Starting and growing a business is hard, but often deciding to start the business in the first place is even harder. We asked some successful entrepreneurs from around the community to open up to us about how they thought about starting a business.

Dr. Edna Sims | Owner, ESP Public Relations

I am a creative and innovative person, and when I was working for a company, I didn’t particularly appreciate that my ideas had to be approved before I implemented my plan. As a result, I started a business. I became successful, and I haven’t looked back on that decision. Read more>>

Hannah Hall | Holistic Licensed Esthetician & Acne Expert

During esthetics school, I was always drawn to the idea of starting my own business. After school, the job I had allowed me to learn from other incredible Estheticians and provided me with the opportunity to truly lean into the beauty of this career. I quickly realized that taking care of our skin was an internal/external journey of healing and one that did not have to be done alone. Read more>>

Marisa Peters | Founder of Be Seen

There are more and more people that are young, healthy, like me, when I was diagnosed with life-threatening colorectal cancer. To be a voice within the community and speaking about adversity more broadly is something I wish I had as I faced my own cancer. That’s why I started www.BeSeen.care. Read More>>

Schane Massey | Cultural Architect

The birth of Island Mogul came from a need I felt deeply. As a Polynesian, I noticed a lack of platforms sharing my people’s stories, and when they were told, it often felt distant and disconnected. I wanted to create something that not only resonated with my culture but also served as a bridge to connect with the wider world. Read more>>

Rodney Dalton | Marketer & Entrepreneur

My passion for fashion, particularly graphic tees, was the catalyst for starting Shirt Shoppe. I’ve always had a specific vision for the type of shirts I wanted to wear, but I struggled to find exactly what I was looking for in the market. During the pandemic, I found myself with extra time, so I took the opportunity to teach myself graphic design. What started as a personal project evolved into something bigger. I initially invested in equipment to print shirts for myself, but quickly realized there was a real opportunity to turn my passion into a scalable business. Read more>>

Laura Stone | Entrepreneur and Blogger

I originally started losangelesblog.co in 2019 as a hobby because I genuinely love sharing topics in beauty, wellness, travel, key places/events etc. in Los Angeles with others. I wanted to have a space to share key finds I thought others would enjoy. With a blog, there is also the backend which includes web design, SEO, keyword research, app integrations, which I knew nothing about so I spent a lot of time teaching myself digital marketing while also coming up with content ideas and collaborating with businesses. Read more>>

Amber Brewer | Illustrator & Artist

I’ve always been a creative person; as a kid I was always getting into all kinds of arts and crafts like those little foam kits from the craft store, making potholders, painting seashells and rocks, but I have always gone back to drawing and painting as my default. As an illustrator, I like to apply my illustration skills to many different mediums! I enjoy making illustrations and putting stuff together which eventually made me want to try and sell my work. I opened up my online shop on Etsy with a few sticker designs, and now I have expanded to zines, jewelry, art prints, more stickers, magnets and other creations on the way. Read more>>

Sarah Razmann | Owner of Families and Music LLC & Actor

Working with children has always been the “behind the scenes” world while I was making hundreds of dollars a year in stage acting. After moving to to Los Angeles in 2019, I was pushed back into nannying, while running small “parent & me” style classes around LA. The problem was, that no matter how good I was, no matter how many families came exclusively to the studio to take my class, I was just an employee. Read more>>

Christina Lapina | UGC CREATOR | INFLUENCER | UGC COACH

When I found out I was pregnant, I definitely decided for myself that I wanted to devote all my time to my baby. I just couldn’t afford to disappear all day in the office. That’s why I decided to do UGC. Work with brands from home and teach this profession to others. Very often, my baby helps me during filming, this allows me to work and spend time with my baby. Read more>>

Leah Marcus | Co-founder Good Girl Snacks

My co-founder, Yasaman, and I, found ourselves to be extremely unfulfilled in our first job out of college. We are huge foodies and spent a lot of our corporate hours scrolling on social media and sending each other food related videos (oops). We noticed a trend: pickles. Everyone was eating pickles! There was 9B views on the #PICKLE and #PICKLES combined on TikTok, multiple pickle trends such as the chickle or chamoy pickle, and we felt as though the obsession was worth exploring. Read more>>

Henry Lipatov | Director, Visual Effects Supervisor

I never work for hire, so I don’t know exactly. But definitely it may be fair to start something new. From my projects I create what drives me – is curiosity and interest to try something new. Read more>>

Cesar Cortez | Business Owner/Chef

I’ve always had the entrepreneurial spirit within me but was always held back by fear. When the pandemic struck, early on when no one knew what was happening, I had the realization that now was the time to make something happen, so I up and quit my career of over a decade and started anew with my Smashburger Pop Up Business. Read more>>

