This special episode of Latina to Latina is brought to you by Always.
The CEO and founder of Rizos Curls returns to Latina to Latina! In this engaging and emotional episode, Julissa shares how she broke her big dream (owning a business!) down into smaller, attainable goals; reflects on the unique pressure she navigates as a daughter of immigrants; and highlights the importance of “fun” in her continued success.
Rizos Curls is a clean, cruelty-free hair care brand designed specifically for creating defined, frizz-free curls. Julissa shares how she founded it in 2017 to create products that embrace and celebrate the beauty of curly hair, and how the brand has since ignited a movement across social media for curly haired individuals to embrace their natural hair. Growing up, Julissa struggled to find products that worked for her hair, so at 15, she had her first dream to start the hair care brand she wished she had. She attended UCLA for undergraduate and holds an MBA from Wake Forest University.
This May, Always is launching the Always Soñando National Scholarship to provide financial assistance and mentorship to 50 emerging Latina college students. Apply now at https://www.always.com/en-us/sonandoscholarship. Always believes that nothing should stop you from achieving your dreams – especially your period. That’s why Always Ultra Thin Day and Night pads provide up to 100% leak free protection, so you can focus on what really matters – going after your dreams.
Juleyka Lantigua:
This special episode of Latina to Latina is brought to you by Always. This May, Always is launching the Always Soñando National Scholarship, which will provide 50 Latina students with $2,500 to go confidently after their dreams. In addition to the scholarship, Always has teamed up with some amazing Latina entrepreneurs, including us, to share what we've learned along our path to achieving our dreams through a content series called #SoñandoAcademy. You can find more info on the series in our show notes.
To see if your child or your friend may be eligible for the Always Soñando scholarship check out the link in our Instagram bio and go to always.com\soñandoscholarship. And don't forget when it comes to your period, Always ultra thin day and night paths provide up to 100% leak-free protection so you can focus on what really matters going after your dreams.
Alicia Menendez: Today we're speaking with another member of the Soñando Academy, our girl, Julissa Prado. Last time we spoke with Julissa, the CEO and founder of Rizos Curls was still in her come up. She shared her journey from Carl Whisperer to Carl Mogul. It has been three years since Julissa and I found ourselves in a Manhattan hotel room recording and crying happy tears about how far she'd come. Since then, she's seen her business through a pandemic, built out her team. And while she is as always confidently living out her own dreams, what does that look like? Well, it's changed. Hello, Julissa.
Julissa Prado: Hi, Alicia.
Menendez: I cannot believe it has been three years since we last spoke.
Prado: Yeah, it's a whole new world since then.
Menendez: There's so many parts of you and my first conversation, Julissa, that are just burned on my brain. I can see you in high school with your little plastic baggies of lemon juice, popping out of bathroom stalls to teach women how to do their hair. And I always think about the story you tell about your dad and your dad immigrating to this country and the way in which that has shaped you and shaped your ethos and your commitment to family. And I realize though, part of the story that we skipped over, probably for the sake of timing, was about college and the role that college played in preparing you for this moment. Because there are a lot of people, because of the price of college in part, which is really legitimate because of fear and concern about debt, people question the value of a college education. And I wonder for you both if college was a question mark or if it was a thing that you absolutely knew that you would do and what it took to get yourself there.
Prado: So it's really interesting because something that I've realized recently that has helped me get to the point where I am now was that that whole process, I had a lot of smaller dreams and goals that ultimately led me to my big goal, which was Rizos Curls now. And I would say high school Julissa, her dream was just to go to college. My brother was the first one in our family that went to college. And even him finding out about college was something that we didn't even hear about until maybe high school time or late middle school time when college students would come volunteer at our school.
I think that for my brother, and I it was such a goal for us because both our parents never went to school. They literally grew up in a rancho, super rural Mexico, and they only had one year school. My mom actually never went to school cause she was a girl. And the misogynistic kind of culture that she grew up in their, they told her like, "Oh, you don't need school to be a mother. You don't need school to be a wife."
So my dad only went to one year school and they barely even knew how to read and write. So I think that for me, I felt like there was such a learning curve to just get to the same place as my friends that had parents that grew up here in the US and actually knew how to speak English and had an educational background. And I think that for me, just getting to that same place would require me to pursue higher education.
