We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ron Denoo a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Ron, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today How did you find your key vendor or vendors? Maybe you can share the backstory and share some context and the relevant details to help us understand why you chose them, why they chose you, etc.

In order to get the instruments out of Ecuador I needed to figure out the logistics. Ecuador is a country without a postal system and moving goods around is not trivial. I decided that I needed to get my feet on the ground and start meeting with people face-to-face to try to find a solution, so I booked a trip. Once there I networked with everyone I could…. Government officials, bankers, lawyers, logistics companies, local people, anyone who would listen. My efforts paid off as I was able to find a logistics company that had been exporting locally made panama hats from a village nearby San Bartolome and they agreed to work with me to pickup the instruments in the mountains and package them for export. There is no way I could have found this option by searching online.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I have been an executive in the chemical industry for over 30 years but my passion has always been music. In February, 2020, my wife and I visited Ecuador on vacation and I had heard about a small village in the mountains near Cuenca where they have been hand-building guitars for over 200 years.called San Bartolome. I hired a driver to take us there and we spent the day meeting many amazing craftsmen who were struggling to maintain their artisan way of life. One family in particular, Santiago and Patricia Uyaguari, really connected with us. Santiago is a 4th generation luthier with two beautiful young daughters. We ended up spending the entire next day with them and became fast friends. Two weeks later is when the entire world exploded with COVID and their already difficult way of life became nearly impossible to maintain. We stayed in contact with them, doing what we could to help them survive the pandemic. Once things stabilized again we turned our attention to how to bring their amazing instruments to the global market, this was the inspiration for Andecraft Music.

Andecraft Music offers affordable, handcrafted music instruments from the artisans of San Bartolome, Ecuador. Each instrument is unique and is made with local woods that have been selected over centuries of refinement to make the best possible instruments. Even the instrument cases are made by local artisans with local fabrics. The goal of this business is to provide a sustainable way of life for these remote artisans so they can pass their skills down to the next generation. It’s more of a passion project than a business as I really care about these people and their livelihood.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I had started a few small businesses before Andecraft Music so I thought I knew the process. However, doing business in Ecuador is a different animal. Things that are simple in the USA like shipping products, banking, export regulations, etc, are extremely complex in Ecuador. It’s a country that is full of amazing, hard-working people, but they are still figuring out how to participate in the global economy. I had placed my first order for 20 instruments before I had any idea how to get them out of the country, that put me under pressure to figure things out quickly… which I did with the help of many people who shared my vision and stepped up to help me figure things out. It was inspiring to me how many people were willing to jump in and help once they understood my vision and motivation. I did a lot of networking with local people to eventually connect with the people I needed to make this happen. Networking and getting my feet on the ground was the key, people don’t always reply to email but if you are sitting across the table from them it’s hard to be ignored.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

One of the first meetings I had once I was on the ground in Ecuador was with a lawyer. He had been referred by a friend and I was seeking advice on the legal exportation of goods from Ecuador. This lawyer proceeded to explain to me that the only way to export from Ecuador was to hire a middleman to pay what were essentially bribes to the proper officials to ensure the process ran smoothly. I politely explained to him that I don’t do business that way and left his office wondering if I had made a big mistake committing to make this happen without understanding how things REALLY work in Ecuador. I quickly researched and found another attorney who assured me that there are ethical ways to export, it’s all about aligning with the right people and sticking to your values.

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.andecraftmusic.com
• Facebook: Andecraft Music

Image Credits
All photos are mine