We recently connected with Gladys Reyes and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Gladys thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. One deeply underappreciated facet of being an entrepreneur or creative is the kind of crazy stuff that happens from time to time. It could be anything from a disgruntled client attacking an employee or waking up to find out a celebrity gave you a shoutout on TikTok – the sudden, unexpected hits (both positive and negative) make the profession both exhilarating and exhausting. Can you share one of your craziest stories?

Hello, thank you very much for interviewing me again, it is a pleasure for me, well, my path in modeling has been short, but even so, many things have happened to me. And of all that has happened to me, I would like to share a bad experience that I had and that can leave a lesson for those of us who have dreams and don’t let to anyone to take advantage of it. Some time ago I went to a catwalk casting which I did not pass because I did not require experience. So I decided to take a catwalk course at an “Agency” whose name I will not mention so as not to risk a lawsuit, I worked very hard to be able to pay for the course, the director of the agency knew my situation very well when we met, we agreed that I did not want to get into debt with the course, I would go every month to give her money and after paying everything, take the course. The agreement was that the course that I would take would be the basic one that included one day makeup class, catwalk, dance and a photo session and I was happy that was the only thing I needed to prepare for modeling. I paid $900 for the course, it would be 8 course weekends, that is, 16 days. The day I went to make the last payment I was very happy but the director surprised me by telling me that my course did not include photography. Thanks to God I had a conversation with her on Instagram where she assured me that the course included photography. I showed it to her and she told me that it was her mistake but for that mistake she would give me the session. On my first day at the agency I saw something unusual that made me reject the place but I was already there and the contract said (no refund) I tried to have a good time and enjoy the moment but days passed and the director told me that my course did not include makeup, unfortunately I couldn’t do anything, so it made me very angry…. A classmate was days away from finishing her course at that agency And the director found out that my classmate was thinking of enrolling in an modeling academy and They had a discussion in which I got involved because my classmate at that time was minor, and I defended her. Coincidentally, the director tells me that my course was not 18 days as we had agreed, but that it was 12 days and that I only had 4 days of course left. There were already many changes in the contract and it bothered me a lot. I asked her to reimburse me for what was left of the course. She decided to reimburse me. I paid 500 dollars for just the catwalk without a coach because the agency didn’t even have that. So my advice to all of you is not to enter small agencies that pretend to be good, invest your money in prestigious and recognized agencies where real professionals can train you.

Gladys, 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?

I am currently a photography model, I realized that social networks and your effort and perseverance will open paths for you. I already had my first catwalk and I am very happy to see the results of all my effort. I also have my YouTube channel where I give advice for those who want to be models. I am also a content creator on tiktok and instagram about makeup and other topics. I do live videos on facebook about makeup while I talk to my followers about my experiences in modeling and I hope to get to work with brands.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

What has helped me build my reputation is always letting myself be guided by people I consider to be experts in this industry. I love asking for advice to be able to learn and thus be sure that I will do it well, always keeping my position of what I want to achieve but always in the right way.

Any advice for growing your clientele? What’s been most effective for you?

Like any business or project, I invested and collaborated The strategy that worked for me to make myself known to photographers was investing and collaborating. First I paid for a photo session and then with those photos I advertised on my social networks. I decided to join a group of models on facebook and with those same photos I introduced myself to the group and they contacted me to collaborate and so I have met more and more photographers.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cl49UpaOiV_/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bellaglarey?mibextid=LQQJ4d
• Youtube: https://youtu.be/ITnZ58OdC1w

Image Credits
Luigi Luigi_photographer