We reached out to some of our favorite entrepreneurs and asked them to think back and tell us about how they decided to start a business. Check out their responses below.

Alejandro Vargas | Owner & Founder AV Remodeling

I have always had an entrepreneurial soul and real estate has always been my passion. I knew that I wanted to have my own company. So, I gathered all the 18 years of experience I had gotten from multi-family managing, and managing construction for multi-family homes, and in 2018 I decided to make a career change and open my own remodeling company. We started servicing the Metro Atlanta area, with quality and honesty as some of the core values of our company and it has been an amazing journey. Read more>>

Jeremy Knauff | Founder of Spartan Media

I grew up in poverty and was determined not to stay that way. Even more important, I was determined to make sure my future family never experienced poverty either. So I shortly after getting out of the Marine Corps at 22 years old, I started my first business. As a young man still serving, I realized that because of my background, I didn’t yet have the knowledge to run a business, so I began to read voraciously on the subject. I remember cramming piles of books into my sea bag before my last deployment so that I could educate myself during the little downtime we had. This was long before the internet was what it is today, so these books were my only source of information while I was floating around the Mediterranean Sea and popping in and out of various countries in the area. Read more>>

Dana Tyler | Ghost Writer, Editor, Consultant, Virtual Assistant

One day, I was sitting in my office located behind judges’ chambers in the courthouse of a small California Superior court. I was drinking a venti caramel macchiato, as I did every morning, hoping the caffeine would kick in. My phone was ringing incessantly because a pipe had just burst in one of the holding cells and a tidal wave was coursing through the secured hallway. Emails were flying in and a disgruntled research attorney was mumbling something about a summary judgment motion he needed to locate. Ordinarily, this would not have bothered me. I love being the solutionist. I thrive on being the creative problem solver and multi-tasking was my super power. Read more>>

Hans Fleurimont | Entrepreneur & Graphic Artist

Ever since I was a teenager, I always had dreams of building a family business. I didn’t know how I was going to do it or what kind of business I would create but I just knew that I wanted to do business. Back in 2008 when I was leaving the military service, I decided to give it a try. I started a company that focused on doing events and parties at first. I didn’t really have a solid strategy or a plan and so the company went through some issues while I was running it. Basically I didn’t have the right skills to manage and grow the business. Eventually I had to walk away from it because it just wasn’t working out for me and it became more trouble than it was worth. Read more>>

Raymondo Antoine | Photographer & entrepreneur

My thought process behind starting my own business was to provide access to people who are either entrepreneurs or wanting to be entrepreneurs or even people with talent to one showcase their work and skill’s with the world between other businesses and opportunities allowing them to express themselves, and to also support one another when it seems there’s no one to support us when needed. Read more>>

Zillah Duzon-Hazel | Fashion Designer, Surface Pattern Designer and Mural Artist

I grew up in a home where my parents were entrepreneurs. They ran their own catering company and I grew up helping them in their business. Every year my father would close the business for the month of July and the entire family would go on vacation and travel. The freedom that my parents had to do that made me decide that I too was going to be an entrepreneur and structure my life on my own terms. Read more>>

The Weekend Lovers | Band

The five of us started jamming together toward the end of 2021. Zach Sutton (guitarist) and Kevin Sutton (drummer) are twin brother and had been playing together their whole lives. Brennan Fussman (keys/guitar player) went to highschool and college with them and the three of them played in bands together in college. Brennan moved to Atlanta and met Aaron “Real Soon” Roth (bass player) through getting involved in the music scene. Noelle Vocelka (lead singer) met everyone through mutual friends and we all immediately hit it off musically and as friends. We quickly realized we had something special together and decided to form The Weekend Lovers. Our first ever show was March 2022 and we released our first song, “Fist On the Ground” in August 2022. Read more>>

Kevin M.J. Murphy | Co Founder and CEO of Entertainment development company and a black themed, spec fiction streaming service.

