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

Sandra, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

With Haitian-businesses.com, it all started when I held a position at a government institution and wanted to extend to opportunities available for small businesses to my community. I conducted an impromptu search to identify and locate Haitian owned businesses online. After several unsuccessful experiences, I began to collect their Haitian owned Businesses Information which ended up in me creating the platform to offer more opportunities to those businesses and expand their network. After about 6 months of thinking and working on the idea, in March 2014, Haitian-businesses.com launched as the premier platform to connect, promote and support Haitian Businesses.

Haïtea, was born one august night in 2015 at the diner table. When my 8yr old daughter, who’s an avid tea lover and creative, decided to combine the word Haïti and Tea. She also suggested we sell tea from Haiti to share our culture with the world. Having grown up in a house with a Haitian mom and grandmother her love for tea was inevitable. As the founder of Haïtea , she hopes to expand into Haïtea tea shops in every city. Today, we proudly empower Haitian women farmers and factory workers through sustainable opportunities and education.

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 grew up in close proximity with both my grandmothers, they were both amazing inspirations who greatly affected the person I am today. They were extremely caring, giving and loving not just for their loved ones but as well as the community. It always came naturally to me to give back to my community. I truly feel like helping others is in my DNA. Therefore, with both of my businesses, giving back to my country and my community are the core of our mission. Being able to provide a platform for Haitian Businesses to thrive, connect and grow their business is a mission that I am very proud of. It’s even more personal with Haïtea because we are directly contributing to economic development in Haiti.

Have you ever had to pivot?

I was comfortable in my government position when I began my journey in starting the Haitian Businesses platform. By no means did I expect it to grow they way it has over the years. It will in turn require me travel, attend events and dedicate more time in order to properly structure the growing platform. As a result, in 2017 I officially embarked on the entrepreneurship journey. It took a while to adjust to the change but with proper planning, I took on the challenge and haven’t looked back since.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I’ve heard the saying that Haitian don’t support each other so much that prior to embarking on this journey, I started to believe it. Nothing could be further from the truth, after my experience with the Haitian Businesses platform, my views have completely changed. However, the lack of exposure could be as reason for the lack of support. In which case, providing more exposure to the businesses is the core to our very existence.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.haitian-businesses.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/haitianbusinesses/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Haitianbusinesses
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/haitianbusinesz
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8lHZbHYcJSqriCZK10GDFA