My Entrepreneurship Story: A Puerto Rican Travel Agency

I spent most of my life growing up in the tourism-based city of Orlando. What started off as a small orange growing town quickly transformed into the tourist capital of the world. While most people would write about Walt Disney when it comes to the city of Orlando, I am choosing to focus on the business life of my grandparents. Tony de la Cruz was born in Rio Piedras,  Puerto Rico in 1933. After going to school in Puerto Rico he helped start a family business in Jewelry with his two brothers. This was the first of many businesses that my grandpa had started including a trophy shop, an apartment complex, and a real estate business. His final business, and by far the most successful one, was to be called "Viajes Tony." It was a travel agency headquartered in Central Rio Piedras.

It was originally created to offer opportunities to travel the island of Puerto Rico and other surrounding islands such as the Dominican Republic. Before this business was created, access to travel opportunities were hard to come by for local citizens even though Puerto Rico was already established as a summer getaway for people across the United States. In October of 1971, when the Magic Kingdom opened for the public for this first time, easy access for the people of Puerto Rico was hard to find. 

By February of 1972, Viajes Tony became the first travel agency in Puerto Rico to offer tours of Orlando including the Magic Kingdom. This is exactly what people of Puerto Rico were looking for because sales sky-rocketed every year afterwards. It went from a business that employed only two or three family members to one that employed every single member of the family who wanted to travel Orlando for the entire summer. This included cousins, uncles, siblings, and even those second cousins twice removed. As Orlando grew, the tours became longer and the amount of guests reached upwards of thousands of guests every summer. One local hotel had to build a second wing because of the size of the tours coming from Puerto Rico. 

It was only last year that this travel agency had closed as my grandparents entered retirement. Even with the online websites such as  Expedia and Travelocity, the agency continued to be strong until its closing day. 

I chose to take ENT 3003 because the biggest role models in my life were all entrepreneurs including Steve Jobs, Walt Disney and even my grandparents. Being able to start a new business based on the needs of society has always interested me and while my passions are based mainly on tourism and technology, I someday hope to create a business that can benefit not only the residents of Orlando, but also the tourists that come every single day.