(Editor’s note: This is the 28th installment in a monthly series speaking with minority business owners and leaders. Each will be asked their views on minority-business conditions in the state and for ways to improve those businesses’ chances for success. See previous installments here.)
Dropping out of college to start a business is probably not what most parents dream of for their children.
Especially if those parents are immigrants who came to the U.S. in search of the financial stability that higher education and a good job provide.
Just ask Xander Monge. When Monge left Syracuse University during his freshman year to concentrate on his fledgling video production company, his parents – natives of the Dominican Republic and Guatemala – weren’t exactly supportive.
“They came to the U.S. specifically to go to school and to get a job, so they wanted me to do the same,” Monge said. “My dad was so mad.”
Monge did it anyway. He can’t quite put his finger on why he was able to cast aside the pressures from his parents, or the barriers that dissuade minority entrepreneurs from starting their ventures.
“Probably, I was a little oblivious to the risk,” Monge said. “I am ambitious, and maybe it’s a little bit of ignorance but not in a bad way.”
Indeed, in the four years since he turned his YouTube channel into a media services and video production company, Monge has seen Deft LLC take off. He’s booked promotional video projects with major universities, including Brown University and Duke University, received accolades and grant funding from competitive startup organizations, and landed an office in the coveted CIC Providence LLC coworking space.
But his success in the corporate world has not come without challenges.
As a 22-year-old Hispanic business owner, Monge is acutely aware of the differences between him and the university leaders or business executives who hire him.
“Everyone in these meetings are [older] corporate white people,” Monge said. “No one is ever overtly racist, but I think they have a lot of doubts about me at first.”
A lot of that is probably due to his age more than his ethnicity, Monge acknowledges. But he can’t discount his Hispanic heritage, which has shaped his experience as a business owner in ways both good and bad.
The good: being a minority business owner, including the accompanying certification through the state Minority Business Enterprise program, has helped him get grant funding, he says.
Although he has never been openly discriminated against because of his ethnic background, there have been racist undertones he has seen rise to the surface, especially for his parents. One memory from his childhood stands out as an example: a passing customer in a grocery store scolded Monge’s mother for speaking Spanish to her son.
“I was probably 11 at the time and didn’t really think anything of it,” Monge said. “But as the years went by, the fact that I still remember it, I kind of realized how messed up people can be.”
It’s also hard not to feel like an outsider in an industry where there are still few people of color. He couldn’t think of any Hispanic videographers in the state.
“If I wanted to hire a Hispanic director of photography, it wouldn’t happen because there isn’t one,” he said.
Monge hopes his business success can serve as an example to other aspiring Hispanic videographers and filmmakers. When not running his business, he teaches videography classes – in Spanish – at a Providence bilingual charter school.
1. Do you believe racism is keeping minorities from starting businesses in the Ocean State or succeeding when they do? Yes, although it’s a complex answer. I think it is because minorities don’t have a lot of confidence to start their own businesses because they don’t see other people doing it. There is, of course, direct racism too, but I think a lot of it is because minorities, especially immigrants or children of immigrants, don’t have the same privileges or opportunities.
2. How dependent is your business on the support of other minority groups? Is that a sustainable business model? Right now, it’s not dependent on it at all because I do a lot of corporate stuff, and corporate stuff is a lot of white people. I am trying to switch to focus more on documentary-style films, and [I] hope to feature and work with more women-owned and minority-owned businesses.
3. What one thing could Rhode Island do to boost the odds for minority-owned business success? I think anything that shows that there are minority-owned businesses already out there succeeding would be helpful. Rhode Island is really big on advertising its small businesses, like the “Buy Local” initiative, but they don’t have that same, cool Buy Local Rhode Island branding and advertising for immigrants or minority-owned businesses.
4. Have you had to turn somewhere other than a bank for a loan? Do you believe the state’s lending institutions generally treat minorities fairly? I have never gotten a loan from a bank, so I can’t really speak to that.
5. If another minority entrepreneur asked you where they could turn to for support for their business, where would you direct them? I would send them to RIHub’s Venture Mentoring Services, which is a mentoring program for entrepreneurs. They helped me start my business and connect me to a lot of mentors, and even offered me free office space in CIC Providence.
