By Maritza Diaz | Project Leader
Life has unexpected changes and confronts us with endless challenges, which require courage and determination. Lilibeth is an example of this, as we will see below:
“I started my business on 2019 selling products by catalog, for cleaning and for personal care. This gave me time to take care of my son, who was just a few months old. Later, I started noticing that the clients were not paying on time anymore, that they were not paying the hole amount they owed me, and that if I asked them to pay cash immediately, then they prefered not to buy anything. So, my husband’s job was pretty much our only source of income at that time.
A few months ago, my husband lost his job. This complicated more the situation. We realized that we had to switch to a business where people pay immediately with no credit option. This is when we saw in the motorcycle washing business an opportunity, do to the fact that the motorcycle is the principal mean of transportation in Baru town and that to maintain them, it is very important to wash them regularly as in Baru Island there is no sewage system, and the streets are unpaved.
Without giving it much thought, we invested his final payment and the few savings we had to start the motorcycle wash business on a small piece of land in front of our house. We began to spread the word about our new entrepreneurship with our friends and we decided to open at night, because it is the time of the day when everyone returns to town.
We are offering our clients to wash their motorcycle during the night, so that they are ready and clean for the next day.
This is how, in the blink of an eye, we started our new business. The first day, we washed 14 motorcycles. Now a days, we wash approximately 30 motorcycles a day. My husband is in charge of washing the motorcycles and I'm in charge of the payment and even helping to dry them when the helper doesn't come. Ah, I forgot to mention it, we are generating a job!
Generate a job and that the customers return and prefer our service, makes me feel excited as we are doing something that helps our people”.
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By Maritza Diaz / Ana Milena Ordosgoitia | Project Leader / Director
By Maritza Diaz / Ana Milena Ordosgoitia | Project Leader / Director
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