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Latina, Entrepreneur
& Advocate
Owning your own business requires you to be
tenacious, strong and driven. Rising to the top of
any ladder requires you to be at least somewhat
self-serving, to have your own interests at heart.
There are those entrepreneurs, though, that manage
to make room for outside interests, and whose
entrepreneurial achievements are only outweighed by
the work they do for others.
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One of those entrepreneurs is Kenia Davalos-Romero,
a vibrant, young Latina entrepreneur from East Los
Angeles whose mission in life is to empower both
Latino business owners and Latino leaders to be
successful within their business and community.
Empowering Hispanic business owners is close to
Davalos-Romero’s heart because she comes stems from
six generations of business owners. Davalos-Romero
is a partner in Perini Enterprises (formerly known
as Zion enterprises), which is a family-owned
management company consisting of BNC International,
Biz Investor, and Café Perini, the “pride and joy”
of her family’s coffee plantation. The family
business is “about family warmth,” says
Davalos-Romero, and is full of tradition. “When my
family drinks coffee, they roast it there in the
kitchen.”
Business and family will always be intertwined for
Davalos-Romero. Her parents, who immigrated from
Mexico to the United States in search of the
American dream, were the first in the
entrepreneurial family to open a business in the
United States. But aside from being involved in the
day-to-day operations of the family business,
Davalos-Romero’s real passion is for her advocacy
work. “I’m very faithful, I’m very spiritual. I
believe that everyone has a mission in their life,”
she says. “It became very clear to me that my
mission was to serve my constituency — the Latino
entrepreneur.”
Fulfilling that mission did not come easily,
however. Early in her life, Davalos-Romero’s home
environment involved the mayhem of substance abuse.
To escape that toxic atmosphere, Davalos-Romero
immersed herself into her studies. “Life was hard,”
she says, “and I knew my only way out was to go to
college.” As a result, she maintained a 3.9 GPA and
graduated with honors. Yet despite her noteworthy
academic achievements, her high school advisor told
her she would never go to college and even her
father tried to discourage her from continuing her
education. This heartbreaking news, instead of
holding her back, lit a fire under her. She was more
determined than ever to make something of herself
and family.
Davalos-Romero attended the University of
California, Santa Cruz and, like many other things
in her early life, it wasn’t easy. She worked three
jobs and only saw her family twice a year. Yet she
prevailed, receiving her bachelor’s degree in
history with honors. After college she moved to the
East Coast to study at The Maxwell School of
Syracuse University, where she received a master’s
in public administration and public affairs. By her
mid 20s she had worked for The White House and the
U.S. Small Business Administration’s Latino Issues
Forum, and she had been accepted to law school — but
her roots were calling her back into the community.
Davalos-Romero returned to California and flirted
with the idea of a career in politics, but her
passion for the community led her towards advocacy
for business owners. She attended the University of
Southern California’s Marshall School of Business to
gain more business skills, and became the executive
director of the Latin Business Association Institute
(LBAI), a non-profit organization dedicated to the
promotion of business development in the Latino
business community, and under her leadership the
Institute generated over $40 million in procurement
contracts and $12 million in access to capital.
Today, Davalos-Romero continues her mission to
empower Latino business owners and leaders by
serving as commissioner and legislative chairwoman
on the Los Angeles County Office of Small Business.
She is also an active board member of the LBA as the
chair of Government Relations. In addition, she sits
on the executive board of Hispanas Organized for
Political Equality, a political action committee,
and the National Latin Business Women Association
(NLBWA), and she is an advisory board member for
Hispanics for the Los Angeles Opera and the National
Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals.
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Kenia Davalos-Romero
(left) with Martha Montoya, founder and
president of Los Kitos and board member of
the LBA |
Her efforts have garnered her numerous accolades,
most recently being named the 2004 Advocate of the
Year by the LBA. Davalos-Romero accepts her honors
by accrediting her mentors for shaping her into the
Latina she is today. “Whatever I’ve accomplished is
a reflection of the people who have influenced and
touched my life,” she says.
Davalos-Romero is one example of a Latina who
conquered humble beginnings in order to accomplish
extraordinary things, not only as an entrepreneur
but also as an activist for the local Latino
community. “I work so hard because I want my
children to have a better American dream than my
parents and I had,” says Davalos-Romero. “That is
the inheritance I want to leave them — a better
American dream.” |
