The first step to starting a business is deciding to start a business. They say the first step is the hardest and in our experience this is especially true when it comes to starting a business. Getting over the mental roadblocks can be tough, often harder to overcome than the challenges you’ll face once you actually start the business. Fellow entrepreneurs share their thoughts below.

Ravneet Chhabra | Co-founder: Arza Foods, fashionista and a mom

Arza Foods is “my pandemic baby”!! I have always had an entrepreneurial spirit. I come from a family of entrepreneurs and I have my degree in business management. It is so fulfilling to have something of your own, something that you have built from scratch. During the pandemic my fashion business was completely shut down and my children were home all the time. I started making home made snacks for my very imaginative and beautifully determined daughter Arza. My goal was to make foods that had the purest and most flavorful ingredients and at the same time be easy and interesting for her to eat. This is how Arza foods was born. Even though my venture started out with a desire to see my daughter grow up healthy and strong, it transcends to every human out there across cultures and borders. Read more>>

Whitney Rose | Yoga Instructor and Studio Owner

I had been teaching yoga through a few studios for about 5 years. Towards the end of that time I had started to think about opening my own studio and oddly I had students asking me when that would happen. But when it all boiled down to it, I didn’t have the finances to get a lease or buy props or anything at all for that matter. I genuinely didn’t feel as thought it was something I was capable of. However at the begging of October 2019 the main studio I was teaching at informed me that they were closing the yoga program at the end of the month. Read more>>

Addie Pecord | Interior Designer

I started my career in interior design working for one of the most well known firms in the Vail Valley. I gained not only an immense amount of knowledge, but I was immersed into creative and well designed jobs and gained experience that cannot be taught so to speak. After eight years of being in the interior design field I felt the desire to branch out on my own. The thought process behind this move was carefully constructed and my goal was to create an overall style that was cozy yet inspiring for my clients. Read more>>

Eric Snider | Wedding Photographer

I was just tired of having a boss. I was tired of working, period. Still am. I want to travel. I want to party. I want to run around the desert naked during a meteor shower. Photographing weddings is a blast. Photographing people is fun. Choosing my own jobs, working with people I want to work with. I’ve put 7 years into sales, and managing wedding day stress is second nature. To be honest, the day my old boss promoted his wife from his wife to my manager, I knew photography was my path… Until I promote my future wife to my manager and have to start looking again. Read more>>

Melissa Baker | Craft Canned Cocktail Co Founder

When Quinton and I started thinking about canned cocktails in 2017, no one else was putting actual spirits into cans and making real cocktails to-go. Of course a lot has changed since then, but at the time everything was malt beverage or total sugar bombs. Having lived in Colorado since our early twenties, we were always camping & boating and bringing a bottle of vodka and some mixers around was so inconvenient! I owned two restaurant / bars in Steamboat and Quinton was a bartender in Denver, so I sold everything and he quit his job and we went all in on canned cocktails. Read more>>

Javier López | Javier López Photography

I mostly, always wanted to make money doing something I like Read more>>

Juan Sipion | Full-Time Filmmaker & Creative Director

I spent a lot of time trying to fit into the traditional 9:00-5:00 space, and it left me super unfulfilled. I wanted to do something creative, where I could have a lasting impact on those around me. Video was something that I sort of just fell into, but it ended up being the right place for me. I didn’t want to spend my days making money for somebody else. I wanted to find a way to make my money work for me, while doing something that I love. Read more>>