Meet Gardenia Zuniga-Haro | Publicist, Mother, and founder of Gardenia Zuniga & Associates

We had the good fortune of connecting with Gardenia Zuniga-Haro and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Gardenia, what was your thought process behind starting your own business?
The thought process I had when starting my own business was, “I do not want to work for anyone that’s holding me back from my creative growth”. I come from the infamous word of tech in the San Francisco Bay Area in which I learned that my voice, my ideas did not matter to those above my role. I was put in a box way before the Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion at work laws came in place, but I am thankful for those experiences because it pushed me to start my small PR Firm that is constantly growing and expanding.

I knew it wasn’t going to be easy but while attending City College of San Francisco and cleaning houses across the bay area, I was able to collect enough knowledge, business connections, and save to start something that to this day is growing and providing results to my clients and myself as a Latina Pandemic Mother.

What should our readers know about your business?
My little PR firm started out of the love to be behind the scenes as a publicist. My sister passed away in 2017 and we both had the idea to start a PR firm one day and represent films at Sundance Film Festival. Her loss and passion inspired me to pursue what is Gardenia Zuniga & Associates.

Starting wasn’t easy. I volunteered my services in the beginning for companies to see I had case studies but also provided results. I started doing PR volunteer work for SF Film Festival, Mill Valley Film Festival, Sundance, and after presenting media results; now I get invited to the premieres and more. It’s taken a few years for my reputation as a publicist to be known by clients in which all my work is by word of mouth to this day. It’s been a beautiful blessing to have artist contact me and tell me “I want you to represent me.”

Starting your business as one person is never easy. I did not have investors giving me money, instead I cleaned houses to save for all the fees to start a business and invested in my equipment. After one year of not getting any clients, I felt like maybe I should go back to tech, but I kept reminding myself that my sister Gaby would have kept going and here we are now, 5 years in business.

My brand started from the bottom. I had nothing other than a dream I shared with my sister. The year 2020 was going to be huge for my business as we were going on tour with a band, had a few clients shooting films that year and then a global pandemic happened, and everything was cancelled. I was devastated but also, I became a mother later that year which pushed me 10x more to continue to thrive as a publicist and now I represent independent music artist like Tea Elani and 2morrows June who I know will be getting awards one day. I believe in them like they believe in me as their manager.

It takes a lot of patience, dedication, and perseverance to be a publicist, especially working on your own. I do not have a fancy office in the city.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I want to nominate Tiffany Anderson, a Bay Area mother, motivational speaker, author, and creator of Natural Hair products. Tiffany’s story and mission will bring joy to readers and motivation that you can make it even as a single mother.

Website: https://www.gardeniazuniga.com/

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

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gardenia-zuniga-haro-4b34a96b/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/GZ_Publicity

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GardeniaZunigaPR

Other: https://linktr.ee/gzunig5

Image Credits
ByLorena TammyLee Photography TiuTimes Media