I’d say my decision to pursue a kind of freedom I’ve seen others enjoy, but never found the keys to as a hardworking, educated employee was the genesis of my business journey. Spending my life working for someone else, building their dreams, legacies and empires even as I was conscripted to answer to their whims and rules never felt like freedom to me. Mostly, because it isn’t. Working for others never optimized my gifts and talents, and frankly, I got tired of trying to chart a path to my dreams by journeying as little more than a human asset, through the workforce. Later for that. Read more>>

Vianca Mireya | Rising Entertainment Industry Executive, CEO, and Founder

I started my own business because I wanted to combine my creative passion with my business mindset. I grew up in the performing arts realm so when I started applying to colleges and learned that I could combine my passions for music and entertainment with my other passions of business and law, I was ecstatic. The degree programs in Music Business and Entertainment Law were perfect for me because I was able to still perform and learn music education while also learning the business and law side of the industry. Since I have a background in music performance, education, theory, and production, I can better relate to my clients and artists because I understand what they go through on both the musical side of things and the business side. Read more>>

Monique Farrow | Portrait Photographer

I began my photography career as a Sophomore in high school. It was a project titled “personal project” for the International baccalaureate program where we had the task of learning a new skill. I have always been indecisive so first I went with learning to knit. Then I went with photography, not knowing that this would eventually be my career. At that moment, I never imagined that I would be an entrepreneur but something instantly sparked in me to make my passion a business. Read more>>

Lynn ‘LA’ Adams King | Executive Producer and Content Creator

I’ve been an entrepreneur most of my adult life. I am a career private investigator (20+ years) and we’ve had our own agency since 2008. I also am the founder of a 501c3 nonprofit, DreamBIG Angel Network. I always found the structure of a 9-5 very restrictive; it made me feel like a caged animal. I knew my DNA prohibited me from adhering to this type of routine lifestyle. I am wired in a way that sees unusual opportunities in the most mundane circumstances. I have been a closet content creator without an outlet for a very long time. When I was unceremoniously fired from a position (March, 2023) I highly valued, I knew that would be the very last time I would EVER allow anyone else to dictate my circumstances in life. Read more>>

Michael Schulte | Pastor and Mission Developer

The vision for the Collective was birthed out of my own experience trying to find a church home in my early twenties. I was fresh out of college and living in a new city. I was longing to find a community like the community I had back home, and I thought church would be the perfect place to find people my age. However, I found, when I was looking for churches, that I was left with two not-so-great options. I could attend a traditional Lutheran or Methodist or Presbyterian congregation which had values which aligned with my faith, but I would often be the only person in that congregation in my early twenties. Read more>>

Samaiyah Melton | Tech Recruiter| DEI enthusiast| Entrepreneur

Back when I first started on this entrepreneurial journey, I found myself in a rather tricky situation. I had just been laid off, was juggling a part-time bartending gig, and tirelessly searching for a Human Resources job in the tech industry. It felt like a constant hustle, but not necessarily in the right direction. Finally, I secured a full-time job, but it still wasn’t cutting it. That’s when I had that lightbulb moment and told myself that if I was going to work part-time, it would be on my terms and for my own venture, not someone else’s. And that’s the story of how Pick Perfect Photo Booth came to life. Read more>>

Jack Harris | Comic Book Creator

As a teenager, I wanted to create Comic Books and Video Games as a career. Life had different plans for me early in my career as a Software Engineer. After some time I found that my career wasn’t fulfilling. So I decided it was time to start producing a comic book I had been writing for a decade. That was in 2020. I started Clash Digital Publishing that year and start producing our comic book, Terminus Veil. Read more>>

H.E.F the Prophet | Rapper & Songwriter

We wanted to cut the middle man out of the business and do everything ourselves. It’ was always more expensive to have someone else get something done, as well as it wasn’t always the best quality, so we took matters into our own hand. Once we got good at that side of things it became far more easy for us to continue our goals quickly, the way we wanted to pursue them. Read more>>

Coach Ayesga Watson | Entrepreneur/ Therapist

My thought process when I thought about starting a business is that I could take my education, my skills, my experience, and my passion, and make money. I want to utilize my skills in my education to not only army money, but work for myself. Being a single mom inspired me to push and push and push to work for myself so I can make my own hours so that I can be there for my kids and my family while earning money.. I realize that working at 9 to 5 was not in the plan, especially for single moms, or working every day and trying to provide, and seek to the family. I knew I wanted to be there for my kids as they were growing, to become mature young men, especially in this society in this day and age I want to assure that I was able to use my education and to turn it into income working for myself. Read more>>