make in order to become a business success?
I had to let go of the dependability of being with my friends and just spending time alone with my business idea.

What is your favorite quote?
“Victory goes not to the swift nor to the strong but to he who endureth until the end”- Unknown

Is it difficult to be unconventional?
No, I think as an entrepreneur it comes naturally and sooner or later you see that you’ve accomplished so much out of the norm that it is now a way of life.

Biggest mistake made?
It has to be the lack of execution from the beginning.

Do you consider yourself an innovator? Why?
Yes, I’ve overcome many entrepreneurial hardships through unconventional practices and with the help of some serial entrepreneurs and a great business coach.

About the Company
Founded in 2008 by Patricio Quezada, 18, Hispanics Learn provides bi-lingual computer and technology training to the Hispanic Community in the U.S. and abroad. Hispanics Learn has been featured on CNN, CBS.com and in the Washington Business Journal. http://www.hispanicslearn.com/

Hispanics Learn offers in person workshops and online training and tools to create a dynamic learning experience for both individuals and groups. The content is available in multiple formats, audio, video and print and is also presented in Spanish and English for those who are also learning the language. Quezada is exploring partnerships with workforce development programs and non-profits that work to improve opportunities for Hispanics. Quezada is also penning his first book, The Bilingual Computer Handbook that he plans to release on Amazon.com this fall. The book will be written in English and Spanish and will introduce basic computer concepts and terms in a step-by-step format.

Jorge Siffredi > www.englishmedianet.com

Jorge Siffredi, CEO & Co-Founder, English Media Net.

What do you need to be an entrepreneur?
To be an entrepreneur, you need ‘attitude’. You could have been born with it, or you can work on it during your whole life. If you reach them both, you are likely to reach success in everything you want.

What did inspire you to start your Business?
In my case, it was something natural. Once I had reached the top position at an International Company (which trained professionals and companies in English language) and when I felt that to manage 350 people in 5 different countries was not such a surprising challenge, my next step was to have my own company

How did you finance it?
With my own money and partners.

Being Hispanic…Does it have any influence on your business?
I don’t think your place of birth is so important.

In the face of adversity, how do you decide to keep going?
In that situation, you can tell one who starts some business (who usually gives up) from that one who is an entrepreneur, who is driven by passion and iron faith he has in his project. Both are engines that strengthen and inspire him to always find an appropriate solution and to carry on.

What is the biggest challenge your business has faced?
To learn how to manage it.

If you could change one thing about your business, what would it be?
‘Nothing’ and ‘everything’. ‘Nothing’ in the sense that we are successful in what we are doing. And ‘everything’, since we are always on the alert and checking all our procedures, so as to improve them, having critical thinking skills in our acts (with an external perspective), keeping alert for any necessary change.

What was your childhood ambition?
I have always tried (since I was a child) to be the best one in those things I set out to do. Obviously, at that moment, I was not so much conscious about it.

Tell us about three entrepreneurs that you admire?
Thomas Alva Edison, Ray Kroc and Steve Jobs. They have inspired me through their brilliance, forward-looking approach and their enormous perseverance capacity.

For business meetings: breakfast, lunch, or dinner?
For me, it’s the same. I really love what I do, then, I can talk business over breakfast, lunch and dinner the same day.

What sacrifices on your personal life did you have to make in order to become a business success?
To be successful in any sort of business, you have to get ready for sacrifice. For obvious reasons, devoting long hours to continuous work, means taking them out of family, friends and leisure time. But, if to that effort you add intelligence, what you leave on your way, in that sense, will be then returned to you in full.

What is your favorite quote?
I’d like to be the main character in the film of my life, not only a mere spectator of things that happen to me’.

Is it difficult to be unconventional?
At this moment in humanity, to be conventional is to be left out of the game.

Biggest mistake made?
Choosing my first partners, mistake that, thank God, I managed to mend in time.

Do you consider yourself an innovator? Why?
I can not help thinking about how wonderfully fast humanity advances nowadays. To be innovator is something I love and, besides, I consider it essential. That’s why I had the idea (when it was still considered technologically ‘impossible’) to create a whole virtual company for learning English 100 % live, from any place in the world.

About the Company:
English Media Net is an institution which makes it possible for staff, professionals, businessmen and businesswomen, to learn to speak, read and write in English fluently, taking all the advantages that e-learning provides, concerning its comforts in spite of time and distance, added to permanent live classes, something essential to learn a second language in the correct way.
www.englishmedianet.com

Diego Gaona > www.onna-gourmet.com.ar

Diego Gaona, Owner, Onna Gourmet Pizza Catering.

What do you need to be an entrepreneur?
In a country as Argentina, you will basically need courage, astuteness and not to think so much as if you do it, you will find so many obstacles to start with.

What did inspire you to start your business?
Firstly, the need to begin with my own project, and secondly improve my economy.

How did you finance it?
I rent my apartment for usd 700 to a foreigner couple who lived in Buenos Aires for 3 month.
And I’ve been living at friend’s houses as a nomad.

Being Hispanic…Does it have any influence on your business?
I think we are used to work much harder to resolve any type of problems as here in Argentina everything is difficult.

In the face of adversity, how do you decide to keep going?
The only way is insisting. In our country the decisions are very influenced by the economy and the politics. These are two crucial things to contract a catering.

What is the biggest challenge your business has faced?
The mayor challenge was to consolidate our brand as a concept; we sell the best Pizza Gourmet, accompanied with honesty, education and respect.

If you could change one thing about your business, what would it be?
I would like to be a step forward on business. For example open premises and be able to manage it and expand this concept all over the world.

What was your childhood ambition?
Have a good economy position and be able to help other people who need a hand.

Tell us about three entrepreneurs that you admire?
In alphabetic order: Claudio Destéfano, Andy Freire and Alec Oxenford. I’ve been lucky meeting the 3 of them in entrepreneur congresses, reading their books and inviting them to my TV program (www.encuentrosgourmet.com.ar) where I could join my journalist profession with the kitchen.

For business meetings: breakfast, lunch, or dinner?
None. I think the best is to have the meeting before, make the deal where both parts win and then have lunch or dinner. I don’t consider beneficial to mix a tense moment with a pleasure one.

What sacrifices on your personal life did you have to make in order to become a business success?
You are working meanwhile the other people are enjoying the event, party, birthday, etc. You should assume this from the very begging to delight the work you are doing.

What is your favorite quote?
Regarding thoughts, to be alert every moment to catch any opportunity; and my favourite expression is “wind on favor, wind against”. Nothing is more pleasant to win when you perseverate and work honestly.

Is it difficult to be unconventional?
No, is very interesting because you have no limits. I’m my own roof and I decide till where I’ll reach.

Biggest mistake made?
Biggest mistake made? I think I didn’t make one. Saint Ignacio de Loyola said “the experience makes the man”, you learn from your errors and good decisions. You should recognize and repair them on time, no matter what it takes.

Do you consider yourself an innovator? Why?
Yes. I consider myself an innovator because 5 years ago I proposed myself a very ambitious objective: make the best pizza in the world; I try to re invent the pizza, giving more value to it and converting in a gourmet plate.

About the Company:
Onna – Gourmet Pizza Catering: Our mission is re inventing the pizza, adding more value to it, and making a real gourmet plate.

In Onna we organize birthdays, parties, vernissages, company events, openings and product launches.
In Onna we make the better Pizzas Gourmet in your house, country house, farm or apartment.
www.onna-gourmet.com.ar
www.encuentrosgourmet.com.ar