Archive for July, 2011

By Amanda Roberson
MBA Candidate, 2012 

It started out as a regular Saturday. In need of some downtime and hungry for some of Peru’s world-class seafood, four of us Salta interns headed to La Mar Cebichería. One of Lima’s top restaurants, La Mar is a stallion in the culinary stable of Gaston Acurio, the chef responsible for putting Peru on the global food map. Little did we know we would be treated to more than just some delicious cebiche when Gaston showed up at La Mar to watch Peru battle Venezuela for third place in the Americas Cup soccer tournament. 

Not ones to pass up an opportunity, we took the liberty of introducing ourselves. Acurio was interested in hearing more about Proyecto Salta, and he invited us to his table and treated us to pisco cocktails after Peru defeated Venezuela 4-1.

Acurio is not only a natural chef; he is a natural social entrepreneur and an inspiration to the women we work with through Proyecto Salta. Just as he works wonders in the kitchen by calling upon Peruvian lime, seafood and chiles to reach new heights, he also challenges the country’s food industry to be pioneers of social and environmental responsibility. At his cooking school, Instituto Cocina Superior Tenológico Nuevo Pachacútec, he and his staff offer training for aspiring chefs from low-income areas. On his Facebook page (which has almost 420,000 fans), he shares everything from the concoction he whipped up for lunch to his musings that chefs are like soldiers. He recently posted:

 ”We cooks fight our battles always in the land of the kitchen and in everything that it positively influences: agriculture, fishing, nutrition, the environment, fair supply chains, exports, national identity, education, culture, innovation, added value, and the promotion of our work in the world. But from the kitchen. Political offices are for the politicians. Chefs are the soldiers.” 

After training at Cordon Bleu in Paris, where Acurio met his German wife Astrid, the pair opened Astrid y Gaston in Lima in 1994 (http://www.astridygaston.com/web/intro.php). Today, the Astrid y Gaston concept has been replicated in Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Spain, Mexico and Argentina. Understanding the value of creating a brand, Acurio went on to develop other Peruvian food concepts, each with a different twist. At La Mar, he focuses on cebiche (seafood cooked in fresh lime juice), while his Panchita restaurant showcases the traditional Peruvian kebob, or anticucho. A sandwich shop, juice bar and bakery are among the other brands in Acurio’s portfolio.

As we chatted with Peru’s entrepreneur in chief, he brought up a few of the issues on his mind: how to make sure fishermen get a fair price for their catch, the need for organic farmers markets in Peru and how to train restaurant owners in the best business practices. With his trademark curls and relaxed demeanor, Acurio hasn’t let international fame go to his head. Rather, he remains down to earth as he shoulders the responsibility and opportunity that come along with leading Peru’s food revolution. As he continues to dream up new flavors, he envisions his country achieving economic growth along with social and environmental justice.

The more we chatted with him, we realized that Acurio’s food, although memorable, isn’t what makes him unique. It is his desire to inspire his fellow entrepreneurs and live as proof that talent, natural ingredients and sound business practices are the recipe for positive change.

By Amanda Roberson
MBA Candidate, 2012

As Salta interns, we have been working in Manchay, one of Lima’s pueblos jóvenes, or young districts, as they are commonly known. It sprung up in the early 80’s, populated by residents of Peru’s interior who fled as Shining Path guerillas terrorized their villages in the name of bringing about a fundamentalist Maoist revolution (http://www.cfr.org/terrorism/shining-path-tupac-amaru-peru-leftists/p9276). For them, Manchay became a refuge and a new beginning.

Since then, it has grown significantly, although when making our way down dusty roads to visit the women entrepreneurs with whom we work, we see that it is still quite young. Water and electricity are not a given, and many houses are accessible only by long metal yellow stairs that take the place of the road when it ends.

Dina Alvaro, in her early 60s, lives with her family in Manchay and works as an artist, although she would never identify herself as one. During our first visit, she opened up a cabinet in her kitchen and pulled out item after item that she had made by hand: lace tablecloths, paintings on velvet, wool baby blankets, nativity scenes, crochets pillow cases, knit purses and more. She loves to keep her talented hands busy, in fact she feels that she has to.

“Sometimes when I can’t sleep, I get up at 3 or 4 a.m. and start working on something. I always have to be doing something, making something,” she explained. Innovation, creativity and production will never be a problem for Dina. Her problem, she says, is that she does not like to sell. After investing in the materials to make all of her treasures, Dina has a hard time recovering her costs. She’ll often have orders from people who have passed through Manchay thanks to the Catholic church’s heavy involvement there, but business is not steady. Dina’s neighbors live day to day, and her creations are out of their budgets.

After a couple of sessions working with Dina on how to interact with potential clients, calculate her profit margin and keep a basic cash flow statement, we headed to the artisan market of Miraflores, an affluent district of Lima where she could potentially find her target market.
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by Jacquelyn Hunter

MBA Candidate ‘12

The businesses we work with as Proyecto Salta MBA mentors come in all shapes, sizes and locations.  Some of the businesses are operated directly out of the entrepreneur’s home, while others have multiple store locations. One of the entrepreneurs I work with has a profit of only 80 soles (roughly 25 dollars) per month, while most have sales between 300-1,000 dollars per month. The majority of the entrepreneurs we work with are located in the lower income zones of Lima like San Juan de Lurigancho or Manchay, but I also work with an entrepreneur that lives three blocks away from my apartment in the heart of Miraflores, one of the most popular high income and tourist districts in Lima.

