We were lucky to catch up with Tina Fontenot recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Tina thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. How do you think about vacations as a business owner? Do you take them and if so, how? If you don’t, why not?

As a business owner who business is solely about travel. I think it’s imperative to take and make time for yourself to practice self care. Before, I became a full time entrepreneur in the travel industry I was a social worker for 15 years. The things that I’ve witnessed seeing and hearing from others while trying to manage my own grief forced me to practice self-care. My form of self-care and therapy for myself was traveling. I found so much joy in seeing new places, meeting new people, and just simply shifting from one reality to the next. I believe this what made me have a passion and love not only for travel, but group travel as well. I wanted others to feel exactly how I felt whenever I traveled to a new destination.

Tina , 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?

My name is Tina Fontenot and I am the proud owner of Boss Moves T.L.F travel agency. Before, I became a travel business owner I traveled quite frequently domestically and abroad. I take proud in offering affordable, memorable, well organized, and overall just a dope worry free vacation experience.

As, I stated previously I was a social worker for 15 years before I became a full time travel advisor. I certainly believe my education, work ethics, and being culturally competent helped me to connect and place people from different social backgrounds together.

Also, I just recently entered into motherhood and I am the proud mother of Nova Wren Maiden. She has inspired me to curate more family/ kid friendly group trips. It’s equally important for children to have exposure to new places, people, and things.

The one thing that I can say that I’m super proud of is that I grew my business organically by word of mouth and people just watching me be my authentic true self as I lived my life out loud. This country gul from Boyce, La is proud to be an up and coming household name as it relates to travel.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I believe COVID tested every business owner gangsta. Seriously, it was definitely survival of the fittest. I remember going from super booked and busy to cancel, cancel, and cancel. At this moment in my life I became very depressed because I was not only responsible for myself, but I also had five employees that I was responsible for ensuring that they received their paycheck every two weeks. People always share and highlight the highs of business, but they never highlight the lows. I found myself going without and placing the things I needed to take care of on the back burner just so I could pay my team. In hindsight, honestly I should have just laid everyone off, but the compassion I had as a social worker wouldn’t allow me to do it because I knew my staff needed and depended on their paychecks to take care of their family too.

Eventually, I had to make a choice to layoff 80 % of my team. By keeping everyone we had quickly started operating in the red. I’m so thankful that now we are out of the deficit and we’re slowly back thriving again.

I believe the one thing that helped me get through this tumultuous time in life is knowing that seasons change and it won’t be like this always..

How did you build your audience on social media?

Although, I have a business page for my business on social media majority of my business is generated via my personal page on Facebook. I personally believe people are curious to know if I act the same in person as I do on social media. I believe it’s important to be your authentic true self. Let people fall in love with the true you. Also, showcase what is that you do. Don’t let them forget about you. Always remind them of what you do by showing them and making them believe their is no one better for the job than your business. Please also know that you just won’t be able to please everyone and it’s definitely Ok with turning down people who maybe a potential problem in the near future.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.BossMovesTLF.com
• Instagram: bossmovest.l.f
• Facebook: Boss Moves T..L.F
• Other: App: BossMovesTLF