We were lucky to catch up with Alvy Monarrez recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Alvy , thanks for joining us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

My wife Julie and I had always talked about homeschooling our kids. It was something that was important to us so we were determined to do what ever it took to make it happen for Julie to be a stay at home mom after our firstborn. I was a CNC machinist for a surgical device company. Pay was good but living in California (at that time) took a lot more than one good paying job so overtime was extremely important for us. I had to look for extra income the moment they started cutting off my overtime. I went from 55/65 hours a week to barely 40. One day my DJ friend posted on Facebook that his friend was looking for a photo booth attendant. I knew what a photo booth was but I didn’t know photo booths needed attendants because I always remembered the photo booth at malls that were left unattended. I reached out and got the job. I was astonished of how much people liked the photo booth and how important it was for an attendant to be present to make things fun and organized. The whole concept was amazing but I was not satisfied on the appearance of the booth. The booth was built inside those instrument cases (black and silver) that musicians use to transport their instruments and they had a black tent to enclose it. I thought it was the ugliest thing on the planet to have at parties or weddings. I did a Google search after my first day to look for a decent looking booth. To my surprise there was nothing on the market except VW bus photo booths (which inspired me later on in our photo booth journey). There were no enclosed/stationary booths that were aesthetically pleasing. This is where our photo booth journey began. I was determined to build something unique and aesthetically pleasing with top notch quality. Julie at that time was not very intrigued with the idea. We were short on money and unsure if people would accept the idea. Nonetheless, I quit the attendant job after my first day and began building our first booth.

Alvy , 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?

We are a husband and wife duo team that are extremely detail oriented. We’ve built one of a kind photo booths that we rent out for weddings, corporate events etc. We operate and handle everything ourselves and go against what the photo booth community considers convenient. Our booths are beautiful ,heavy, hard to put together and hard to transport. We are all for it! It keeps us in shape and unique.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

I kept my CNC job and ran our photo booth business on the weekends. It was extremely hard. We eventually decided that we wanted to take the photo booth full time. We sold our home, packed our bags and moved to Texas. We rebranded and took it full force. We put all our efforts into the business which has finally paid off. Starting all over in a new state is hard for any business but we committed and executed.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

Luckily I’m a good visual learning and could figure things out. We saved thousands of dollars by doing everything ourselves. Our initial cost was wood and all the technical components which were paid off in the first 6 paid events we had. We now have a total of 4 photo booths that are all paid for.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.Homesteadphotobooth.com
• Instagram: @homesteadphotoboothco

Image Credits
Mackenzie Smith photo