We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Acouplewithoutborders Robyn & Paul. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Acouplewithoutborders below.
Acouplewithoutborders, appreciate you joining us today. Do you take vacations? Why or why not?
As our business and staff grew, we were able to get away more to pursue what we love – birding and wildlife eco-travel. As we showcased our travels on IG, our followers (mostly also birders and wildlife photographers), started to ask, “Can I come with you?” We built trust and a large following in the community and knew this would be a great opportunity to be able to share our love of travel with others and also be able to travel a lot more throughout the year. So we started a Travel With Us series where we work with local guides and tour companies around the world and put together group trips. It has become so popular, our trips book up years in advance and we have 5-6 trips a year.
Acouplewithoutborders, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
Out journey began very organically. As avid birders and wildlife photographers, we started showcasing our love for nature on our IG account. Each day, we posted (and still do) daily stories, taking our followers along on our adventures almost live. From hiking to plant based dining to birding to wildlife photography. We started meeting people in person with the same interests and made some amazing friends. We truly never imagined where this journey would take us – our lives have completely changed. We became involved in conservation work, volunteering with shorebirds on our local beach, started a large Monarch Conservation project in NYC which we work on 5-7 hours a day each summer, we give talks throughout the country on various topics, create content for our favorite plant based food and restaurants in NYC, and started a Trip Club where we setup group trips around the world with our followers. It’s been a whirlwhind journey that we are so grateful for.
All of this is “extra”. I (Robyn) started a Dog Walking & Pet Sitting company 22 years ago which I also franchised and that is our “bread & butter” and our main business. The rest has just added so much enrichment and joy to our lives and all the work we put into it on a daily basis on top of our full-time jobs makes us truly fulfilled.
How did you build your audience on social media?
We always tell people – BE YOURSELF.
All we did was show off what we loved and were genuine with who we were.
We also put in the work to create valuable content each day and engage with other accounts, connecting with people who had similar interests.
It took us a couple of weeks to come up with our IG name @acouplewithoutborders
We went through many names seeing how they sounded and looked on the screen as well as represented what we were about.
Do you have any stories of times when you almost missed payroll or any other near death experiences for your business?
The COVID-19 Pandemic was a blessing and a curse for us.
Our Dog Walking & Pet Sitting Business had been booming for 18 years. It seemed like nothing could slow it down. Then came something we never dreamed of. The pandemic meant not only people not wanting others in their homes, but clients were home from work, many of them losing their jobs. We lost 90% of our business. We struggled to pay our mortgage, and didn’t want to lose our staff so continued to pay them. We had to drastically drop our expenses both in the business and in our personal lives. I wasn’t able to pay myself for over a year and we lost some of our new franchisees who had to close. Things have recovered but we are still down 50% and I’m 4 months behind in paying myself – but it gave us the motivation and the TIME to pursue new endeavors! All of the things we spoke about earlier.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/acouplewithoutborders
- Other: https://taplink.cc/acouplewithoutborders
Image Credits
n/a