Meet Gunnar Traustason | CEO of g-events dmc | pco

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

Hi Gunnar, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
It just came naturaly when i was a young boy that i wanted to own a business when older.

My grandfather that i take the name from was a hardworking successful businessman which i´m sure influenced me.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I bought my first business/store when i was 20 years old. It was a store that the two previous owners, much older than me, were rather uncessful with. What gave me extra boost was when an old lady, that became one of my best clients, said to me shorly after i bought the store: “Do you think the store will be succesful in your hands”. I really wanted to prove to her and myself that i could do better than my predecessors. This was the beginning. Than 5 years later i sold the store and some time later it went bankrupt aprox a year later.
The 2nd store i sold closed down as well some time after i sold it. In both cases i think the reason was that the owners just did not work as hard as i did and therefore i belive very strongly in hard work.

It´s my believe that hard work and consistancy are the ways to succeed as well as knowing your strength and weaknesses. Leave what you´re not good at to others. I think that you have to love what you do to succeed in it.
I also believe that in the end it´s better to wait for the right opportunity for you instead of rushing. For example i did not work for almost a year after i sold my first business and for 1.5 years after i sold my 2nd business. The reason is that i did not see any opportunities that were appealing to me.

I´ve been in business for 30 years. It has never been easy and i think it never will be. If the business is very successful you will just have other problems to deal with other than money so you will have challenges all the time no matter how successful you are.

One of the things that gives me pleasure in my business is when i feel like i´m better at what i´m doing than i was yesterday. When i have learned something new or solved a task that i have not dealt with before. I think it ´s just the nature of us humans to want to improve and grow.

My current business is over 10 years old and it´s a company called g-events dmc | pco. To describe what we do in one short sentence is would say this: We´re an event planning company organizing meetings, incentives, conferences, exhibtions and all other events you can think of. We´re 99% B2B and our clients are from all over the world including some of the largest companies in the world. Here you see some names from our clients list:

Our Clients

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 would definately not only take my friend to spots in the city cause Iceland has out of this world nature. I would take him to the countryside as well. Icelandic food gets lot of positive feedback from our clients from all over the world and we have many very good restaurants. It would be easy to find a new one for a whole week. Many of the best one´s are located downtown but as well in the suburbs. I would definately go to the southcoast where we would see Game of Thrones like nature, beautiful waterfalls, ride quad bikes on black sand beaches, hike on glaciers, ride buggy´s where we cross rivers in nature you only see in movies, sail on a boat at a glacier lagoon, visit over 1.200 years old man made caves, bath in a hot stream in the nature, visit beautiful lava tunnel, sail on kayaks among seals, ride snowmobiles on a glacier, visit Europas biggest glacier and much more.
Than i would take the friend to the west coast and we would go to man made icetunnel inside iceland´s 2nd biggest glacier and drive to the beautiful spots on Snaefellsnes peninsula.
Than it´s a must to visit some of our beautiful lagoons like Blue Lagoon and Sky Lagoon. We actually have beautiful lagoons in all parts of Iceland.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
My grandfather most likely influenced me beying a hard working businessman. My father and stepfather were very hardworking as well and i´m sure that influenced me.

Website: https://g-events.is/en/

Instagram: gevents_iceland

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gunnar-traustason-9796801a/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/g.events.eventmanagement