Sion Tesone (OPM 43, 2013) is the founder & CEO of Amani Enterprises, LLC, which operates the for-profit social enterprise TISSINI. In this interview, he talks about TISSINI’s aims to empower Hispanic women through friend-to-friend retail sales.

“TISSINI is all about empowering Hispanic women. We believe in the idea that once you empower women, they, in turn, help their families and their communities. So, we do it in a way that is sustainable. It's a for-profit social enterprise.

“We have an exclusive line of quality products in the US that women can buy at wholesale price. And they, in turn, sell to their family and their friends at retail price. The difference is the money they make. We're very sensitive to our clients’ needs, so we make sure that we understand what they want to buy and what they want to sell. And based on that, we give them our product offering.

“It's a platform. We have different lines. We have a beautiful textile line, a jewelry line, and also a bedding line. The idea behind that is that the women will sell first, let's say, a jean to her friend. And then they will sell a bedding product to her friend, and then a jewelry piece to her friend. And little by little, she will start accumulating extra income through her friends in a way that is sustainable and simple.

“We love the idea of friend-to-friend, because Hispanics tend to be very social. They love to mingle. So the idea for us to create a social enterprise, in a way that is understandable to them, makes sense. We get stories literally every single day of our Emprendedoras, our clients, telling us how impactful they were thanks to TISSINI. So, for instance, saying that thanks to us they were able to earn extra income. And with that income, they were able to provide for their family, or buy shoes for their kids, or be empowered, and also be able to sustain their lives better.

“The women that we empower, unfortunately, most of the time, are ignored, they’re unbanked. So the idea for us is to be able to help them in a way that is sustainable, easy to understand, and in a language that they understand, which is Spanish.

“Once we empower women, they, in turn, empower their homes, their families, and their communities. So it does have a ripple effect. And that's why we are so passionate about that.”

(Published November 2018)

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