Brazil is a country that presents plenty of challenges to the entrepreneur. It can also be quite rewarding as there are many opportunities for those who know how to recognize them. The country makes it incredibly difficult on those in the property and hotel industry because of its low ranking of its ability to deal with construction permits. Guilherme Paulus has overcome all of the obstacles that have stood in his way of becoming a successful Brazilian entrepreneur, and he how runs a thriving hotel chain known as GJP Hotels & Resorts and the travel company CVC Brasil. Read more about Guilherme Paulus at infomoney.com
Guilherme Paulus was born in Sao Paulo in 1949, and he always wanted to be a businessman when he was a child. He ended up studying business administration when he went to college and eventually went to work with IBM as his first job. When he was a young adult, he met Carlos Vicente Cerchiari, and together, the two decided to startup a tourism company. The agreement was that Cerchiari would front all of the money needed for the company, while Guilherme Paulus took care of its daily operations. Their original store opened up in 1972, and Cerchiari stayed with the company for four years before making his exit.
Guilherme Paulus stayed with the company and has drawn on his intuition and positive nature to build it up. His understanding of the country’s tourism industry has really helped him with this, and he has been able to place stores in vital locations with a lot of foot traffic. CVC now has close to 1,200 locations all over the world and has over 3,000 employees that keep it in business. Paulus has also expanded GJP Hotels & Resorts so it now offers over 3,000 rooms in its 14 hotels. Every major city in Brazil has one of its hotels serving guests, and Guilherme Paulus likes to visit them whenever he can. He has continued to pick up awards over the years and was even recognized in France for improving the country’s tourism industry. Viagem e Turismo of Editora Abril also named him the Personality of the Year.