For my final blog post, I’d love to talk about a personally experienced entrepreneurial venture. I worked for six months at a beautiful little cafe called Brazilian Table. This place and the family that began it is very close to my heart. Its story is unique and the epitome of bring people together.

Sylvia Boff was a well-established pianist in Brazil with a love for baking and cooking. She raised two daughters and a son, then once they were grown up, she moved to America to start selling her delicious meals and desserts. The two daughters traveled with her; Mariana got a business degree at Messiah University and Juliana learned English and business at a local community college while running the cafe. Starting up was a process that I was lucky enough to be a part of. I was hired about six months after opening, but so much progress still needed to be done. The stories I could tell of processes trial and error, rearrangement, establishments of new equipment, and the Brazilian culture and language are endless. I was paid minimally but gained ineffable riches in my character development and work ethic and business skills. The real life entrepreneurship I witnessed was chaotic.

Success became possible, not because of perfection, but because of the wonderful environment Sylvia created. She has an extremely welcoming presence, a desire to pour out onto every person she comes into contact with, and an extreme work ethic. Most nights, she’d stay up cooking until about 4 am and then come into the cafe later in the day to restock. The support she gained quickly from the community truly made the entire thing possible. Sylvia is impossible to dislike.

There are so many lessons I could discuss that I gained at my time at Brazilian Table, but a few stand out. One of these is about spirit. People are drawn to passion, personality, and story. Sylvia trained me in customer service to meet guests where they were by welcoming them exuberantly, explaining products, and providing a rich experience that was way more than the food I was serving. I became quickly acclimated to meeting strangers whether they were American and familiar or Brazilian and spoke a language I barely knew. I learned the joy in hard work and how to laugh through inevitable mistakes. I gave my all in my different areas of talent and passion, too. Sylvia let me design all the chalkboards and run the social media. These were priceless opportunities that I would encourage everyone to search for.

I will always look back on my time working at Brazilian Table with so much thanksgiving.

https://braziliantablelititz.com/

I am a huge Yeti fan, and always kind of wondered how the brand started and grew so prosperously. Turns out, it’s been around longer than I expected. In 2006, two brothers were completely over dealing with low quality coolers. Roy and Ryan Seiders crafted an indestructible cooler from their father’s garage, and then launched the business from the same location. Yeti’s popularity grew quickly due to its actually well-made nature, the right social media testimonials, and classic word of mouth. Their cooler is now an outdoor staple, coveted by many and sometimes sold at wildly high prices. In 2014, ten years ago, they launched a new line of Rambler Tumblers and the Hopper soft cooler line. The Seiders just kept expanding, and now their company is worth 3.8 billion dollars.

The concepts of Yeti’s creation apply beautifully to classic entrepreneurship principles. The Seiders simply had a problem that they began with: cheep, breakable coolers. They got so tired of this inconvenience that pouring out hard work and countless time seemed worth it.

https://www.yeti.com/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_content=__iv_p_1_g_27908074949_c_650688525329_w_kwd-102062560_n_g_d_c_v__l__t__r__x__y__f__o__z__i__j__s__e__h_9005925_ii__vi__&key_yeti&&utm_id=google_475534229_27908074949_650688525329_kwd-102062560_c&gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQiAsOq6BhDuARIsAGQ4-zhh-uc9w2w-ptiifVKB5mGT_Wha4t7G6LyJioqSOJj5Pj8gNixclQQaAkWiEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

(not sure why the link is CRAZY long; it’s just to their home page!)

If you’ve been part of broad Christian circles for a long time, the brand He Would Love First is probably pretty familiar to you. It’s staple bracelets have been popular among Christians all over for at least the last several years. They are a simple, woven, and adjustable; the most common ones have either WWJD (meaning what would Jesus do) or HWLF (He would love first) on them. The brand / movement was began and developed by a young entrepreneur named Casey Shultis. He was captivated by the gospel and wanted his life to reflect the love of Jesus. Shultis ended up creating this simple emblem to remind himself and others everywhere of the simple love God allows us to live in. He Would Love First now represents the greatness of Jesus’ consistent reaction of love in every situation. It is a wearable reminder and has spread into a way to share the gospel with anyone who sees it.

