We were lucky to catch up with Danni & Fede recently and have shared our conversation below.

Danni & Fede, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What’s the kindest thing anyone has ever done for you?

We were traveling through Senegal, and drove several hours to a destination saved on our map. We had seen a really impressive mosque that a local had posted, so we added the city of Touba to our itinerary.

The roads in Senegal aren’t always the best, and it took us several hours to make it the city. We couldn’t find an ATM or restaurant along the way, so we were hoping that we’d be able to find one in Touba.

Once we pulled into the city center we started to drive around. We weren’t having any luck with our search on Google Maps, so we pulled over to ask someone for help. As we pulled into the parking lot we had a lot of concerned looks, which were certainly not welcoming.

With Fede’s broken French, he tried to explain that we were looking for a restaurant, ATM, and hotel in the area. They forced us into a room inside what looked like a religious site, and made us wait there. All we could hear was a lot of arguing, and we started to feel super uneasy. It was obvious that we weren’t welcome.

One of the guys came back and started explaining that Touba is not a tourist destination. Not only that, but there are no restaurants, hotels, ATMs, or basically anything. We started to be quite worried, as we were out of gas, had no money, and now also had no place to eat or sleep. The next “city” was at least 2 hours away, so things weren’t looking good.

He left the room again, and we waited for what felt like eternity – what was going to happen to us?

Finally the man walked back in and told us that the locals were currently making lunch for us, and that they would help us make it out of Touba.

We had an incredible meal, and Bamba (the name of the man who we had been primarily communicating with) started to ask us questions. Once we asked where we were from, his face lit up. Fede is from Argentina, and apparently so is Bamba’s wife. He was visiting his home town (Touba) but is actually living in Buenos Aires with his wife and children! We were then able to speak Spanish and there was a much better understanding of the situation as well as a new connection there.

He left again to speak with some of his friends. When he came back he explained that he spoke with the head of the town, a man who has his own power from the country’s government. They were going to let us go to the mosque, and were actually going to give us a tour of the place! But one thing we had to do was change our clothes. You see- Senegal is muslim, and women have to cover EVERYTHING, including our hair.

We were taken to a house where we were dressed from head to toe in local clothing. We had an hour tour from Bamba and the head of the town himself.

Once we got back they told us that the the clothes were a gift, and that we didn’t owe them anything! He told us in their culture it’s about community, and helping each other is important to them. They also helped us exchange some of our euros so that we could get some gas at the nearest gas station, and continue our journey in Senegal problem-free.

We couldn’t believe the sheer care and selflessness of Bamba, and the others around. He took care of us, and wanted nothing in return. It really showed us the importance of helping others without expecting anything in return.

To this day we keep in contact with Bamba, and will always make an extra effort to help tourists who are lost, without a ride, hungry, or need any guidance during their travels.

Danni & Fede, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

We are Danni and Fede, a couple who met 6 years ago working on cruise ships.

In 2019 we set off on a 6-week trip through South America, and decided to create our Instagram.

Our brand started to grow, and during the pandemic we were split up. Danni was onboard a cruise ship, and Fede was in Argentina. We took this opportunity to create our website, and started providing free travel guides, so that other people could learn from our mistakes, save money, and explore unique destinations.

Ever since, our brand has been growing, and we currently offer Lightroom Presets, personalized travel photo books, travel pillow cases and scarves, travel planning, and we even just wrote a book about how to travel as a couple and build a business.

At Scratch Your Mapa we also work with brands, tour companies, hotel, and tourism boards to create personalized content for them, and promote them on our social channels and website. We work with small businesses such as boutique hotels rather than big chains. We promote underrated destinations, and support mom and pop shops over big corporations. Sustainability is also an important factor for us, and we are always looking to work with people wanting to better the world.

Every decision we make as a company comes back to our mission – to make people better travelers. Whether it’s helping them save more, travel greener, or explore hidden gems, we always keep our mission in mind.

We are proud of always staying true to our values over money, and always providing our own unique content. Many bloggers fill their pages with guest posts. It’s easier, and it brings in more money. But for us, integrity is everything, and we want to make sure we are providing honest and up-to-date information at all times. Stealing info from the internet won’t help people find authentic restaurants, and AI can’t capture the pure moments of traveling, so we know the importance behind experience, and will always keep our site and social platforms that way. Currently, we have over 375 articles completely written by us, and will continue with 2 articles per week, as long as we can imagine.

That’s another reason we started doing travel planning. Traditional agencies work with big corporations where they get a bit cut. They work on commissions rather than flat fees, so their goal is never to save people money, or give them a unique experience. It’s all about the money.

At Scratch Your Mapa we believe in value, which is why we developed a completely different system for our travel planning services. It’s important to us that we can truly help people have the trip of their lifetime.

All of our products and services are to make people enjoy their travels as much as possible. Everyone can make the time or money to travel, and our goal is to help people see that, so they can explore as much of the world as we have.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

A lot of people think that people randomly get a lot of followers. We can promise that this is not the case, and growing your social media is truthfully a job in itself!

One of the things that is the most important is providing value. Whether it is entertainment, education, or inspiration, you always want to bring value. Take time to make captivating content, and write captions that will help people.

Optimizing your profile is also something that will help you- almost like a resume. Make sure your handle, name, and bio is clear and concise, letting your followers know exactly what they’ll find on your site.

Finally, engaging is key. Unfortunately, if you don’t spend time on the app(s), the algorithm won’t favor you. So make sure to follow people in your niche, and engage. Comment on their posts, respond to other comments, and build a community.

If you’d like to know more ways to grow your Instagram, we’ve written a free guide on how to do so

https://scratchyourmapa.com/grow-instagram-followers-organically/

Okay – so how did you figure out the manufacturing part? Did you have prior experience?

All of our products are manufactured by us and one other woman (also names Danni) in Buenos Aires. We go to the local garment district and pick out the fabric and zippers. We have designed the models for our pillow cases and scarves ourselves, and our co-worker Danni brings the ideas to life. She hand-sews everything, which for us is very important.

We always believe in quality over quantity- so rather than hiring a factory and adding to pollution, we prefer our products to be made with love, and not negatively affect the environment.

It was difficult to find someone who we could rely on! We were constantly looking in Facebook groups for people who could sew, and it was a lot of trial and error before finding the right one.

One thing we learned is that it’s important to create multiple prototypes, and to test them out as much as possible before going into mass production. We purchased zippers that we later found out were not the highest-quality. We learned the hard way and had to not only lose our inventory, but pay Amazon to get everything back as we didn’t want to see a product that would break.

We are currently testing out several other zippers, knowing that sometimes increasing the cost is inevitable, but it will bring a higher-quality product in the long run. The most important thing is your reputation, so if you have to invest a bit more, that’s more than okay.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://scratchyourmapa.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/scratchyourmapa/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scratchyourmapa
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/89490255/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCa44-QmlA7LoDUrHi1d_66w
• Other: https://www.pinterest.com/scratchyourmapa

Image Credits
Scratch Your Mapa