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In this episode, I sit down with serial entrepreneur, Gayle Zalduondo.

Gayle built a multimillion-dollar furniture design and manufacturing company with 85 employees; then she created a company that turns shipping containers into tiny homes and restaurants; and now she guides creators and founders back into alignment with who they really are.

Gayle's work lives at the intersection of intuition, design, messaging, and identity. She helps people bring the inside out—whether through the spaces they inhabit, the brands they build, or the stories they tell.

In our conversation we explore:

• What “alignment” actually means beyond the buzzword
• Why your values are strategic
• The connection between resonance, client attraction, and trust
• The difference between creating from your head vs. your heart

If you’re in a season where you’re trying to figure out your next step, or you’re creating content that feels right internally but isn’t resonating externally, this conversation will give you a lot to sit with.

Connect with Gayle

www.gaylezalduondo.com

The poet Hafiz once wrote, the words we speak become the house we live in. Stories are powerful, especially the stories we tell about ourselves. Today's guest is Gayle Zalduondo Gayle is a serial entrepreneur. In the early 2000s, she founded Urbanus, a multimillion dollar furniture design and manufacturing company. Later on, Gayle co-founded Little River Box Company, a manufacturer that designs and alter shipping containers into restaurants,

dwelling units and facilities.

Now, Gayle is a creative mentor and guide. She helps people come home to themselves through the spaces they live in and the stories they tell. Her work, voice and message in alchemy supports creative and change makers in reclaiming their authentic voice. Welcome back to the Business of Trust podcast. I'm your host, Hugo Sanchez, and I'm excited for today's episode with Gayle Salvondo. Let's get started.

Hello Gayle, welcome to the Business of Trust Podcast.

Hi

Hugo, thanks, it's good to be here.

Thank you for being here Gayle, you do some extremely transformational and deep work. I've been your client and you've been my client, but most importantly, when I work with you, we went very deep. So can you explain to our listeners what is exactly that you do?

think at the heart of it, it's life design.

I work with both individuals and brands and businesses as well. I bring in ⁓ what's on the inside to the outside. That's how I see it. I do that ⁓ through designing spaces and crafting messages and building brands for people.

I see the essence of someone and I try to guide it with deep listening and conversation and exploring and bring it out. bring it into an alignment to who they are and what they do, bringing those together.

and I've done this work with you and the work that we did together really like transformed me. if you, I remember a moment when you were, you asked me what is, what were my superpowers? And I ramble a little bit here and there, but like you told me, like you could see through it. And you told me your superpowers are that you implement infrastructure and see, and really distill complexity into clear, into clear

Yeah.

It comes so easy to you, you probably don't even realize it. And it was so true, and I've carried that along in everything I do now.

think it's intuition, actually. It stems from something inside of me. I I know you. I've worked with you both on different sides of the fence, if you will, both as a client and as a colleague, right? But even people that I don't know, if they're open and willing to go through a transformative process with me,

and somehow I see it's so much easier for one to see something in someone else than it is in yourself So it's just about listening and then it somehow gets revealed rather ⁓ easily for me.

Mm-hmm.

I sense how things work and how things are. Maybe it's because I'm an empath, but I kind of feel the room, if you will, and everything in it. So I guess that's what I'm doing now, is parlaying it into ⁓ my next chapter.

Mm-hmm

I had this concept of you as someone very smart, you have created multiple businesses and most importantly, you have a heart and that's why I wanted to work with you. mean you create a multi-million dollar business at some point in your life and I would like

dozens of employees, can you tell us a little bit about how everything in your life, you know, converged to this point?

it really has evolved through time. I call it the arc of time.

One of my clients and mentors, Gordon Siegel from Creighton Barrel, once told me when I was in my 20s, he said, there's no such thing as mistakes, only expensive lessons. And I've taken them. I've taken that to heart. I literally have. So right? Right? I mean, think entrepreneurs in general probably would prescribe to that. Yeah. So.

I subscribe to that.

I've always been a creative entrepreneur, but all of my businesses have been inspired and design related. Whether it's designing furniture, it was always I was designing the whole space.

and now I'm parlaying all of those lessons that I've learned and experience that I've actually gone through. It's a lot easier. Rather than having it be theoretical, it's actually practical at this point in my life. Yeah.

OK, I want to go back to the central theme of this conversation, which is what you're doing right now and the work of alignment that you do with people. And ⁓

What does being in alignment And how does that trust

I see things, it's bringing the inside out. That's how I see it. And so I think we all have different unique strengths and weaknesses, right? But each one of us have something that makes us tick. Each one of us has a core value that's really important, or three or four or five or six, however many core values that we have. And we did this together.

so I'll give you some of my core values as an example, right? One of them is definitely relationship versus transactional.

