Divine Womyn Interview Series with Catherine Romero
The perfectionist, Catherine Romero Event Planner and Decorator chats with us about building her event planning business, her life inside of the corporate world and overall being a bossy chick!
Teh Jai’lyn:
Is there any advice that you would give your younger self?
Catherine Romero :
I would’ve, I would’ve told myself have patience. Because when I graduated high school I had a full scholarship to go to North Eastern University in Boston, my major at the time was chemical engineering. When I was out there I hated it, it was a dark period in my life where I didn’t know where I was going I hated Boston, I’ll visit but I was home sick everyday. I’d call my mom and cry to her. Then I went into psychology, I love crime scenes the studying of the mind, I just loved psychology, I love reading peoples minds and I was like oh this is still not for me. So you know when I was younger I should've sat down and think about well what is it that you really love? Patiently thinking instead of having expectations.
Teh Jai’lyn: How do you define our status as womyn in any industry, do you feel like its improving or its more improvement? also where do you see our status in the next 5 to 10 years?
Catherine: I think we are improving, we still have to have that old person stigma that we need to fight and it stems back to racism and stereotypes that women are only suppose to cater to their husbands & be house wives I think honestly its going to take some time for men to understand that womyn are meant to make a statement, its going to take some time. But I think people are finally understanding the capabilities that we have. Yes we are emotional people, but we come from a good place and any woman with common sense knows how to make decisions not based off our their emotions and I think thats the stigma that a lot of people put on womyn. Were in the right direction.
Teh Jai’lyn:
How do you define yourself and what is your favorite part of being a woman?
Catherine Romero:
I think my favorite part of myself is my mindset,because if I don’t think clearly my life wouldn’t be clear. I’m a very observant person, people tell me this all the time I can read them like a book. I like the fact I make people feel comfortable, if i’m getting to know you I wouldn’t want you to have your guard up.
Teh Jai’lyn:
How do you define a feminist and do you believe at any point that the feminist culture supports more of white women and not minority women and do you think we’ve came a long way?
Catherine Romero:
I think so, when it comes to feminist you have your extremist and you have your more subtle people. Me personally in the community of women of color we have a long way to go but were taking baby steps in the right direction. I think with feminism we have black women that have conquered a lot more than we think and its important that we as black women do that research to know the right information when it comes to the women that have helped us get to this point.
Teh Jai’lyn
As far as being your own boss lady, who as a woman in New Orleans that you want to establish relationships with or that you inspired by?
Catherine Romero:
There is this very well known event planner DKay Designs thats one of the people I was like Oh My God, I’ve actually been to one of her events that she planned and it was beautiful and thats one of the women I feel that should have some seminar that are having event planning or trying to pursue that career. Like you said New Orleans is a party city their going to need an event planner and she is one of those women that I highly respect, her events are flawless. She is one woman that I would love to have a conversation with.
Teh Jai’lyn:
How do you balance being in the corporate world aside of being a business woman and your personal life outside of your career(s) without being overwhelmed?
Catherine Romero:
They all go both hand and hand, with my corporate job you have to pay attention to great detail, you have to learn time management. I learned that I wanted to do this the discipline, encounters and training I experienced over the years at this job I can bring it into my business. So when that came into mind I said okay this is your business your going to have to present yourself the best way that you can and If it has C. Romero Events on it, its going to be 100% no matter what. You have to find that balance in between your work.
Teh Jai’lyn:
In the corporate world do you sometimes feel as though you receive the short end of the stick because you are a woman and do you feel that you sacrifice a lot from your personal life?
Catherine Romero:
As a woman, I’ve been blessed enough with my career in the corporate world because at the position that i’m in I worked hard for it. And, Luckily with the permission of God everything became possible and I knew that when I started working in this world that I had a time frame for everything I wanted to do. With his help and support from family and friends I was able to accomplish within the time frame I was setting those goals for. Luckily I have a great support system through knowing that Catherine is booked up this weekend, we’ll see if she needs anything I have those type of people in my life that I’m very grateful of. As a woman and a woman of color, I am of hispanic descent t you do get that query eye of a white persons corporate world but at the same token you do find yourself and say you know what I am here to make a statement. And as a woman I feel like every time a woman has a touch to it it is better.Yes I do feel like I sacrifice my personal life at times and i’m at stage where i’m 26…..am I going to have kids
Teh Jai’lyn:
With your business how do you want to shift the event planning business and what challenges and norms do you want to break?
Catherine Romero:
I want people to be aware of how much work it actually takes to plan an event. I’m very grateful that people send me inquiries but to be honest you cannot plan an event in a week or two. I like to stick to what I know, you have your team and I feel weird betraying or going to someone else last minute because they aren’t available and at I don’t think anyone in this industry wants to showcase a half ass job. I want people to get away from this stigma that a $500 budget can not be done. Its not realistic. I’m not doing an event in a week or two weeks, if i’m not having fun doing this its time for me to pack my bags thank everyone for their business and go.
Teh Jai’lyn:
What advice do you give to young girls and women to follow their dreams and going against the grain?
Never stop. You want to perfect your craft the best way you want to do it and its going to be long nights and early mornings. Never worry about what other people are going to say. Once you start worrying about what others say your not living your life. Anything that your passionate about and love doing, do it you don’t have to worry about the approval of nobody. At the end of the day when push comes to shove and you die, its going to be yourself. And I rather be that person to say hey I lived my life to the fullest, how I wanted it to be. When you find that thing that you love be patient, research your market and don’t let anybody get in the way of that.
