We were lucky to catch up with Deanna Munoz recently and have shared our conversation below.

Deanna, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Let’s kick things off with talking about how you serve the underserved, because in our view this is one of the most important things the small business community does for society – by serving those who the giant corporations ignore, small business helps create a more inclusive and just world for all of us.

The Latino/a/e Chicano/a/e aspiring artist community in Kansas City can be underserved and under resourced within the arts eco system. Latino Arts Foundation supports the aspiring artist in our Latino/a/e Chicano/a/e communities by way of no cost art mentorship in all art genres for the aspiring artist, an annual festival to celebrate the culture with the arts where artists can participate to showcase their work and sell, community pop ups, a Latino Arts Foundation art scholarship where we awarded 5 college art students in 2023.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am Deanna Munoz and founded Latino Arts Foundation 15+ years ago as I saw that my daughter was writing at the age of 6 and wanted her to have the mentor support that I did not have when I was growing up. Seeking this type of mentoring was not easy and most said I should wait until she is in high school or college to even think about mentorship. I did not agree. I was introduced to El Centro and after hearing our story, offered a space for LAF to do the work of mentorship in the community. From there we had creative writing, visual art, theater/playwright, muralism, photography and videography. We dreamt of the festival as we wanted our mentees to know that they could also showcase their work in community and sell as well. This gave them an early path into entrepreneurship.

We’d love to hear about how you met your business partner.

I met Edgar Palacios, CEO & Founder Latinx Education Collaborative about 10+ years ago as we were both building our organizations at the same time, his in education and mine in art. We are now housed under LEC and I can continue the work of LAF alongside LEC.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

Advice I would have for managing a team and maintaining a high morale is trust. Trust is everything and without it you have nothing. Ensure your team is well equipped with all the resources they need to be successful and be a team member.