Menendez: And now that you are actually running your own business, do you think it would be possible had you not gone to college?
Prado: Absolutely not. And go back to all my small goals. So when I was high school Julissa, her dream was to go to college. I went to UCLA. UCLA Julissa, her goal was to get a master's, to be the first to get a graduate degree graduate school Julissa dream was to land a corporate job and then corporate job Julissa was then like, "Okay, I'm ready. I'm ready. My dream is to launch my own business." So I think it was a journey that I needed to go through all of those steps and do it in a way that felt more attainable. I knew it was always in me. I've always been very, very smart. But I just think that when your starting place is so far, I needed school to even get on the same playing field.
Menendez: Then there's of course, the question of how one pays for college. And so often this is a conversation in our communities where people, [inaudible 00:05:58] they know they want to go, even if they've gotten to that point and then they get in, there's the secondary element of how you actually afford to go. And I know part of the reason that Always was so excited about partnering with you was the fact that you had used some scholarships in order to get through college. And I just wonder if there is someone listening, what from your own experience they can glean?
Prado: I was one of those kids that was 100% a scholarship kid from undergrad and grad school. And had it not been for those scholarships and grants and things that I received, I would not have been able to afford college.
Menendez: How were you finding them?
Prado: I would go to in high school... So there was a college office and I would literally go there every day during lunch and be like, "Any new scholarships? Any new scholarships? Any new scholarships?" So yeah, I would apply to everything. I had so many different essays that I would tweak depending on what I was applying for. I was going to the library, finding resources. Now we have different worlds with the internet. I think now we can do all of these things online and social media is such a helpful way to help us find out about a lot of these scholarships. But back then I was physically going to the office at my school or going to the library or different things that people would send me or show me.
Menendez: It strikes me, Julissa, that the name of this Always scholarship, Soñando, that you are nothing if not a dreamer. Whether I'm talking about high school Julissa who was dreaming about college. College Julissa, who was dreaming about grad school. Grad school Julissa, who's dreaming about a corporate career. Corporate Julissa, who's then dreaming about owning and running a business. That the dreaming and the imagining is the thread throughout all of it. And I wonder, in the time both since you began this journey and now even just in the three years since we've spoken, how it is that that dream has changed? What was it that you imagined for yourself, for Rizos Curls and what is it today that you think is possible?
Prado: I think that in the last couple of years especially, I've been reminded of that original dream and trying to never lose sight of it. And I think that that dream is just something so simple, which is just helping people with their hair. And I think that part of what makes any type of business good is making sure that your business is solution driven and making sure that it's your priority the whole time. And I think that with me, when things get really busy, you kind of start coming away from what really matters. And at the end of the day, what really matters is are we helping people with their hair?
Menendez: And also, wait, I just want to say, and also... Because I'd be remiss not to point this out because this is a point you always make, which is, hair is a proxy for everything else. Hair is a proxy for comfort in your skin, for connection to your culture, for a sense that you are allowed to show up in the world as your best, most authentic self. Something like hair is never just about hair.
Prado: A hundred percent, the amount of testimonials we've had from people that say, "I started using your products, I'm wearing my hair natural." And I'm just like, "Whoa." It all just started with this hair product. But for so many people, "It's almost like once I accepted this part of me, it allowed me to begin to accept other parts of me and to begin to choose myself in other areas as well." So I think that whatever that is for you, we're just honored to play any part of that journey.
So it's interesting, but I think the dream has always stayed the same. I just needed that reminder sometimes. And that dream ultimately is to help other people on their self-love journey through their hair and help them learn and understand their own hair. And so I'm really excited to be starting on a national curl class tour. We're going to be starting in Orlando, then going to Houston and New York and LA and doing free curl classes to help people learn and understand their hair better. And I think that those kind of in-person interactions just are obviously fulfilling in that we get to help other people. But it's so fulfilling for me too because I think it just really reminds me of why I'm doing what I'm doing.
Menendez: Can you talk me through, because this has always been a big part of the business, which is originally imagined direct to consumer, ultimately showing up on store shelves. What has it required of your team and what does it change about a business to not just be in some stores, but to be available in every store nationwide?