Big time. Like if it's gonna be transactional, okay, I'll do a transaction with you, but I'm probably not gonna wanna partner with you, right? That's as an example, that's a big one for me. Creativity, obviously, that's off the chart for me because we're all creative. It's not like just some of us are creative or some of us are artists. Just because I'm in a creative industry, I can take that same creativity and continue. It's just in all of us, not just in

some of us. So I mean, that's another one of my values, kindness, kindness is a big one for me. So it makes it a lot easier because when it's out of alignment, whoever that is, I have some that are like,

No-brainer, no start. Like, if you're not gonna be kind, I'm probably not gonna want to even be in the same room as you, let alone go into business with you. So those are some. I have quite a few. ⁓ But that's as an example. And I think that that's what we do as leaders, as entrepreneurs. We're leading by example. It's just, if you don't walk the walk,

you can feel it. So when I say out of alignment, that's what I mean. Otherwise, there are these really pretty words that can come from anywhere. But if you embody it, then it resonates. That's how I see it.

I remember in the moment that I reached out to you, ⁓ you said something that really hit me. You said, Hugo, I was in a moment where I was confused about my next step. And you told me you are seeking your next step in your head, but it's not going to come from your head. It's going to come from your heart.

So I want to go back to how does aligning and subscribing to one's values builds trust in your next step as you deal with uncertainty as an entrepreneur?

I think especially now, and I hate to use this word because I hear it all the time and it's not always true from the people who saying it, which is authenticity, you know? But right now, more than ever, you gotta feel the truth. You know, you have to, it's an intuition. It's from your heart, 100 % it's from your heart. That is my, that is probably my biggest litmus test is,

not just it's what resonates with me is really key. And if it doesn't resonate with me, then it's not for me. I'm not going to judge whether it's good or bad. How about

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Just not for me. That is, and so that's how I see ⁓ even in businesses and how one attracts the people that we want, that are in alignment with us, with our values. It's key. That's key because then all of a sudden, if each one of us does that, then I see that that's possible. I believe that it is possible in this world, even in this crazy time.

especially in this crazy time, actually.

Talking of these crazy times, I don't know if you've seen the latest update on ChatGPTs, a video generator is called Sora2 and it creates videos so real that it's impossible to tell that they were AI generated. Now as I'm scrolling through Instagram or anywhere, I would see a video and I'm like, wait a minute, is that true or is this AI generated? Now you talk about messaging and authenticity.

especially in these times, like it is, there is a feeling of how do we navigate our messaging, our authenticity in this context.

that's a big topic obviously for all of us. And ⁓ I have a thought and a theory that we're.

It is.

At least this is true for me and maybe it is my arc of time and maybe it is my lived experience. But the more I'm much more, I feel more heart centered than I did many, many years ago. It's kind of like I've moved from here to here. And I think you can really replicate things that come from here, but from here, not so much. That's my thought. mean, I think it's really heart centered is also another one of my

Mm-hmm.

my big key ⁓ values, right? It's where I come from. But isn't that true? Also, just not just with your clients, but what you want to do. It is my belief that we all have a unique set of gifts, know, many of them, right? And I think about that sometimes I'm really good at a particular thing, but

I'm not feeling it like in my heart. So I try it and it just doesn't pan out. And I wonder why you kind of know. I remember in Urbanus, Urbanus was my first company and it was my biggest teacher. We were really prosperous and we grew to, ⁓ no, that wasn't, it wasn't my most expensive one, but it was, it was my biggest feature. about that? Yeah.

You mean your most expensive lessons? wearing your glasses. ⁓

Yeah, I mean, it was a spark of an

idea and then it grew and it grew and it grew and it grew. We had 85 employees. I mean, it was just like, what? And then one day I woke up and I said, I'm a CEO of a company with 85 employees. And I shifted or the world shifted for me too. But I remember ⁓ the ideas came and we acted and somehow there was a rhythm to it. That's how I see it.

And it was a flow. And it was what people call now a flow state. But back then, I don't think that, I'm sure that was back then it was something. But when you're in a flow, when you're in that flow, it still guides everything I do. I mean, it doesn't mean I'm always in a flow state by any means, but it guides me. And I believe that you really have to have that clarity and that heart.

in order to do that. I mean, in order to be in that flow state, it has to be real. That's my thought. I don't know if it's true or not, but it's true for me.

And it's for me too. I release a weekly newsletter and I'm putting a lot of content out there, but I write my own copy. I don't let, I do it because I just, one, I enjoy the writing, but two, whenever I'm writing, I'm tapping into my heart. I'm tapping into an emotion. If I can't feel any emotion writing my copy, how can I expect my receiver to feel it?

I hear what you're saying in terms of the ability for AI to do all of these sorts of things. one part of me, like a fear response comes up of like, my God, what are we gonna do? Who do we believe? And it's like, wow, maybe this is my time because my belief is there's an inner,

knowing that we all have, but we have to cultivate that, right? And that inner knowing, you know, maybe it's like, is that true or is that true?