I was introduced to He Would Love First in high school through a fundraiser. My neighbor’s friend was selling these bracelets to raise money for her missions trip. I wanted to support her and gained so much more. Now I have a few products from the company, both clothes I bought myself and was gifted. Their social media reach is pretty unmatched, and as far as I can tell, they have been able to keep up with changing trends over the years.

He Would Love First is a beautiful, Christ-centered example of redemptive retail that demonstrates many amazing characteristics of entrepreneurship.

https://hewouldlovefirst.com/

https://hewouldlovefirst.com/blogs/news/about-us-page?srsltid=AfmBOorgygmAuCOX-iqlzAPhu7cAZLhLxbzKF6sJ2giSpJ9kz-wrIwwk

The online buying and selling hub, Etsy, has submerged itself almost seamlessly into modern American culture. Its ingenious concept is now not foreign to the average household: buying and selling products through an online mediator. The creation and nature of Etsy is a prime example of the thought concept entrepreneurial mind. It makes possible and encourages the individual’s ability to sell simply. As a new Etsy seller myself, I’ve firsthand experienced the ease behind listing and growing a store’s presence.

The start of Etsy is riddled with the essence of entrepreneurship. It began with a frustrated entrepreneur, struggling to sell his creations successfully and consistently online. Rob Kalin was a woodworker at 25 years old when his frustrations led him to the engineering of Etsy. He founded it in 2005 and served as its CEO until 2008. He told Reader’s Digest during this period that “the industrial revolution and consolidation of corporations are making it hard for independent artisans to distribute their goods”.

I love how his story is inspired by real problems he noticed in the American economy and his own life. This points to the reassuring concept that problems in business and otherwise are usually relatable. Solutions can be widespread and shared to create something of an empire that can bring people together for common betterment.

Seven Weeks Coffee is an e-commerce coffee business with a prolife mission. Its name Seven Weeks was cleverly inspired by the size of a baby in the womb at seven weeks old: similar to that of a coffee bean. This is also the first time in its life that a baby’s heartbeat is clearly detectable. Anton Krecic founded Seven Weeks in 2021 at only 22 years old after spending some time in the discouraging scene of Capitol Hill. On the Seven Weeks Coffee website, he explains the discouragement he felt in finding that organizations often valued their profits more than their people-based missions and lacked godly principles in practice. He then is explicit in his mission as a Christian and conservative. This clarity and passion has grown an immense amount of support from large conservative names in the short span of three years.  In contrast with several of their counterparts, Seven Week’s mission statement transparently puts real people over profits, as 10% of every order goes to a real pro-life pregnancy center. Seven Week’s dedication is not only truly advancing its cause, but deliciously so. Krecic and his team care about unborn life as well as naturally sourced, healthy consumption. All of their coffee comes directly from famers the team knows and trusts and is lab tested. Krecic’s ingeniously niche combination of stellar, natural, and delicious coffee with an amazing cause has saved countless lives and enabled ordinary shoppers to fund change for Christ.

https://sevenweekscoffee.com/pages/our-donations

https://www.cxplained.com/interviews-founders/seven-weeks-coffee#:~:text=Anton’s%20Journey,weeks%20after%20he%20got%20married.

Hosana Revival is an ever growing Bible, devotional, and journal business. It was began, like almost all entrepreneurial ventures, somewhat by accident. A woman named Katie Guiliano was inspired by studying abroad and painted the cover of her Bible in 2015. Later that same year, she opened an Etsy shop selling hand-painted Bibles. Within the next year, she launched the website of what became Hosana Revival. Business continued increasing, and Katie hired her first employer in August of 2016. From then on, each year has brought more and more exciting renovations and growth to Hosana Revival. Katie’s husband, Nick joined the organization as well. Reading the story of their trust in God’s provision through the business is awe-inspiring. Hosana Revival now sells a wide variety of products, ranging from the original hand-painted Bibles all the way to their own apparel. The team hosts podcasts and is a hub for many valuable Biblical resources. Katie is admirable for her dedication to the cause of sharing the gospel in beautiful ways; although her business is for profit, it is far more greatly for the revival of Scripture in our broken world. I also love her business for its beauty. The aesthetic of her work and brand captivates me, and then its content makes me really want to support it. I am wholly inspired by Katie’s business and its success and noble mission.

https://hosannarevival.com/