Meet Fernando Hurtado

We had the good fortune of connecting with Fernando Hurtado and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Fernando, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
I started my business for really selfish reasons, and I mean that in a good way. As someone who had been a journalist at various media companies for eight years, I found YouTube playing an increasingly outsized role in my media diet. After work, I wouldn’t turn on the local TV news for a rundown of the day’s news. I’d already seen most of it on X and Instagram during the day. Instead, I’d go to YouTube in search of deeper context on the day’s news. There was no shortage of content: channels like Vox, More Perfect Union, Johnny Harris and Cleo Abram gave me my fix. But there was something I couldn’t find anywhere, no matter how deep inside any YouTube rabbit hole I went: deeply researched, visually rich stories about me. Well, not me, specifically, but people like me: first-, second- and third-generation U.S. Latinos. I so badly wanted to find a channel that explored that. That’s when I realized: I could wait around for this channel to exist, or I could create it myself. I went with the latter and launched In The Hyphen, a YouTube channel dedicated to covering U.S. Latinos. I reasoned that I couldn’t be that unique. None of us is. If I wanted to watch something like this, chances are someone else did, too.

What should our readers know about your business?
In The Hyphen is a YouTube channel covering U.S. Latinos with deeply researched, visually rich stories. I started it after working as a journalist at various media companies. My last job before launching In The Hyphen was at NBCUniversal, working with the NBC and Telemundo stations across the country. That job was an inflection point for me because it let me learn from some of the best, and it gave me something else that’s indispensable in the entrepreneurial world: confidence. There is so much uncertainty as an entrepreneur. The list of questions you don’t know the answer to is always much longer than the list of questions you do know the answer to. All you can really ride on to start is confidence and belief in your mission. From a mental standpoint, that helped a lot. On a logistical level, before launching, I was confident in my idea, but I was not confident I knew the best way to execute it. That’s where doing an entrepreneurship bootcamp was key. I applied to the Google News Initiative’s Pre-Launch Startups Lab, an 8-week program tailor-made for journalists who want to start their own independent news outlet. That program was instrumental to me. It let me stress-test my idea (and my passion for it) over those eight weeks, and it gave me the know-how to set up an actionable business plan. I’m so new to all of this, but I’m enjoying the ride so, so much. I launched in January 2025, and it went way better than expected. My goal was to get 1,000 subscribers by the six-month mark. I got 10,000 within a week of launching. It’s been so gratifying to see the stories capture a steadfast audience.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I love this question because for some reason, when people visit, I forget every place I’ve been to in L.A. I will use my answer to this question as a reference moving forward. One thing about Los Angeles that I love is how the topography is so different across neighborhoods. We’d start the day running from West Hollywood to Silver Lake along Fountain Ave. for a nice little workout. Our reward would begetting bagel sandwiches (the open face variety) at Maury’s. We’d then walk around Sunset Boulevard before taking an Uber back to West Hollywood. We’d then walk to Thunder Road Cafe, a new spot that just opened up near Santa Monica and La Brea. The interior is so cozy and the motorcycle theme stands out in the sea of Millennial beige coffee shops in L.A. My go-to place for thrifting and widow-shopping is Melrose, so we’d do that next. All of this is done walking. I like walking whenever I can as a form of protest to L.A.’s lack of public transit infrastructure. It’s probably time for dinner, so we go to Loreto in Atwater Village for some incredible Mexican seafood. For this we’ll make an exception and drive. That’s an ideal weekend day for me. Throughout the week, I’d make sure to hit up Dupar’s at The Grove for a wholesome breakfast. We have to get burgers at some point at The Window. And it’s always worth venturing east to Burritos La Palma’s Boyle Heights location for the most exquisite Zacatecas-style burritos. They’re not the typical 2-pound burrito you get at most Mexican restaurants. They’re much thinner and lighter (resembling a rolled-up taco), but the stews they fill them with are so well made. We’d hit up Book Soup in West Hollywood at some point for book window-shopping and Bar Lubitsch for a nightcap.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
As I move through life, I’ve realized there are people that have changed me, yes, but above all, places. It’s the people, sights and sounds in those places that have triggered transformations for me. I’d like to dedicate this to my high school, Cate School. I was just a 13-year-old Chicago kid when I got a scholarship to attend the school. So much of who I am today started there. And it’s where I picked up the habit of dreaming loudly every single day.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/byfernandoh

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@byfernandoh

Image Credits
Sela Shiloni