Shola Agunbiade | Founder

I’ve always dreamed of owning a business, inspired by my father, who built his own successful accounting firm. Watching his journey taught me the importance of hard work, independence, and giving back. For me, starting Dabira Aroma wasn’t just about building a luxury fragrance brand—it was about channeling my passion for creating self-care products that help people relax into something with a deeper purpose. Read more>>

Carlos Garcia | Actor and Stand Up Comedian

I was very unhappy with my life at the time. I had put all of my eggs in a basket by taking a job in NYC that I thought would bring me the happiness I yearned for. After a few months there I realized that the job was only making me feel worse. Sometimes spending 60-70 hours a week working on projects that didn’t fulfill me emotionally or creatively. Read more>>

Emerson Millsap | Guitar Repair Tech

I have worked for other people for as long as I have been working and that has always felt very limiting to me. I wanted to find a way to wrap up my passions and professional life into one neat package, and starting my own business felt like great way to do that. Read more>>

Angel Liang | Educational Psychologist, Founder, CEO

With my academic and research experience as an educational psychologist, I’ve been fortunate to stay engaged with cutting-edge studies. Yet after becoming a parent, I saw many friends, accomplished professionals, struggling with everyday parenting challenges like tantrums and emotional outbursts. Research often takes years to reach the public and remains stuck in academic circles without wider exposure. Recognizing this gap, I felt a strong need to bring these valuable insights into the hands of parents. But I knew doing so at the government or school level would be difficult. Read more>>

Kasey Blaustein Greener | Founder + Creative Director of Kasey Jones, Ink

Kasey Jones, Ink. started as a hobby, and organically evolved into the creative studio for art-powered experiences it is today. Before starting my company in 2014, I was working in marketing + branding for luxury lifestyle brands and spirits. I was taking different types of art classes and workshops in the evenings and weekends because creativity has always fulfilled me. It’s always been where I’m most at ease and happy. Read more>>

Anna Novikova | Professional makeup artist

It all started as a passion when my husband suggested I do makeup for a model at a photoshoot. Although I had always done makeup for myself, I had doubts due to my lack of professional training. At that time, I had just graduated from the faculty of architecture and was working at the city council’s architecture office. The work wasn’t creative — mostly paperwork — and I had always been an artistic person: I did a lot of drawing both in university and in art school. This all pushed me to seek a creative outlet. That’s when I decided to take a basic makeup course to acquire the necessary skills. Read more>>

Vanessa Espejo | Founder of KOPS Barcelona

The idea of starting a business has been with me for a long time. I grew up hearing stories about my grandfather starting the family business, and in a small city with few big corporations, where there weren’t many opportunities for a corporate career. However, my perspective changed when I moved to Caracas and later to Philadelphia, USA. Faced with the reality that returning to Venezuela to start the food business I had envisioned was not an option, I pursued a corporate career instead. Read more>>

Albina Mannanova | Creative Director and Fashion Influencer, co-owner of CC Agency

When I started CC Agency, it was really driven by my passion for creativity, my leadership skills, and a sense of ambition that I’ve always had. I’ve always wanted to create something of my own, something that reflects who I am and allows me to bring my vision to life. There’s this common idea that starting your own business gives you all this freedom—and while that’s partly true because you get to make the decisions, it also comes with a lot of responsibility. In reality, it can feel like the opposite of freedom at times! Read more>>

Keshyra Williams | Entrepreneur & Guide in the Pursuit of Passion and Balance

Entertainment Psychology was rooted in my journey of self-discovery and a desire to challenge the belief that we can only excel in one area. Just as a plant needs nurturing to grow, I chose to cultivate my love for both the sciences and the performing arts. This passion blossomed into a brand and platform dedicated to encouraging others to nurture their own roots. Read more>>

Francis Hogan | Chef & Founder- Sabio Hospitality Group

From a young age, I’ve always seemed to carve my own path. Whether intentional or not, I wasn’t one to take the most traditional route with anything I did. Going back to the first business I opened in 2005 (1601 Gastropub in Philadelphia), my thought process was simple; I wanted to create an establishment that I felt was missing in the area where I opened. At that time, I had relocated to an area of the city that was quickly attracting younger residents, but most of the bar/restaurant options were more traditional and geared towards an older crowd. Read more>>

Victoria Do | Tattoo Artist

While I really enjoyed my time working for other people, especially while I was first starting out and finding my voice and learning the ins and outs of the industry, a big goal of mine has always been to become independent as an artist. Obtaining freedom to follow inspiration without questioning it is a big part of the dream for me. I believe a lot of this need for independence and freedom came from my parents, who both left Vietnam during the war in 1979 in pursuit of a better life. Read more>>