[I439] | ENTERPRISING DURING THE VENEZUELAN CRISIS

Enterprising during the venezuelan crisis founder of hecho en venezuela store and co-founder of ridery (a local "uber") a few days ago, someone asked me if it was possible to start a business in venezuela, given that the media portray us as a country in economic, political, and social crisis—where everything seems wrong and many want to leave. the truth is, since 2019, entrepreneurship has been thriving here. more of us are working to turn our ideas into reality. ideas amidst chaos at the start of the 2000s, words like “entrepreneurship” and “entrepreneur” were not as common, but some of us unknowingly began understanding their meanings, the sacrifices involved, the rewards, and the lessons learned. while studying business administration at the metropolitan university of caracas, i had a subject called comprehensive development. our task was to design a business model. most students saw this as just another tedious homework, but i felt excited—creating my own business and earning enough to buy a laptop, which was a novelty back then. i thought, why not open an online bookstore? i called it librosweb.net, and with my family’s support and help from my sister’s boyfriend to create the website, i launched my first venture, using my savings to buy the initial inventory. resilience in action when librosweb.net launched, the response was disappointing—schools didn’t want to partner with us. i almost gave up until a teacher in caracas believed in my idea and shared a list of books his students would request. that support helped the business take off, leading to four...