by Dan Perkins

Mercedes LaPorta is three times a star – a star in business, a star in her community and a star in her family.  Her status as a business star was affirmed on March 23, 2005, when members and sponsors of the Women's Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC) gathered in the Museum Building in Washington, DC for the organization’s annual salute to exceptional women business owners.  LaPorta, who is president of the Miami-based Mercedes Electric Supply, Inc., was one of 14 entrepreneurs recognized by WBENC as "Women-owned Business Stars."  WBENC is the nation’s largest and most widely recognized third-party certifier of women-owned businesses.

“I think I was born with the entrepreneurial gene,” said LaPorta when asked to identify the single key contributor to her success as a business woman.

Born in Havana, Cuba, LaPorta came to the United States when she was six years old.  Her father owned several businesses in Cuba, but lost everything when he and his family fled Castro’s Revolution in the late 1950s.  A determined and resourceful man, LaPorta’s father found work in a cookie factory in Chicago.  Eight years later, he had saved up enough money to open a little neighborhood grocery store on Chicago’s Northside.

According to LaPorta, 85-percent of her extended family members who came to America from Cuba eventually opened one or more businesses in a variety of fields, including freight-forwarding, construction, art framing, and hospitals.  “It’s in our genes,” she explained.

Business acumen is something Mercedes LaPorta intends to develop within her own children.  Her oldest daughter is currently learning the family business, even though she does not intend to succeed her mother, at least not yet.  LaPorta is thrilled that her oldest daughter, who holds a degree in political science, has a real passion for fashion and intends to own a fashion design business someday.  “Whatever business you own, whether its fashion design or an electrical distributor, the principles are all the same,” said LaPorta.  She recently invited her daughter to participate in a renegotiation of the company’s line of credit.  LaPorta knows such exposure will give her daughter a decisive advantage as an entrepreneur.

Mentoring comes naturally to LaPorta who learned important lessons from her father.  “I worked with my dad in his grocery store when he first started the company,” she said.  “I was thirteen years old.”

Years later, LaPorta went to work for the A&P chain of grocery stores, also known as The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company.  “I was the first woman buyer for A&P's Chicago division,” recalled LaPorta who purchased direct-delivery items for the 463 Chicago area stores A&P operated at that time.

“I hated the cold weather,” said LaPorta, as she began to explain the sequence of events that moved her and her family to their present home in Miami, Florida.  LaPorta’s husband had been working for Sylvania; and after the family decided to leave Chicago, LaPorta and her husband met with executives and asked if they could become Sylvania’s distributor in Miami.  The company agreed and Mercedes Electric Supply was formed.  “We started with $15,000 worth of Sylvania lamps, and they are still the only lamps we carry,” said LaPorta.

Initially housed in a tiny 900 square foot warehouse, LaPorta and her husband worked diligently to grow their business into a substantial enterprise.  Along the way, they serviced such notable facilities as the Miami American Airlines Arena, Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, and the Federal Law Enforcement Building.  Last year, Miami International Airport awarded LaPorta’s company a $10 million contract to supply electrical distribution, lighting fixtures and electrical materials at the airport’s north and south terminals.  Today, Mercedes Electric Supply generates over $20 million in revenues, has 43 employees and houses over $2 million in inventory within a 30,000 square foot office and warehouse facility.

Although LaPorta is delighted to service high-profile clients, including Office Depot, she measures her success more broadly.  Community involvement is very important to LaPorta who is a member of the Miami Chamber of Commerce and a contributor to the Diabetes Foundation and Goodwill Industries.  She recently joined the Women Presidents' Organization (WPO), which opened a Miami chapter earlier this year.  Regarding the WPO, LaPorta said, “We look forward to doing great things in the community.”

Nurturing fellow women business owners has become a priority for LaPorta ever since she joined WBENC in 2003.  “It’s been a great experience; and the women in the organization are just incredible,” she said.

LaPorta has been certified by numerous organizations and is or has been a member of more than 70 business organizations in the 26 years she has been an entrepreneur; but she cited WBENC and WPO as the best in terms of promoting women owned businesses.

Running a business is not easy, as any of WBENC’s 2005 Business Star Awardees can attest. “One of the things you have to be prepared for when you start your business is great sacrifice,” said LaPorta.  “If you’re not prepared to sacrifice, you’re never going to make it as an entrepreneur.”

Achieving success in business has required LaPorta to miss out on important moments in her two daughters’ lives.  She appreciates their acceptance of the sacrifices the family has had to endure, and she credits her entire family for seeing her through difficult times.  “My husband, my daughters, my mom, and my dad – my immediate family has been my support,” said LaPorta.