I don't know, I think there's something about that inner knowing and having that come out is really where we are and that's our opportunity now really. Not from a business standpoint, but from a life standpoint. Like, why don't we just go a little bit slower and why don't we just, you know, go inside and bring that out? And when we bring it out, you can't fake that.

I don't think you can.

Now, Gayle, I want to take this conversation like another concentric circle outwards. And we started with alignment and messaging, like the values on an inner level and coming from within and the state of flow. But no business happens in isolation. Your business is a relationship with a broader audience. So how does this alignment of values and clarity of messaging helps you create

Sure, let's do it.

and deepen relationships around you.

Okay, I think that when you're aligned with who you are and you're comfortable in your own skin, then, and living your truth, right? Then you are going to attract, it's about resonance. That's how I see it. When you're embodied and living your truth, then you are going to attract that client.

⁓ That's how I see it anyway. The people for you will come to you.

And it's not so woo woo in that kind of way. I mean, I see it. It's just, I saw it in urbanus a long, long time ago. We caught the wave because we were aligned with, within an industry that needed us. And we had really, really great partnerships. So it was collaboration before collaboration was a really big word, you know? And, and I've taken that experience. I had it then and I have it now. And of course I'm going to align.

myself with somebody who is comfortable in their own skin, their own business. You can feel when somebody is in that and when they're not.

You know, I've done marketing for a long time in my own businesses and that's how I started, right? The message, all of those things were things that came from me from my lived experience. And then I've helped brands and I can tell when somebody is willing to stretch a little bit. And it's not just the words, it's how it feels.

someone who is launching their business or ⁓

It's already established, they have they put content out there putting their message out there, but it's sealed. feels like Nobody's responding. might be it might feel true for them, but there might not be a resonance outside What how would you handle that situation like or what advice would you give to someone in that?

Mmm.

That's a rumor.

Ha ha ha.

I think a lot of it is introspection, I have to say. think, I know I have blinders on, I have had blinders on, and then they come off, right? So some of it is, is it really in alignment? know, not just with your values, but are you, have you put them both together and it's just not just the values and the messaging, but it's the audience. Maybe it's the audience.

Maybe you need a different audience. That would be my suggestion. Or a different platform. Sometimes you can make incremental shifts. You don't have to completely change your business. I think ⁓ it's a process that's not black and white. There's a lot of gray there.

For sure, in my lived experience, I know that sometimes my audience wasn't the one that was buying what I was selling. And I had to shift.

And I'm glad I did.

It's like that story of the comedian who goes to the city and New York and this is still spells his and tells his best jokes and nobody laughs. Then he's like, and so saying like, oh my God, I'm a terrible comedian. Nobody likes my jokes. I should quit. But then he realized it was an Italian convention and nobody spoke English in there. So that's how I relate.

Well, I also think that there's another piece to that, which is I'm going back to a time, I remember, we ⁓ decided to, we used to.

design and build furniture. And I was like, something's got to shift. We have to do something that's scalable and repeatable because we have the variables. I have a business head too. So, ⁓ so I said, we're going to make a product line. So we made 10 tables and we made a booth and the whole thing. And it was so cool. And we went to a, it was a furniture show on Miami beach in the convention center. People loved it.

I mean, they just came in and took pictures and they loved it. And we didn't sell one piece. And I was like, ⁓ God, okay. And we took our furniture back and six months later, we went to New York City.

in with our little U-Haul truck with all of our stuff in the back and we put the exact same booth with the exact same stuff in a different audience and that's where

kind of we were found, you know? I mean, it was like, what? We made a $5,000 sale and then a $10,000 sale. And then we met some of our biggest customers at that exact show. So I say, and I actually, I say, sometimes you need a bigger pond.

Gayle, you've shared a lot of advice with us today and you've had a long trajectory, many businesses and many, the way you said it, expensive lessons in your What would be one piece of advice that you would give 25 year old Gayle out there trying to make it through the entrepreneurial world?

Yeah.

Be who you are.

That's life advice, but it's also business advice. Be who you are. Quicker.

Thank you, Gayle. Alright, for someone who is listening and wants to get in touch with you and learn more about what you do, where would you like to send them?

Thank you.

Sure, ⁓ I have a website. It's gaylezalduando.com. I also publish on Substack ⁓ every week. ⁓ And the name of that is the unfurling voice because it's still unfurling for me too. And then, or you can DM me on Instagram too.

Awesome. Okay, Gayle, thank you so much. I enjoyed this conversation a lot and I'm sure a lot of our listeners will do too. Thank you.

Thank

you so much, Hugo. It's always a pleasure being with you. All right. Bye-bye.

for now.

Well, that's all for today. hope you enjoyed my conversation with Kels Alduondo. If you like this episode, please rate us and subscribe in whatever platform you're listening from. If you're curious also how our company, Mundes Media, may help you in growing your business, please visit www.mundescomedia.com. I'm your host, Hugo Sanchez, and I'll see you in our next episode.