Two of the businesses I worked with during my first month in Lima as a micro-finance mentor were definitely not micro-businesses.  Both of the entrepreneurs, Beatriz and Laura, have businesses that sell over 40,000 soles (roughly 15,000 dollars) per month.  Unfortunately, both of these businesses that are much larger and more complicated share many of the same problems and challenges as the smaller and simpler micro-businesses, such as the lack of an accounting system and formal business training .

Beatriz is the dueña (owner) of an unconventional business for a woman. She rents, sells and repairs construction tools from two store locations, has seven employees and has had her business for twelve years. When I first met Beatriz I was overwhelmed because of the magnitude of her business, the loud welding and drilling noises coming from the workshop, and the constant flow of customers in her store.  Until Beatriz, I had only been working with businesses a fraction of this size. Not only did she sell about 45,000 soles per month, she also wanted to start importing tools and accessories from China.

Laura and her husband own a backpack factory, small warehouse and retail store in a large market. They make thirty different models of mochilas and bolsos (backpacks and bags), have sales of 30-40,000 soles per month, and have eight employees.  Their backpack store is located in Peru’s backpack market, which I toured, that hosts 500 vendors of backpacks all in one location- talk about competition! When I first met Laura and her husband I was surprised when they told me of their plans to travel to China within the next six months to import materials and products. Although I had a great deal I could tell them about China from my recent module abroad in Beijing, I had not anticipated applying my Asia business environment knowledge with the micro-entrepreneurs during the Proyecto Salta internship!

After learning about both businesses, I had a lot of research to do in order to be prepared to help these businesses improve and grow. Most of our Proyecto Salta resources are for businesses in the 25-1,000 dollar per month sales range, but when you are selling over 15,000 dollars per month, like Beatriz and Laura, you need higher level resources.  It was shocking to see that both businesses had no formal accounting system except in the minds of the owners, who are surprisingly good at remembering their sales and costs. Although I was impressed with their memories, I explained that they could only continue the mental accounting system for so long.  Beatriz told me to tell it to her straight, “Jacquelyn- I want your opinion- tell me exactly what I am doing wrong and what I need to improve. I’m so busy all the time and so stressed out that I haven’t even been able to figure out what I’m doing wrong.”  My first words were, “You need an accounting system to improve the management of your finances, business software to manage your clients and contracts, and your workshop needs to be organized and inventoried- how can you find anything when you need it? Ninguna maravilla que seas tan estresada (No wonder you are so stressed out)!”

Both businesses had the goal of expanding to new markets and increasing sales.  They had the capacity but needed help with planning and marketing.  Before I could help them make expansion plans, they needed help getting organized. I told them that the last thing they want is to grow their business more “desorganizada”.

I really don’t know how Beatriz’s business had grown so large in its current state, but I do know I would be stressed out too if it was my business. So much of Beatriz’s time was spent trying to manage the day-to-day chaos of the business, she had no time for her family or growing the business. I told Beatriz if she wants to be successful and less stressed she needs to make an investment of time- one week to focus on cleaning, organizing, and setting up a business management system in order to create new and organized processes that will allow her business to grow profitably over the next 10 years.
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By Marcela Cubas Ramacciotti

Las semanas han pasado en un “abrir y cerrar de ojos” y  ya estamos a la mitad de nuestro proyecto, en el cual muchos somos los favorecidos: las mujeres, los organismos involucrados y nosotros también, sin duda.

En mi caso particular, esta enriquecedora experiencia me ha dado una base mucho más sólida para afirmar que el gran desafío que Perú  aún afronta es el tema de la educación. Al sumergirnos en la realidad de los barrios más marginados de la capital pudimos corroborar, tal y como los índices socio- económicos indican, que el Perú es uno de los países con niveles de educación más bajos en Latinoamérica y el Mundo.

Es por ello que nuestra labor es de suma importancia para el Perú y para  aquellas mujeres que luchan por mejorar su calidad de vida. Estas mujeres, en su mayoría, no poseen estudios de secundaria ni mucho menos han tenido acceso a educación en gestión empresarial, sin embargo se las han agenciado para poder llevar adelante pequeños negocios, que son fuente de su sustento económico.

 Fue así que, con el propósito de mejorar las bases en manejo de negocios para estas mujeres, un grupo de T-birds  viajamos desde Arizona- EEUU hasta Lima- Perú, transportando los conocimientos que adquirimos en el MBA y brindando “herramientas” útiles a una comunidad deseosa por recibir asesoramiento en temas de educación empresarial.

Durante el transcurso de estos meses estaremos entrenando un total de 120 mujeres, dándoles asesoría personalizada en sus centros de trabajo, resolviendo sus dudas, motivándolas a seguir superándose y haciendo un análisis detallado de cada uno de sus negocios.

Gracias a Proyecto Salta hemos aprendido sobre las necesidades de las mujeres limeñas y nos sentimos privilegiados de poder participar en un programa que nos permite  conocer “a priori” la realidad de la población Peruana.