We were lucky to catch up with Jessica Alicia Morataya Cotrim recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Jessica Alicia, thanks for sharing your insights with our community today. Part of your success, no doubt, is due to your work ethic and so we’d love if you could open up about where you got your work ethic from?
Work ethic is something I had to learn through losses, failure, Trial, and Error. Growing up, I always had a job, but I changed them frequently because I struggled a lot with consistency. I couldn’t find passion in working so hard for other people, or for big companies that had values I didn’t agree with. I also struggled a lot with controlling substances I was using to cope with life. And so I always found myself running late, leaving early, calling off, quitting jobs before securing a new one, starting new ones before thinking thoroughly if it was a good fit for me or not, I just didn’t care.
Don’t get me wrong, when I was at work, I was present (most of the time), I have always worked hard, and this came from watching my mother and family get up everyday and handle what they needed to do, so I did the same. But my heart was never in it, and it showed.
It wasn’t until I started my own business, that I developed a real work ethic, and slowly started understanding the importance of discipline and determination.
After we got our retail space, it started becoming clear that I couldn’t just throw the doors open whenever I felt like it, or leave when I got bored. I finally started understanding what it felt like to care. To want something so bad you have to shift your mentality and change toxic traits that could cause you to lose it all.
When I started having months where we couldn’t cover rent, or bills stacking up, or customers upset that we weren’t there, that’s when I realized something had to change. And I thought back to all the jobs I had held in the past, and saw exactly what I was doing wrong and why all the little details, and timing, and habits really did matter.
I never saw myself as a business owner growing up, I fell into it because of my passion for flowers and art and creating, and sharing my visions with all my communities. The biggest risk for me would be not being able to create anymore because of my mistakes. And that’s not something I’m willing to play with.
But the key is knowing that I would have never gained this perspective if it wasn’t for my mistakes. Accepting small failures, but using it to do better. That’s what created my work ethic. You can’t let the stigma of failure keep you from success. You have to go for it, even if you think you’re not ready, because if it really is for you, then you will get ready with experience.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
My Name is Jessica. I am a first generation Latina, born in San Francisco and raised back and forth between Brasil and The Excelsior & Mission Districts in San Francisco. My mother is from El Salvador, and even though we spent more time in Brasil than El Salvador, our household was brought up more Salvadorian than Brasilian.
I own Beija Flor Designs and what I do is Floral Designs and teaching others how healing flowers can be. I get most excited seeing people around flowers.
I’ve been in the industry since 2010, and in December of 2020 we opened up a commercial location in one of the neighborhoods where I was raised. I opened this location with my Boyfriend, Fiance, Partner in life, Jose Eduardo Pimentel.
In February of 2021, just 2 months after opening our shop, Jose passed away. My life completely changed. And what I do now, is wake up everyday and try to keep the dreams we had together alive.
Last year, we were featured as part of Bouquets to Arts, at the De Young Museum of Fine Arts in San Francisco, which was a goal of mine since 2010. This year we have been invited to display at the show again! We also have some really beautiful floral visions for weddings and special events booked with amazing clients that will hopefully help us showcase the passion, quality, and skill I put behind our work. And a couple opportunities for expanding, and exploring new spaces that we will reveal when the time comes!
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Patience, Fluidity, and Math.
My advice to anyone brave enough to go after their passions, is to strap in for the ride.
There are no shortcuts, so you have to be patient. Patient with yourself, as you learn the dos and donts. Patient with your results, as slow seasons don’t define your abilities. And Patient with your community, as most of them do not know what this experience really feels like and because of that won’t always know how to best support you, but it is something you can teach them.
All you start with is a blueprint, so you have to be fluid. You cannot be so stuck in your ideas that you stop yourself from making the necessary adjustments to move forward to the next level. How you begin isn’t always how you will end. And your initial ideas and concepts aren’t always the best way to go about things. Accept that you will not always be right. But as long as you stick to your core values, everything else should be shiftable.
No one will make the sales for you, so you have to know your math. Undercharging is a parasite. This one was really tough for me, because I hate charging my people for things, and I have always been someone that has been willing to gift my creations to my community, but if what you are after if longevity and the ability to give back to your communities in a larger and more impactful way, then you have to stick to what makes profit. Without profit there is no business. Without profit, there is no giving back. If you’ve been given a bigger vision, bigger aspirations, then it doesn’t make sense to keep yourself stuck in the struggle just so people say you’re nice and giving. You can still find ways to gift, I like to use the flowers that come back from a wedding that have already been paid for and have “Free Flowers For The Hood” days where we gift those to the community walking by in front of our shop, or other ways when possible. But ultimately You know who you are, and you know what your mission is. So learn the equations, math, mark ups, learn your market and your industry so you can excel and then go back and help everyone who deserves, and maybe even a couple who don’t.
Any advice for folks feeling overwhelmed?
What I have learned is that feeling overwhelmed is really a mental battle. And the only way to get through it is to ground yourself. There will always be situations that stress you out, whether you own a business or not, if you’re really paying attention you’ll see that life is full of suffering, hardship, and hard times, and that likely will never change. So what has to change is how you react to it.
Yes, I do not want to lose my business, I want it to be successful, however mentally I know I am a worthy human with or without it. You have to understand you are bigger than capitalism, bigger than what you’re able to produce, bigger than the work you do. If you can see the value in yourself even after you have lost it all, then those moments of feeling overwhelmed or stressed out lose their intensity.
My strategy is, I take the work ethic I have gained from my mistakes and errors and I apply that to everything I do every day, work my hardest, and then simultaneously I stay mentally prepared to fail again, and then I adjust to that failure and use it to get back to where I need to be.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.beijaflordesigns.com
- Instagram: @beijaflorgallery
Image Credits
Beth Laberge, Rosa Reyes, Melati Citrawireja, Avery Wong, Jennifer Gonzalez, Tonya
