Monday Monday

Written by Hayet Gessese

Best friends make the best business partners, and these two entrepreneurs are changing the events game.

It's Saturday morning and the Monday Monday team has t-minus two and half hours to get to the venue. The event: a baby shower for their first client. They have to impress, they have to be on time and they have to deliver.

“We need the balloons that we’re getting at Base Warehouse. What else is on the list” Alondra asks. She walks over to the balcony. “Is it raining?” she asks rhetorically. The rain is one of the many hurdles the Monday Monday team has to endure before they arrive to their destination.

Without a car, Cuppy and Alondra walk in the rain to Base Warehouse to grab the final assembling materials for their very first balloon arch. It’s 8am and the girls are already facing major dilemmas. Cuppy has no cell service and Alondra has less than 10% battery on her phone. They miss their bus to Maroubra Beach due to the lack of cell service. At this stage, the Monday Monday team has no capital to order an UBER. With an hour and a half to go before the event, they wait patiently at the bus stop in hopes of catching the right bus and jumping out at the right stop. They successfully take one bus and deboard to wait for their next transfer. In laughing fashion, they watch as very the bus they need to get on passes right before their eyes.

At this point we thought weren’t going to make the event” Cuppy recalls.

With Alondra’s very low battery percentage, they order an UBER with the money they don’t have as a last minute resort. They eventually spot the UBER driver and as he turns to pick them up, the bus they had been waiting for all along shows up. Alondra and Cuppy quickly get on the bus to avoid the rain. After a disastrous morning and many close calls, they finally arrive with thirty minutes to spare to create their very first balloon arch.

Cuppy Flores and Alondra Olivas are the duo behind the company Monday Monday that specializes in grazing boards, balloon arches, photo walls, event hosting and baked goods; a one stop shop when it comes to events of any size. The two formed a partnership in 2018, having known each other for over five years being from the hometown of Tucson, Arizona. The two tow a unique partnership, Cuppy handles more of the day to day operations and business while both equally share in the creativity of the company.

I enjoyed a first hand experience to the formation of the company as I lived with Cuppy and Alondra during my first year in Sydney. Like most success stories, the origin of this one started off with more than modest means. The business started with a $100 loan and operated out of a linen closet and used two shelve spaces, one to store fabrics and the other to store their accessories. Under the shelve spaces were drawers full of balloons, photo wall items, streamers, various party décor and of course, scissors. The duo now operates out of Cuppy’s apartment whom she lives in with her husband Rudy. The closet space is larger and it seems as if the business out grew its modest two shelf spaces. By the product these two are delivering, you wouldn’t be able to tell that this is company is barely a year old. This is very much the beginning for Monday Monday.

Halloween 2018, Sydney, Australia: It’s the week of the eerie holiday and Alondra has taken it to herself create Halloween cookies for a small get together; a holiday Cuppy and Alondra deeply cherish. Alondra spends countless hours making dough and more hours on end getting the exact coloring and squeeze technique to make a frosted cookie. Traditionally one could easily go to the grocery store and purchase cookies like the ones Alondra was laboring over, but that would be all too easy for a woman that strives for excellence. The cookies take hours to dry and Alondra continues to make batch after batch until the right shapes are formed: bats, half moons and pumpkins that are perfectly represented in cookie form.

Days later no one will know the efforts that went into each cookie at the small Halloween get together Cuppy and Alondra throw at their apartment. But that’s the quality that Alondra brings to her Monday Monday partnership. In the unseen hours, precious time goes into even the most minuet details, many that some would overlook but it’s this love for the craft that distinguishes most companies and that of Monday Monday. It’s more than a business, it’s an expression of love through arts and crafts to create the best event. The events side of the company is just one aspect of their many business ventures together. “Cards” Cuppy replies. Planning events is just the gateway to their real dream: stationary. Stationary may seem ordinary, especially when only purchased on certain occasions but in Monday Monday fashion, it represents more.

“My preferred method for documenting anything has always been a notebook and pen. I however, am very particular when it comes to the type of paper I write on, the size of the notebook and how it feels under my hand. I started to wish that stationary companies would change certain things or add things to their current products. I couldn’t be the only one to want that perfect notebook, pen or card” Alondra recalls.

Why couldn’t I be the one to make that happen? Why couldn’t I help make stationary an expression of the individual and create something that someone has always hoped for?

August 23, 2018. A mysterious box arrives downstairs. I take the elevator down to the mail room and retrieve the box. It’s a small box wrapped in black plastic. From the looks of it, it seems like it came a long way. I walk back into the apartment and yell out to Cuppy and Alondra. During this time it’s a bit tense in the apartment. Tuition fees are due and no seems to know how they will be paid.

Despite facing uncertainty, both Cuppy and Alondra stay occupied with creating new photo walls and ideating new party designs and balloon arches. It’s a testimony about the dedication these two have amidst adversity to stay faithful to a dream even when the present situation seems challenging. It’s times like these that new business ventures dissipate and disband when clients are sparse and business is slow, or in Alondra and Cuppy’s case; starting a business from a shared passion while attending college full time and not being able to find a part time job to pay for living expenses and tuition.

“We took a risk in starting a business with nothing! Most people may laugh and say it’s illogical. If there is something we learned from living in Australia, it’s that God makes something out of nothing and it wouldn’t be any different with our small business” Cuppy recalls. “There are many ingredients to a business like finances, work space, right timing etc. But, before you add any of that into the mixture you need faith.”

I lay the box on the table and Rudy begins to open the box with Cuppy. “Shutup!” Cuppy exclaims. I silently record the whole process on the other side of the couch on my phone which I later use to recall this event. “No freaking way. This is so cool” Cuppy exclaims. “Freaking genius, try it on. Try it on something” Alondra tells Cuppy.

In typical Alondra and Cuppy fashion, they FaceTime their pastors Tony and Angelica Bravo to thank them for the balloon pump they desperately needed. Before being gifted the pump, Alondra and Cuppy blew each of their balloons by mouth, including the balloon arch at their first event and sparingly used helium to save costs. Their humility and graciousness for this gift point to the testimony of their character. They eventually get off the phone and start creating balloons with much ease and begin to plan new ideas and balloon arches for events. What started off as a $100 loan turned into something more. Their partnership goes beyond a business, it’s a friendship formed from a bond of trust, many memories together, and their love for Jesus, a bond that is indeed unbreakable.