Collaboration with others and celebrating each other’s strengths are needed now more than ever, as businesses and people alike are suffering due to the economic impact of the current pandemic. Unidas is a collective of local businesses in the San Francisco Bay Area dedicated to female empowerment and creating united networks of female-led businesses. The collective aims to provide their products and services despite these trying times.
The three companies that founded this collective are Pepito’s Paletas, Professional Eco Cleaning, and Utz Threads—all Latina-led businesses, and all aiming to empower Latinas looking to venture into the world of entrepreneurship. A portion of the income generated from all Unidas-affiliated businesses goes to Prospera Coops, the Fondo Resiliencia de Prospera or the Latina Entrepreneur Resiliency Fund.
Nancy Rosales’ brand, Pepito’s Paletas, creates a healthy dessert option in the market. It puts a novel twist to traditional Mexican paletas by combining it with modern, healthy vegan recipes. They guarantee that their products are all-natural by using fresh fruit. Their products are delivered on the day they are ordered to ensure maximum freshness as well, and the eight-hour signature frozen box used to deliver paletas reinvents the frozen dessert experiences, which serves as a greener alternative to plastics and freezers. True to the goal of women empowerment, they are composed of entirely female staff.
Professional Eco Cleaning is an environment-friendly cleaning company by Anahi Rojas. It prides itself on providing a superb cleaning service with safe alternatives to conventional cleaning products and methods, which make use of harmful chemicals that deteriorate the environment. With over ten years of home and office cleaning experience under her belt, Anahi founded this company in an effort to empower women to create positive waves of change for themselves, their families, and their communities. They do this through the personal and professional growth allowed by a space in the cleaning industry where women are safe from exploitation.
Utz Threads by Cinthya Flores connects the world to the ancestral weaving techniques of the Maya Quiché people through their products designed for everyday use. In the language of the Maya Quiché, Utz means “good.” The members of the Maya Quiché people in Chichicastenango, Guatemala, skillfully and artistically weave lively colors and cultural markers into the products offered by this company. With the vision of sustainability, growth, and empowerment, Utz Threads strives to bring their partners to financial independence through self-sustainability, growth, and empowerment.
Through their efforts to empower women, Unidas aims to create more jobs for women by creating more businesses led by Latina entrepreneurs. If you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go together, as the proverb says, and Unidas and its cooperatives firmly believe that being united and working together for the betterment of Latina women, in particular, will bring more benefit than trying to survive alone.
There is beauty in women supporting women, and their efforts to bring each other up serves to inspire truly. Learn more about Unidas and the three founding companies by visiting the Unidas We Shine website or business websites Pepito’s Paletas, Professional Eco Cleaning, and Utz Threads.