Your Name: Andrea Tali
Business Name: Artisara (formerly Leverage)
Type of Business: Fashion retail
Business Location: Bratislava, Slovakia
Website: www.artisara.com
Reason for starting
I wanted to apply and realize my own ideas, have flexibility, freedom in time and money, have no limits in any way and do things my own way, be independent and do what I like to do and do it on my own terms.
How do you define success?
I believe success is living your life on your terms. And to me it means doing what I want to do, when and where I want to do it with whom I want to do it for as long as I want to do it. And that you wake up with peace inside yourself each morning feeling satisfied that you are living it or that at least you are going the right direction and on the right track to it.
Biggest Success
That I am already partially living what I defined as a success and as for the rest of the things I am on the right track towards the rest of this definition. The biggest success for me is that at my age of 30 now, after years of working on myself (and more to come) and after many changes in my life, I know who I am, I know what I want and what I need in all areas of my life, I am on the right track to it and I am aware of my value and have a confidence and faith I will be living a great life on my terms. Specifically in business the biggest success is that I after setting up a company with my sister, only within a year since starting the first project, we won or we were in the final rounds of 4 national entrepreneur competitions.
What is your top challenge and how have you addressed it?
Our top challenge was when we were an exclusive distributor of one and only product line imported (and so depending just on one stream of income) from the US and US manufacturer changed the conditions on the go and increased volumes to higher. Those were not feasible for small countries and such high minimum quantities no company would order here so we had to come up quickly with other alternative and find a product we could offer to our customers that would be available for feasible quantities for this market. Luckily at that time we were also offered cooperation with two other european manufacturers and were able to partially replace the income. But that still was not sufficient, so we had to sit down and rethink and reorganize our business and still come up with new projects. It was a stressful period but it was a great lesson how anticipation and constant check-up is vital.
Who is your most important role model?
I do not have just one role model, I have more of them and those are people who made it big time and I learn from their advice and coaching: Tony Robbins, Robert and Kim Kiyosaki, Harv Eker, Timothy Ferriss, Deepak Chopra, Oprah.