I met Josefina through a local Facebook group I run called “Southwest London Parents: Small Business Owners and Freelancers”. She runs Spanish classes for young children, which is very likely something we will involve Emilia in from an early age since Jorge’s half of her family is Spanish-speaking and we visit Spain a lot. Knowing that there’s Spanish classes for toddlers locally is amazing.
Below, Josefina shares a bit about her small business, Nanos Spanish Club, the story behind the name and some of the most useful and inspiring business resources she has discovered.
LITTLE OBSERVATIONIST: Give us your tweet-sized elevator pitch. What’s your business all about?
JOSEFINA GARCIA: I help parents and early years settings to explore and enjoy the benefits of learning Spanish in early childhood. We offer toddler and preschool Spanish classes, including online Spanish courses for preschoolers.
LO: Now tell us more: What sets you apart from your competition?
JG: I would like to think that I can empower parents to choose to bring their children up learning a second language, can help them on their journey and hopefully convince them to learn with their children too!
LO: Share a bit of background about yourself and your business.
JG: I am based in Earlsfield, in southwest London. I am a language teacher and lead the language department at school in Putney. I was inspired at university studying language acquisition and am very intrigued by this topic, which I have always followed and researched. The studies confirming our children’s amazing capacity to be multilingual are there, so I wanted to put it into practice.
Nano means small (Greek root) so Nanos Spanish I thought would be cute; Spanish for small people.
LO: Which social media platforms do you use for your business? Has this been time well invested? Any tips for newcomers?
JG: I use Facebook and Instagram, but still working them out. My only tip: be out there!
LO: What’s the best piece of business advice you’ve been given that still resonates with you today?
JG: Keep going, learn from your mistakes, and take chances.
LO: What are your favourite resources for small business?
JG: I started listening to Tony Robbins for motivation and The Membership Guys for tips on how to run my membership website. I am also a member of the cocoon Making Mumpreneurs by Erin Thomas Wong which helps with solving problems and feeling supportive.
LO: What have been your biggest challenges and greatest rewards as a small business owner?
JG: My biggest challenge is making all the decisions alone. My greatest rewards are seeing the children learn and, with the parents and children who learn together, seeing how enthusiastic they are about their decision to bring up their child learning a second language.
LO: What are your hopes for your business going forward: what would you most love to achieve as a short-term goal? And long term?
JG: I would like to increase the number of parent and children classes, grow my online membership website (Nano Spanish Club Preschool Spanish at Home) and successfully launch my new online membership for Early Year practitioners with resources to help them teach Spanish in their own settings.
LO: Little Observationist is all about appreciating life’s little luxuries. Name three you’ve enjoyed recently.
JG:
1.) Sleeping late on a Saturday morning – is that one?
2.) A very nice dinner in a Spanish restaurant in town.
3.) A nice cinema movie, invited by my daughter!
Connect with Nanos Spanish Club
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