Prado: I think that it definitely changes how available you are to the customer. How the connection that you have when you are D to C, direct to consumer, selling directly on your website. You have such a direct relationship with your customer. If anything goes wrong at all, you're like, "Here's a refund, or this is how you use it." "Oh, it arrived damaged, let me help you." And when you have a retailer in between, it's kind of up to them. So it definitely has changed that relationship, but it also has brought a lot more areas that we are now accessible in. And I think that during the pandemic e-commerce had such a boom, and I think that now that things are returning back to in-store shopping, I think customers really want that experience.
Menendez: Did you have a boom?
Prado: Yeah. So I would say that we saw such a growth in our website shopping during the pandemic because there were so many people that started wearing their hair natural because they weren't straightening it and going out. Even people with wavy hair for example, it's easier for them to just straighten it, but they were at home, they're like, "Why am I going to burn my hair?" So it brought out a whole new type of customer who during the pandemic, decided to try out their natural hair.
Menendez: I think about you in that moment because you'd already built a company that was pretty big and it was clear, I think even to you, that you were on the precipice of something so much bigger. And how have you yourself changed as a leader in the past three years?
Prado: Oh, man. I've definitely changed so much. I think that I've learned a lot. I've also learned to have more fun because I think that in the beginning everything is so new, so of course it's fun. You're just kind of rolling with the punches. And I think that the more you start selling, the more responsibilities. The larger the team, the more people depend on you. And the bigger the risk is if things don't go right. So the pressure just gets much harder.
And I think that along that process, it's really easy to just kind of focus on the numbers, focus on the deadlines and the deliverables, and kind of lose that spirit of fun that was the reason why people gravitated towards zoo to begin with. So I think that for me, part of my process has been kind of reverting back to that 2017 Julissa, to that original girl who was just having fun.
Menendez: Julissa, what do you wish that teen Julissa knew that you know now?
Prado: I think that I was so hard on myself back then because I was like, "Failure is not an option." I recently read this... No, actually I recently watched a TikTok that was talking about how the first Latina daughter is a lot of the time is super, hyper independent and something that's the oldest immigrant child feels like this immense amount of pressure to kind of make it for the whole family. And I think that was me. I think that I was just really hard on myself. I just felt a lot of pressure to not let my parents down. "Oh, my gosh, Alicia, there you go again. Every time."
Menendez: I think my friend, that part of the reason you were crying and part of the reason that I am now crying, so thanks for that, is I don't think that ever stops. I think if that is your come from and you have a sense of how lucky you are to live in this country and the things that your parents, your grandparents sacrifice in order for you to be able to live in this country, then there is just an incredible amount of responsibility you feel to make good on that promise because you've been given opportunities that they never had.
When that is your come from, even after you have built a business that has multiple millions in revenues and is available on shelves, I think then it starts to feel like, "Okay, well, now I've brought myself up, I have brought my family with me, and now I have to do even more." I actually think for people who are built like you and like me, that sense of responsibility grows the more access we have, the more power we have, the more capital we have.
Prado: Darn. Man, here I was thinking it would go away one day.
Menendez: Julissa, as always, I love you. Thank you for doing this.
Prado: Thank you. No, I'm honored to be here three years later. Congratulations on everything too. I feel like I've seen you in so many great things. So you know you have a friend in me.
Menendez: Be rooting from you from across the internet.
Prado: A hundred percent.
Menendez: Thank you to Always for working to support the Latina community and through scholarships, making education attainable for the next generation of Latina CEOs and leaders. Remember, the Always Soñando scholarship closes on May 30th, so please check out our show notes for details on eligibility and how to apply.
Thanks for listening. Latina to Latina is executive produced and owned by Juleyka Lantigua and me, Alicia Menendez. Paulina Velasco is our producer, Kojin Tashiro is our lead producer and mixed this episode. We love hearing from you email us at hola@latinatolatina.com. Slide into our DMs on Instagram or tweet us at latinatolatina. Check out our merchandise at latinatolatina.com/shop. And remember to subscribe or follow us on Radio Public, Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Good Pods, wherever you're listening right now. Every time you share the podcast, every time you leave a review, you help us grow as a community.
CITATION:
Menendez, Alicia, host. “How Julissa Prado's Dreams Grew with Her Success.” Latina to Latina, LWC Studios. May 3, 2023. LatinaToLatina.com.