When the doors of Lately Café opened on January 21, Ara Meniño was 18 years old (he turned 19 in February).
Leaning at the bar of her brand new establishment on Montañeses Street, in Belgrano, the young girl has
endless sensations going through her head, "all positive,"
she clarifies.
"On the one hand I can't believe I have this, on the other I am very proud of having tried and achieved it. And the first thing I can say is that it is
possible, it is not that complicated and I didn't have help from anyone
," she emphasizes.
He says that every day he arrives early, an hour before opening, "to acclimatize and breathe my space," he smiles.
Ara says that she always felt an early autonomy, "a need to become independent," despite living with her parents.
"This is the first step to leave my house, where I am very well, but
for some time now I have been moved by the possibility of having my place, my space
. Lately it is the baptism and I suppose that then the chance will come to rent an apartment on tomorrow."
She is listened to and observed and because of the way she expresses herself, she seems older.
He began earning his money at the age of 14
, thanks to his skill and ease in drawing.
"I was hired and I offered to make designs for book covers, company logos and private orders, and I received jobs, even from abroad, that allowed me to have
my first financial income
until I could save about two thousand dollars."
While in her fifth year at Cristóforo Colombo, she also did internships in the Mugica neighborhood teaching English, her second language.
That incipient work responsibility began to shape his personality and character.
"When I finished high school (2022)
I felt the urgent need to have my money, I wanted to avoid asking my parents
and so I started looking for jobs and, the funny thing is that they all asked me for experience. What experience can you have at 18 years old? ? At the beginning of 2023 I started moving around, consulting and I found out that in Ushuaia they were looking for a person with good English to be a tourist guide. I sent my information, a few days later they called me, I
had the interview via zoom and they asked me if I was willing to travel for four months. I didn't hesitate."
Accustomed to her adult initiatives, Ara's parents let her fly.
"Working far from home, with
a proposal that included accommodation, food and salary, was incredible.
My job was to guide tourists on the excursions they took, always in English, and I received very good tips in dollars. I returned to Buenos Aires Four months later, I was packed, and I started handing out resumes like crazy, in hotels, bars and restaurants. They immediately called me from a very important hotel chain and also from a cafe.
Since they gave me the schedules, I accepted both jobs."
Ara Meniño (19), owner of the Lately cafe.
"When I see someone stop and squeal to enter my coffee I get excited."
Exhausted by the intense activity, in addition to taking the CBC at night to pursue a degree in Medicine, Ara began to
brainstorm
her project.
"Why am I working so hard?
What's the point of running around from Monday to Monday?"
, she wondered.
"I'm doing it to go live alone," she answered.
"But I will not be able to sustain this pace nor did I want to do it just to pay rent which, as we see, is an impossible mission. So, within the same route, I changed the objectives. This effort, I told myself over and over again,
It had to be to save and invest in a project of my own,"
shares a girl who defines herself as "accelerated, not anxious."
The entrepreneurship began to be clear from its early culture of coffee.
"
I started drinking it alone, when I was 12 years old, to see what would happen and I didn't take it any longer
. I love coffee and over time I became demanding when it came to looking for the best flavor. I took a barista course and there That was when it became clear to me:
'A coffee shop, yes, that's what I want,' I convinced myself.
But I wanted a different, specialty coffee, one with a refined bean, without additives, that is not sweetened and is prepared at a certain temperature. With the idea fixed, I started looking for a place and in August I found this one, which was an old laundry."
"None of us are 20 years old, but we are trained to be able to manage this cafe," says Ara, the captain.
Accompanied by her parents, she signed the contract on September 1. "
I had saved 6,000 dollars, which was enough for me to do the renovations
, which weren't that many. The rest, as you see, is austere. Without rushing, but without pause, The setup took me about four months because
I was still working at the hotel to have resources
, because last-minute problems always arise. The first rent, of 300 thousand pesos, I only paid in January, which gave me a little relief. air".
People pass by on the sidewalk who stop to spy what Lately is about.
"It's open?".
Mix of nerves, excitement and happiness Ara welcomes two older women.
She pauses to attend to them and returns after a while to continue talking to
Clarín.
"When someone comes in, it gives me chills, it moves me, I think: 'wow, he's entering my place, something caught his attention. And
when you see familiar faces, who come back again and again, it fills my soul
.'
"I prefer to work with friends that I love and trust, although I know that it is not ideal to mix work with friendship," believes Ara Meniño.
Ara says that she toured the neighborhood, that she knows a lot, because she lives ten blocks away.
"Near Barrancas de Belgrano, in Barrio Chino, you imagine that there is competition but we have the best with our colleagues, very good vibes and we exchange invitations. We are in the birth stage, you see, we still have little offer, but we do "High quality. In addition to specialty coffee, we offer
alfajores, puddings,
scones
and cakes, all
made in-house
by a pastry chef friend who prepares them delicious
. "
It seeks to slow down its rapid march.
He smiles, because he notices it and slides.
"This job is teaching me to be more patient
, but sometimes my natural vertigo plays tricks on me."
She talks about everything he wants to do with his small but warm place.
"I think about a deck on the sidewalk, or sometimes when it's full, as happened last weekend,
I wonder
how another table could be added," says Ara, who every night, before going to sleep, consults the
reviews
of the clientele that passed by here.
"I read some things that make me so happy, and then some other not-so-cool comments appear."
Ara, the captain.
"I had to insist my friends come to work with me."
He confesses that "once" in the fifty days that Lately has been open
"no one came all day and I swear it was a downer, I started thinking
, 'Has word gotten out that the place is not good?' ', I thought. It was a Monday, a day when many businesses in the area are closed. When I found out a little, I decided to also close and open from Tuesday to Sunday.
Adult, with a gentle but authoritative manner, Ara radiates leadership.
"
I am the captain of the place
, but that does not mean that I am bossy, not at all... Yes, I am the one who organizes, the one who distributes schedules, distributes tasks and the one who pays. There are five of us: Guadalupe, the pastry chef; Camila, the waitress; Florencia, the barista, Julia, the manager, and I. We
all earn the same, I decided that the salary disparity could generate discord...
In fact, I was the one who earned the least. We know that the first months will be more difficult but each In his first month, he pocketed 270 thousand pesos plus tips. I earned less than half. But we agreed that, from now on, whatever is left over will go to a common fund for future franchises.
Ara is not talking about empowered women, but about young entrepreneurs "who
are not in the labor market that prevails these days
, where you leave high school and go to look for a job and they ask you to be 18 or 19 years old but with two years of experience. Who can think of it? I worked hard for a few months, I raised 6,000 dollars and opened this place. I think that
opportunities are not expected, you have to look for them.
Look at that bar, see? We put it together with leftover wood that we found in a tipper".
The place is filling up and Ara gets a little nervous, although she clarifies that she is very comfortable working with friends of the same age.
"
None of them reach twenty, but we show that we are capable of making the coffee work
. We all do everything. I am learning pastry making, the other prepares specialty coffee and when we have to grab the broom we don't drop the rings. Although It says the opposite, that friendship can be put at risk, for me experiences like these enhance it and make it more solid.
P.S.