WILLMAR - Clients were a little hard to come by at first for Luz Adame in her 1st Choice Cleaning Services.
But help from the Willmar Area Multicultural Business Center kept her on track with her business plan. She has found more clients, both business and residential, and she’s enjoying being able to follow her own schedule.
“I like being my own boss,” she said through interpreter Roberto Valdez Jr., the director of the business center.
“They helped me with everything,” Adame said.
Jeff Madsen, the staff business consultant with the Willmar Area Multicultural Business Center, said the center assisted Adame with registering her business and with developing marketing plans and brochures. She is insured and bonded.
Madsen also worked with her on a financial plan and helped her determine her rates. Adame originally had the idea with a partner, but that didn’t work out, so she is striking out on her own now with the support of her husband, Jaime.
But Adame does the real work on running the company and serving clients, Madsen said. She is also responsible for doing good work and building trust with clients.
“We’re just the guiding hands,” Valdez said. “She needed help launching and doing it right.”
Clients include a local hotel and business offices, and she is always looking for more opportunities. With little advertising, she has received calls from people in Litchfield and Granite Falls who want to hire her. For now, her clients are primarily in Kandiyohi County.
Adame is already busy five or six days a week and works five to eight hours a day. Her goal is to keep growing, and at some point, she and Madsen will probably talk about the economics of adding an employee.
1st Choice is a family-owned business. Jaime Adame answers phones and does some of the record keeping while Luz cleans.
Valdez said WAM-BC likes working with the spouse of a business owner, too, to make it a family effort.
The family lived in Mankato before moving to Montevideo 12 years ago. They have lived in Willmar for five years, moving here after Jaime Adame got a job here. They have two sons, Alex, 4, and Jaime, 7.
Valdez said he believes rural Minnesota offers opportunities for small businesses that
