8 min read
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Susana Sánchez G. is a Mexican entrepreneur who seeks to create the first glamping chain in Mexico. These are canvas geodesic domes, with a wooden and metal structure that become the most comfortable shelters to rest in tourist destinations located in the middle of a forest or in front of a monolith.
Currently Cool Glamping , his venture, has two locations: Otomí, in the State of Mexico and Bernal, in Querétaro, and he plans to open a total of 10 locations during this 2021. The next openings will be in Animal Kingdom, in Teotihuacán, State of Mexico; Los Azufres, in Michoacán and Riviera Nayarit, very close to Sayulita. Each dome is equipped with beds and its own bathroom with hot water, so no traveler will have to worry about sleeping on the floor or sharing a shower. There are even domes that have a pool.
But in addition to providing this service to the traveler, Susana also offers an investment opportunity for entrepreneurs who want to enter the real estate market, to whom it offers profitability of up to 10% per year.
Photo: Cool Glamping
The ideal of a girl
The entrepreneur recalls that the entrepreneurial seed was implanted in her when she was 12 years old, when she experienced the unemployment of her parents. “Almost on the same date, they were both unemployed and my family’s financial stability was never the same again,” he says.
“I knew then what it was like to grow up with an absent father who went to Chihuahua to look for work and after that he was no longer at home for a vacation or sometimes even on my birthday. From there I said, when I grow up I don’t want to depend on someone for my financial life ”, shares Susana.
Then he began to see magazines and photos of businesswomen with their suitcases and airplanes and began to idealize his life. At 18 he decided to study accounting because he considered that this is how he would learn the art of managing a business. At the age of 19, he received a book that would change his life forever: Rich Dad, Poor Dad, by Robert Kiyosaki.
“It was there when I learned about financial education,” he says. After reading, he decided to invest in training. “Above all, something that stuck with me was that if I wanted to be an entrepreneur, I had to get together with businessmen.”
He experienced training with figures such as Grant Cardone or Tony Robbins and realized that in the United States business is done differently than in Latin America, which he considers a land full of opportunities.
His first project was a real estate development. “Since I came to real estate I became passionate, especially because I declare myself a lover and a pioneer of making money without your own money .” That’s what his real estate academy teaches people and the reason he started a real estate investment fund three years ago.
Susana Sánchez G. Photo: Courtesy
Finding the opportunity in the crisis
During confinement to prevent the spread of COVID, Susana observed an opportunity in the geodesic dome developments. “With the supplier of domes, Cosmotec, we saw a growth in demand towards ecotourism, mainly towards glamping,” says the businesswoman.
And it is that people could not travel by plane, they were also afraid of a bus or traveling long distances with more people, but if they had a car, they would find an opportunity to escape from everyday life because they were already tired of the four walls.
“With my mentor Tony Robbins I learned that human beings have six basic needs and one of them is variability . In other words, it cannot always be in one place and that is where I see an opportunity in glamping ”, says Susana.
Photo: Cool Glamping
A very cool business
The goal is to open 100 destinations around Latin America. The name came from ¡Qué cool !, an expression of its investors by showing them the developments and the figure of infinity that is formed with the word. “My vision is to create a company that has a beginning, but not an end. May it offer infinite happiness to our guests, to our collaborators and, of course, to our investors ”, affirms the interviewee.
The advantage of geodesic domes is that they are eco friendly and represent a minimal investment, compared to what it would take to build a cabin, for example. They can be invested from $ 20,000 and generate free profits of $ 800 per month, says the businesswoman. How does the model work? There are two paths: the first, you own the asset, that is, the glamping, which you place in one of Susana’s tourist land and she manages it.
“We make a real estate management contract and they are charged 20% for administration,” he points out. “An average location is generating, with a conservative projection, a monthly income of 60,000 pesos.” Among the services offered by Cool Glamping it includes the rental of the destinations (the part of the land); human resource management (hotel management); the publicity so that yes or yes there is lodging, the reservation software, the providers, security and legal bonds.
“Something very important in the case of the dome administration is that almost practically 100% of the expenses are variable. For example, if it is rented, the investor pays land rent; If you don’t rent, you don’t pay anything. If it is rented, we pay maintenance, supplies, suppliers, otherwise, no. That, unlike a traditional business, becomes very profitable because we don’t want the income to eat you up, ”says the entrepreneur.
The second way to invest with Cool Glamping is to be part of the SAPI where the interested party places capital and has share guarantees, backed by land or the same domes owned by the company.
When the investor opts for the first model, he not only owns the dome, but also the interior furniture, and hydraulic installations, which they can move when they decide, and settle in the land that is most profitable for them. Susana says she has approximately 50 investors interested in this model, some from the United States and Colombia.
Photo: Cool Glamping
Win as a team
Cool Glamping is a very young company, it just started operations in its destinations last May, but it has managed to combine several needs under a business: people who have land, but do not have the capital to place a hotel and / or domes; that of people who have the money to install the glamping but do not have the money to buy the land and that of those who want to invest their money in a business with attractive returns.
The businesswoman continues to analyze areas that want to join her business nationally and internationally. He is analyzing locations in Cusco, in Peru; Bogotá, Colombia and Costa Rica. It is important to highlight that the land susceptible to doing business with Susana must be free of any litigation, be located in safe tourist areas and have access to services or their installation.
Susana is optimistic about the future success of her model. He says that in Mexico there is no destination with geodesic domes that has more than 10 glampings because whoever is doing it, goes alone. “Our philosophy is to team up and we are passionate about it. I’d rather have 100 destinations and earn 1% than want 100% of a destination ”.
Cool Glamping plans to inaugurate a total of 10 venues for this 2021. The rents for tourists who want to stay in the destinations range from 2,800 pesos for a couple dome during the week and 3,500 on the weekend, while a family dome costs 3, 800 pesos during the week and 4,500 on the weekend.
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/380402