We were lucky to catch up with TONY BERARDO recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, TONY thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

During 2020 when my wife and I were all stuck at home, like everyone else and honestly we were going a little crazy since we couldn’t go out and do our normally day-to-day activities. Of course, it was much more difficult for the small business around us here in Florida, as we watched a lot of them suffer financially with some even being forced to shut down.

After about of year of running out of things to do in our little condo, we put together a business plan together where I can focus more on my personal podcast and we could start a company together, which we always wanted to do.

TONY, 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?

What really motivated us to start a business is the fact, that personally, we had a friends that were in effected by the pandemic due to a lot of restrictions that were set in place. So, we know we wanted our

Well at first the lockdowns seemed fun, unit we wanted to have date nights. Since we normally go out to dinner, movies or events, we didn’t have a lot to do. As fun as Netflix & Chilling is, it got old so we started inventing fun way to keep our date nights fun and different. In fact, they became so much fun we started sharing ideas with friends and family and they really loved it! So after a few months, we thought “This might be a business idea!”

Still, we were early in our business plan but knew we wanted to include small businesses some how. After brainstorming for a few months and pitching the idea to a few local business around town and at farmers markets, we figured out our mission statement, inventory capacity, expenses, etc even turned our guest room into an office space where we can really get to work on this.

Fast forward 18 months later, we open our company, Meet Cute Box! Truly one of a kind, our unique date night box is themed differently each month based on a membership profile. Every crate is handmade featuring items that are ONLY from local businesses around the globe so partners can experience something different every month.

The response was very positive in the beginning so we launched SINGLE boxes, GIFT boxes and even E-Gift Cards a just a few weeks of being open. There’s much more work to do but we love doing it and are proud that our boxes can help small businesses generating brand awareness while keeping that “meet-cute feeling” alive for our members.

On top of that, we figured if folks can’t afford our membership we wanted to offer something similar in the form of a podcast. So a few times a month, my wife and I research relationship advice, share date night ideas even joke about our previous relationships. Our show, The Meet Cute Box Podcast is available wherever podcasts are, even YouTube.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Personally, now that I’m in my mid-3o’s I’ve spend my entire life working for corporate America with large Fortune 5oo businesses. While it’s great to have the security of these giants for most of my career, I have had some health scares coupled with being laid off due to the pandemic, so turns out corporate jobs aren’t always secure and I wanted a change.

I knew that if I lived the rest of my days working a job that was only fulfilling 1/2 of my desires and only a fraction of my skills – I’d regret it. That’s when I decided to start looking more into consultant work for jobs that I’m truly passionate about; like health and wellness, content creation and podcasting.

I had to switch up my thinking to becoming more independent, while trying to remove all those great managerial speeches from my corporate jobs. I just realized that if you’re not waking every Monday morning excited to go to work then you need to quit and find something you love to do before it’s too late.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

Well, the easy answer is: You should have a partner that sees your vision and has their personal life in order. If each of you aren’t set up to take care of yourself, you may recent each other if you try to do something as “risky” as starting a business. So for us, the capital we needed simply came from years of planning and being smart with our money. Only buying things we needed, not wanted. The easiest way to have more money is to NOT spend it.

We sold things we weren’t using, donate the rest which helps us declutter our physical space (and mental space) which believe it or not made us way more productive! On top of that, we just set up a goal of where we needed to be and did what was necessary to get there. 

Finally, when we both felt comfortable financially we built the business within the four walls first, took our time to get organized while building the site – then picked a launched date! Now, we can make our own future but it won’t be easy but that’s what makes it super exciting.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.meetcutebox.com
• Instagram: @theberardo
• Facebook: @theberardo
• Linkedin: @theberardo
• Twitter: @theberardo
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/tonyberardo
• Other: I also host a personal podcast where I talk about health, wellness and social interaction, THE BERARDO PODCAST. That’s available everywhere or at www.theberardo.com