Episode 4: Melissa Peralta of Mood Food Wellness Co.

 

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Melissa Peralta is a free spirited entrepreneur with a diverse professional background and deep passion for pursuing projects that bring more joy to the world, or one of the many other projects she is a part of, Melissa is always looking for an opportunity to help others embrace better living!

HER START

Melissa talks about her start and love of entertaining at home and how it has evolved into her business at Suddenly Simple Events. She also talks about how COVID has impacted her business in unexpected ways and trying to find the positive such as getting to work on smaller events again. She’s also been able to expand her second business, Mood Food Wellness, by launching a virtual marketplace and talks about her third venture, The Borrowed Board and how that came to concept. 

HER ENTREPRENEURIAL JOURNEY

Melissa speaks about her family's history and how it modeled for her that business ownership was always possible. She saw what it was like to work for her family and for someone else and was driven from a young age to pursue entrepreneurship. She discusses how she was taught at a young age that a little bit of hard work and belief in yourself can be turned into a profit as well as to follow what makes her happy.

BRINGING AN IDEA TO FRUITION

We discuss how Melissa took her passions and molded them into her business. She talks about taking a leap of faith and really leaning into letting go of the worst case scenario and choosing to do what she loves. She realized working in the corporate world that she has a drive for doing the things that she loves and wanted to put it into building her own dream and passions. When passion and purpose align, magic happens. She speaks to trusting yourself and knowing that you are capable.

LAUNCHING AND GROWTH

Melissa talks about her launch for Suddenly Simple Events and how she decided to give away her first five events. In doing so she was able to build her portfolio and gain valuable experience. From there she was able to build her community organically by word of mouth and truly focusing on taking care of her clients and delivering the best experience possible which led to further growth.

FUNDING & OUTSOURCING

We discuss what it was like for Melissa to fund her journey. She focused on bidding out jobs and investing the money back into her business in order to build equity in her company and continually be able to offer more. We also discussed outsourcing and how she determined when and where to hire others in her business. Melissa talks about wanting to take things on herself but finding the need to determine her strengths and weaknesses and hire where it is necessary to. We talk about having to dig deep into your own self awareness as business owners and while there are hard lessons to learn it is necessary for growth.

ON KNOWING YOUR WORTH

Melissa and I discuss how she learned to put value on her time and how she transitioned her pricing as she gained experience and her business grew and evolved. She talks about underestimating feedback and how hearing other’s feedback on her services truly being worth it has been so validating for her. We talk about the importance of getting client feedback and testimonials in your business, how women in general struggle with confidence and that we shouldn’t shy away from celebrating our successes.

FOLLOWING YOUR INSTINCTS

Melissa talks about the importance of following and trusting your own intuition