Cláudia is founder and strategist of BE A PEACH, a creative agency focused on using creativity for good. She studied Business, Marketing, and Art Direction in Lisbon and London before moving to Asia where she immersed herself into different social and environmental projects and initiatives. In 2017, Cláudia founded BE A PEACH and has been working with planet-centric projects from all over the world with a team of multi-talented creatives who want to use their creative skills for positive impact.
Learn more about Claudia here:
If you are an entrepreneur, what motivated you to start your own business?
I was 25 by the time I had the idea of creating BE A PEACH. At the time I had been the top student of one of the top Business Schools in Portugal and I was immediately invited to join the most well known Portuguese multinational. I remember my disappointment after working there with the lack of creative flow I felt on myself and others around me. BE A PEACH started as a love manifest for the world and for creativity. I wanted to create a company that would create with others to do good for the planet. Our main motivator is believing in a new way of creating and seeing how we should work together. Ultimately, this way creates the reality we believe on – collaboration, value everyone and everything, partnerships instead of hierarchies, etc
What does success mean to you?
Success means having the luxury to express myself with no fears and fostering an everyone where others can do and feel the same. Ultimately success also means that myself and BAP has been able to improve someone else’s live or made someone fell in love with the planet again.
What is your mantra or favorite saying? (If it's a known quote, please let us know who said it first!)
“No problem can be solved with the same consciousness that created it.” – Einstein
What failure taught you the most about life or business? What was the lesson?
Thinking that there is always a right and wrong version of every history. The lesson is: it is all a matter of perspective and only through dialogue and understanding, the world can change.
What's your favorite book - fiction or non-fiction! - in the past year?
The mushroom at the end of the world by Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing
If you could teach the world one five-minute lesson, what would it be?
That we have so much to learn with each other and how wonderful it is to leave our own minds to see other people’s worlds.
Knowing what you know now, what would you have done differently when you were first starting out?
I would have worked better on my boundaries to protect my health and selfcare.
What does women's empowerment look like to you in action?
Women’s empowerment in action for me looks like a deep acceptance of our own individuality, of our self value and of our voice. We have been dismissed for so many decades by society. Empowerment is our own acknowledgment of our worth and a deep trust on each other, with collaboration instead of competition. Women empowerment is also ultimately deep ecology in my opinion: the greatest respect for Mother Earth and the acceptance of the equal value of everyone.
What would you tell 19-year-old YOU?
I would tell my 19-years-old self to worry less and to feel and observe more. We can learn a lot when we are just observing and being curious!
What will 86-year-old you want you to know TODAY?
To trust my intuition
Does anyone call you by a nickname? What is it?
no
Congrats! You just met a Genie in a Bottle. You get three wishes. One can be worth $0-100, one is worth $100,000, and one is worth $100 million. What are your wishes?
To have a deep insight of how to find a better country measure than the GDP
What is your favorite quote? (It can be yours or from someone that you look up to.)
“When we recognise the virtues, the talent, the beauty of Mother Earth, something is born in us, some kind of connection, love is born.” Thich Nhat Hanh
