WaxMe

Have you ever wanted to be your own boss? Have your own company? Be the 100% beneficiary of your hard work? Desiree Aviles did and decided to start her own business. But, she asked, “where do I start?”

Although early in her career, Aviles was already a successful aesthetician with a loyal client following at a highly-regarded Orlando spa. All thanks to her expertise as a skilled and licensed body waxing technician. Like many first-time entrepreneurs, however, she was not an experienced business planner or manager.

“I had no idea how to start or run a business,” Aviles recalls. “Not a clue. And I don’t have friends who have their own businesses either. I felt like I could never have done what needed to be done on my own. So I decided to go to the FSBDC to see what I could learn from them.”

And that’s what Desiree Aviles did. She went to the Florida SBDC at the University of Central Florida (FSBDC at UCF) and attended its “How to Start Your Business” training class. Then she followed that by meeting with FSBDC consultant Chuck Wheeler.

“It’s like I said, this was all new to me. I didn’t know about business entities, EIN numbers, breakeven analysis,” Aviles continued. “But then the FSBDC took me through everything I needed to get started.”

“Walking into that class, I felt a little intimidated because of my lack of knowledge. But I was made to feel very at ease right away. Then I sat down with my consultant and he helped me so much. He was always there for me as I moved ahead. Anytime I had a question or needed help, he was there.” As a result of Aviles’s hard work and the assistance of the FSBDC, her new business WaxMe – a studio offering full body waxing for men and women, “from the face all the way down to the toes,” using only organic hard wax – was started. She has now been in business a few months and is off to a great start. “Business has been booming,” she reports. “Between my loyal clients and some new ones I have found through marketing online, I am already making money. In fact, I hit breakeven within 5 days of opening my doors.”

“It has been great working with the FSBDC. If I hadn’t gone there, I wouldn’t be here,” new business owner and successful entrepreneur Aviles says today. “They are exceptional. No one else will sit down with you and go into such detail on how to start a business. There’s so much involved that I didn’t know about but my consultant and the FSBDC did, and they guided me through.”

“I know there is more I have to learn and I will be using the FSBDC to help me,” concluded Aviles. “I plan to continue attending their seminars, and will be meeting regularly with my consultant for his counseling. Their assistance and service has been exceptional from beginning to end. And this isn’t the end for WaxMe; it’s only the beginning.”