OWNER OF LUKUSA BUSINESS CONCIERGE SERVICES
“There is always space for starting over.”
As is true across the country, immigrant and refugee entrepreneurs play a strong role in creating a vibrant, healthy economy here in Colorado. In the Denver/Aurora metro area, 1 in 6 business owners is an immigrant (American Immigration Council, 2020). RMMFI is proud to be among the local organizations supporting this community of entrepreneurs: 45 of the individuals we’ve served across our programs identify as immigrants or refugees. Their businesses span a variety of industries, including technology, arts and entertainment, business services, retail, food and restaurants, and transportation.
Rachelle Lukusa, owner of Lukusa Business Concierge Services and graduate of Business Launch Boot Camp #21, immigrated to the US from France in 2008. Initially, she only planned to stay for business school, but she ended up moving permanently because of the workplace exclusion faced in France by people of color.
When she was first starting her career, Rachelle didn’t anticipate becoming a business owner. She thought success meant climbing the corporate ladder — even though she hated her job. Then, in 2017, Rachelle’s contract at an HR firm was unexpectedly terminated, and she decided to pursue a different path by starting her own business providing operations, administrative, and bookkeeping services.
Rachelle has been steadily growing her business over the past 4 years, and we’re excited that she recently became part of RMMFI’s accounting team as our contract bookkeeper. Rachelle is bringing her strong attention to detail and depth of knowledge to not only reconcile our books monthly but also help make sure our financial systems are consistent and accurate.
For Rachelle, entrepreneurship is a way of controlling her own well-being and stability, rather than having that depend on an employer’s decision. She can build a career that is a reflection of her own skills and talents, and she can still be the CEO without her success depending on someone else seeing her worth. As Rachelle’s business continues to grow, she wants to use her services to support other immigrant entrepreneurs – something she already does by volunteering as a mentor in RMMFI’s programs.
As Rachelle and many other immigrant entrepreneurs have found, “there is always space for starting over.”
