When Cristina Lopez and her husband Ricardo first came to the United States from Uruguay in 1977, they never expected to own a business that employed more than 300 people.
“We came to this country looking for the American dream and we found it,” said Lopez, owner of Cristi Cleaning Service Corporation in Union City. “But we still have a lot to do.”
Apparently, some believe they’ve done enough, as on Sept. 26, Lopez received the United States Small Business Association’s 2001 New Jersey Minority Small Business Person of the Year award. This award is given to a small business in each state every year during National Minority Enterprise Development Week, which ran from Sept. 23 through Sept. 29 this year.
“We hope this award will give other people [the encouragement] that they too can accomplish this,” said SBA Acting District Director James Kocsi.
Today, Lopez’s cleaning service, a janitorial firm that has contracts with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the U.S. Department of Defense and 25 schools throughout Hudson and Bergen counties, has annual sales between $5 and $6 million.
However, when Lopez first started 21 years ago, she never imagined that her home-based business would grow that large.
“We put our heart into it,” said Lopez, who has made their family motto ‘In order to succeed, you must first think you can.’
Road to success
In 1981, Lopez and her husband opened the service from their Union City home.
“We worked 16 hours a day, seven days a week,” said Lopez, adding that the only employees at that time were herself and her husband.
By 1993, Lopez moved her business into office space on Paterson Plank Road in the city. The company grew to 21 employees and their annual sales went up to $150,000.
“We built a lot of relationships along the way,” said Lopez, adding that she still works with some of her original clients.
However, Lopez credits the SBA with a lot of the company’s growth throughout the years. In 1993, Lopez joined the SBA’s 8a Contracting Program which, according to Kocsi, was established to help minority-owned businesses gain federal contracts.
“The SBA was like our second step in helping us grow,” said Lopez, who now has contracts with McGuire Air Force Base and West Point through the program.
“[Lopez] is a success story for the program and for her herself,” said Kocsi, adding that only 25 percent of Lopez’s business is with federal contracts.
Lopez also credits part of her success to her contract with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
“We have been really lucky with the people we’ve met,” said Lopez. “We have found help everywhere. Especially for people like us who have come from another country. I’ve found that you have to integrate yourself with the community.”
According to Kocsi, the SBA will have handed out a record-breaking amount of loans and dollars to minority-owned businesses in New Jersey this year.