On this ongoing collection, we’re sharing recommendation, suggestions and insights from actual entrepreneurs who’re on the market doing enterprise battle each day. (Solutions have been edited and condensed for readability.)
Spark & Riot
Who’re you and what’s your corporation?
My title is Ana de Diego and I’m the founder and Govt Producer of Spark & Riot, a globally-minded manufacturing and administration firm in Los Angeles.
What impressed you to create this enterprise?
In 2010, after graduating from USC, I had already spent a yr interning within the business manufacturing world and I noticed a area of interest hole out there — budgets have been reducing quickly and conventional business firms have been passing on these jobs. That’s after I determined to begin a small, nimble manufacturing firm that will service that area of interest for bigger companies that have been too cumbersome or too busy to bid. That have led me to a extra important hole within the international leisure market: worldwide content material. Being a Spanish feminine, I seen a major rise out there wants, however a dearth within the expertise to produce it. That’s after I began a administration firm, Spark & Riot, to characterize, develop and produce cross-cultural, worldwide content material. S&R represents administrators from all around the world that collaborate with international language writers to create scripted tasks and commercials.
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What has been your largest problem in the course of the pandemic and the way did you pivot to beat it?
In 2020, I leaned into constructing a roster of administrators and writers that align with a typical objective – to create impression via the intersectionality of artwork and commerce. Administrators like Justin Baldoni, Elisha Smith-Leverock and Gabrielle Gorman — leaders who promote impression of their private {and professional} lives — are actually a part of the Spark & Riot workforce the place creativity and consciousness are given the platform to collide and spark.
When manufacturing paused in 2020, I didn’t cease constructing and dealing internationally. I used the yr to strengthen and construct one other side of the corporate, international language movie and tv. At all times globally-minded, I mined common tales from around the globe to domesticate below the brand new improvement arm of Spark & Riot, aptly named, Cinder.
What recommendation would you give entrepreneurs searching for funding?
I began my firm by investing all of my very own financial savings to get it began. When you don’t imagine in your corporation, who will? Evaluating how a lot beginning capital you have to get began and assessing if it’s an funding you may make your self, is a vital first step. It offers you management over your corporation and permits you the liberty (and stress) to consider the place to greatest spend your cash. Apart from that, it’s actually about your dedication and fervour for your corporation. What makes you a unicorn?
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What does the phrase “entrepreneur” imply to you?
The phrase “entrepreneur” signifies that you’re each loopy and daring — loopy sufficient to begin it, and daring sufficient to make it work. An entrepreneur is solid within the philosophy that you’ll be the primary one in and the final one out it doesn’t matter what adversity stands in your approach.
What’s one thing many aspiring enterprise homeowners assume they want that they actually do not?
Plenty of cash. Clearly, this is determined by your corporation, however I strongly imagine most profitable companies are born with ardour, not capital. The cash will come, however solely after you’ve proven buyers your hearth.
Is there a selected quote or saying that you simply use as private motivation?
“A easy sea by no means made a talented sailor.” — FDR
I grew up on boats, and the reality is, within the hardest seas you be taught every thing you have to find out about your self and people round you. You be taught to be a frontrunner and also you additionally be taught when to be led. You be taught to work as a workforce. You learn to make fast selections and when to course appropriate. You study timing. You be taught concerning the significance of luck; being on the proper time and place, and when to seize a line, alter the sails and begin slicing your individual path.