Gabrielle Trahan and Tangie Narcisse broke free from corporate America and built their own businesses from the ground up. They shared those journeys to empower others at Councilwoman Deedy Johnson-Reid’s Women in Business event.

Trahan was born in Louisiana, but moved to California until age 25, when she moved back to her home state. There, she received an associate’s degree in accounting and a bachelor’s degree in mass communications from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. She worked in the oil field industry for years as an account coordinator, until she took a leap of faith in starting her own business, UFit Nutrition, in 2017.

Trahan never intended on starting a business, but in the process of going to school and finding employment, she never found the right job for her. While working, she decided to start her weight-loss journey. She ate better, worked out more and went on to lose 65 pounds. People started requesting her help to lose their own weight, and it clicked for Trahan. She had a passion for helping others.

“I had one lady step on the scale and she was down 28 pounds, and she burst into tears. She said she’d never seen that number on the scale before, and for me that was everything. There was no amount of money, no amount of recognition that could replace that feeling. I knew in that moment, this is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life,” Trahan said.

So she essentially created a program for others, teaching them how to meal prep and operating weight loss challenges out of her garage. She’d been working in the oil field industry for five years, and decided to start her small weight loss business on the side. Trahan started talking about her side business at work, and was approached by her boss asking a variety of questions. Trahan thought she was interested, but the next week, they fired Trahan. She vowed not to return to corporate America.

“I wouldn’t allow someone else to tell me what I could and couldn’t do, that I couldn’t have a way to make money on the side, that I couldn’t go to my kids’ game or be there and be a present parent. In that moment, I drew the line in the sand,” Trahan said.

When Trahan started her weight-loss business full time, it quickly grew from five people to 160 people. In 2017, it grew too much to operate out of her garage, so she opened a brick and mortar location. The business stayed there for eight years, until the COVID-19 pandemic struck.

To ensure fiscal freedom, she started a real estate investment company and eventually a digital marketing company.

Tangie Narcisse owns and operates Jubilee Insurance Agency and was the first Black woman to represent St. Martinville on the city council. Narcisse has been in the insurance world for the last 25 years. She worked for State Farm for 17 years, but she knew she needed a change when the year she made the most amount of money was the same year she was the least happy.

“I enjoyed what I did, but something was still missing,” Narcisse said.

Narcisse said she couldn’t tell people “no” anymore, so she decided to open her own not-for-profit insurance agency. She started in a tiny room, but as she gained clients, she grew her name. So when a building popped up for sale, they offered it to Narcisse. Narcisse used word-of-mouth to her advantage, building a client-base around St. Martinville.

Narcisse finds that running her own business brings her peace and the confidence that she’s mastered her craft. She doesn’t believe in “following the fame”, but rather following her heart.

“We have to master our craft, we can’t half-step. Because if you wanna be the boss, you gotta walk it like the boss. We not into half-stepping,” Narcisse said.

Clem Matthews concluded the evening by discussing micro-loans and ways to build capital. She is the chief administrator and mortgage loan originator for Southern Mutual Financial Services. As a Community Development Financial Institution, they loan money, but don’t take money. Since opening in 2010, they’ve approved 26 million loans, according to Matthews.

Although they focus on mortgage lending, they found a need arise for micro-business loans. Micro-businesses are small, self-owned businesses. The loans give them the opportunity to build inventory, working capital, supplies, machinery or equipment. The loans cannot be used to refinance existing debt. The goal is for business owners to receive a loan, pay it back and go back for more and essentially establish a long-term business partner. The loans also build effective long-standing credit.

Johnson-Reid plans to establish a series of Women in Business seminars to cover a variety of topics including free digital tools that assist in managing and coordinating businesses. Anyone looking to get access to a micro-loan can reach out to Councilwoman Johnson-Reid for more information.