Hi, I'm Carolina!
And I will tell you my experiences as an entrepreneur, a woman and a mother.
From record-breaking buildings to century-old institutions that are still active today, we tell you about 10 curiosities that will make you look at Valencia with different eyes.
Chapter 1
I started studying tourism, with the aim of obtaining a degree in tourism. official guide, I was able to dedicate myself to what I was really passionate about, showing the wonders of my city to all the visitors who came; with that spirit and the potential and growing market in the trend of the FreeTours I decided to embark on the Valencia & Go project.
So, little by little, I discovered the way in which other colleagues in the sector showed our city.
We improved the quality of our services by learning from each other in order to create the best impression for our clients, and it was at this moment of growth when we I discovered how to add value to Valencia & Go's services., We started with closed and personalised tours and excursions, because showing the centre of Valencia is cool, but... Do you know how many beautiful places we have less than 30 minutes away by bus?
Every day I saw that my studies in tourism made more sense, I dedicated myself to showing my city!!!, I was so excited about this project that I dedicated more and more time to it, and in the end I was able to do it, for the first time in my life, working for and by me.
I decided to create a website to promote these new products that I was making and create a team that I am more than proud of, today I can say without fear of being wrong that Valencia & Go has the best team of professionals in the sector in Valencia.
Chapter 2
Fortunately, this new project was growing steadily, I had already been in the sector for some time and I was constantly surprised by the number of people who came to visit the city, or even the locals who wanted to discover things from our hand. It was right at that moment of business growth when I had to live in first person a stage that will surely appear in many history books... The COVID_19 pandemic.
It was a tough time for most entrepreneurs, worldwide, but my sector in particular went to zero activity due to sanitary restrictions, confinements, perimeter closures, and so on. It was a time when, as a businesswoman and as a woman, I took the 2 riskiest decisions I have taken and of which I am most proud:
1- Entrepreneurially I decided not to stop the activity, Instead of giving up and looking for another sector, I trusted in our work and what our customers were saying about us, I have always wanted to continue with the same passion as the first day and no pandemic can take that illusion away from me. We decided to increase our presence in networks, reinvent our services, add products to our catalogue, maintain daily contact with my work team in order to go out, more plugged in than ever, I have to admit that in order to reduce our activity to 0, our work increased non-stop.
2- I fulfilled another of my great illusions, embarking on the project of becoming a mother ? with the business uncertainty behind our daily work.
Dear reader, I want to be honest, being an entrepreneurial woman is not easy and even less so if you are thinking of becoming a mother. We start from the premise that being an entrepreneur in a country with little help for entrepreneurship is not easy, but if you are also a mother you must know that you have a little person in your charge who does not know how to live alone...
You have to keep working every day, making difficult decisions that are even more complicated if you have to carry the fatigue of feeding a baby every 2 hours, and even if you think that working for yourself is all advantages, I will tell you the truth, maternity leave is different when you work for others. The day after giving birth I went back to my work email and answered the Valencia & Go phone.
Final chapter, reflection
Working for yourself is GREAT, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have its quirks - and of course it does - and you'll probably never face a boss who is as demanding of you as you can be. Although there is nothing more satisfying than working for a company whose business values you share 100%, and this is easy when you are the one who marks them.
Thinking about entrepreneurship? I encourage you to do it, I really don't regret at all each of the stages I have lived through that have made me get to where I am today, but the best advice I have for you is not to think individually that you are capable of everything, share your project with good people you can trust, I have been surprised many times and I still am with the amount of good ideas I receive when I share my concerns with the right people.
Looking back, all this journey has led me to fill my backpack with experiences, knowledge and companions that you can only get by living. don't hesitate, LIVE.
And this is the beginning of my story, Will you join me to find out what the future holds?