Meet Taylor Garcia | Entrepreneur

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

Hi Taylor, how has your perspective on work-life balance evolved over time?
Maintaining a work life balance has been one of the more challenging parts of my career. I pursued my business first as a passion, which means I truly love what I’m doing. My love for my work and business makes me want to always be at work, and being at work can often feel like leisure time as well. And I know many other entrepreneurs can relate to that.

I enjoy being at work so much that I have experienced phases of forgetting to spend time at home, with friends or family, or enjoying any other aspect of life for that matter. But I am always reminded that even though my work is a work I love, family is so much more important. It’s so easy to get caught up with our routines and tasks that we can forget to do things we love with the people we love. And in the end, finding a healthy balance between the two is what will keep us going in the long run.

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 have a natural soap company in Hawai’i! I’ve always been creative and I’ve always wanted a business, but I knew nothing about business. Soap is the art form I pursued that I was able to turn into a business! I’ve always loved natural products and I grew up using homemade products from ingredients we had in our backyards. I started soap making just for fun, for personal use and to share with friends. I loved incorporating natural ingredients I could find locally, and being conscious of the environment was important to me, so the idea behind creating my product line was for it to be natural, eco-friendly, and plastic free. I hoped that if I made awesome products that were aesthetically pleasing, more people would want to be sustainable, and we would make it accessible and dare I say, trendy!

So, I started selling my products at a local market, and people seemed to love it! I immediately fell in love with creating products people loved, so I kept creating and I kept selling and people kept supporting. Over time I slowly perfected my art, sales became profitable and I was able to invest more into the business which allowed me to keep going, I started to study and learn more about business and finances on the side, which really allowed me to understand a whole other aspect of what I was doing. I really was just an artist who was happy to make money on things I liked making, what I didn’t realize was that running business is a completely different world that I knew nothing about! It has been such a crazy learning experience and I feel as if I’ve been humbled and I have so much respect for other businesses owners out there!

Now fast forward to a few years in business. I now have employees, as well as family members, who have helped me grow my business more than I could have imagined. We are one of the largest soap making companies in Hawai’i, we’re the largest manufacturer of shampoo and conditioner bars in Hawai’i, and we are now slowly expanding into the U.S. mainland! I’m so stoked on how far this has come and I’m excited for where the future will take it. I hope to cultivate my business into an awesome company that provides jobs and can give back to our Hawai’i community in many ways, and to continuously promote sustainability and aloha ‘aina.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I’m happy to say that I have been able to pursue my passions because my parents have helped and supported me every step of the way. I’m so grateful to have such a solid foundation and support system that allowed me to live my dream life as an artist and create something much bigger than we could imagine. They’ve always believed in me and I can’t thank them enough! Especially my dad who has built everything I’ve ever needed for my business with his own two hands!! He’s amazing.

Website: www.kealiaorganics.com

Instagram: kealiaorganics