In the small village of Kopomá, Noé was known as the man who could fix anything, except his own path to a better life.
Working as a plumber and electrician, Noé had the technical skills to repair a leak or wire a house. But his dream was bigger: he wanted to own a thriving business and a lemon plantation that would provide stability for his wife, Cinthia, and their two children.
The problem wasn’t his work ethic; it was his lack of business structure. “I had the difficulty of tracking expenses,” Noé admits. Like many entrepreneurs, he found that earning money and managing it are two very different skills.
When Noé joined a Mentors International training group, he was the only man in the room. He felt out of place at first, but his desire to provide for his two children outweighed his discomfort. He was very outgoing, sharing his thoughts while encouraging his peers to join in as they learned the fundamentals of financial discipline.
Through the Giving Machines, Noé received two pigs to raise and fruit tree saplings. In the hands of someone without training, these might have been a temporary fix. But Noé saw them as a strategic asset. While his mentor, María, visited with him to help him refine his plumbing business’s finances, Noé applied his new habit of saving.
By tracking every peso and cutting waste, Noé saved enough, along with the proceeds from the sale of a pig, to buy an irrigation pump and 10 meters of hose. Today, those lemon trees are being watered, his plumbing client list is growing, and Noé is no longer just a handyman. He is a business owner of a thriving enterprise.
