Bonbon Shoes’ Jana Lindberga: Intuition and persistence are key to entrepreneurship

Jana Lindberga, the head of Bonbon Shoes, says successful businesspeople need to trust their intuition and remain persistent. She argues that everyone has intuition, but it is often overshadowed by fear and outside noise. Listening to it can point you in the right direction. Persistence is just as important: in moments when everything seems lost, an entrepreneur should hear the inner voice telling them not to stop. Lindberga says it is always better to find the strength to get up and try again than to give up. Every entrepreneur faces difficult moments, and the ability to recover after failures is one of the most valuable qualities in business.

Lindberga grew up in the Ventspils district and attended a small rural school. It was a rather closed environment, so children tended to dream of becoming what they saw around them. Her parents were teachers, which is why she thought she might become a teacher one day. She did not consider entrepreneurship at the time. While at secondary school, she organised summer camps and took an active part in community work. She enjoyed staying busy and trying new things.

After finishing school, she moved to Riga to study communication sciences and later specialised in public relations. Once she graduated, Lindberga worked as a press secretary at Ventspils City Council. It was during that period that she came up with the idea of setting up her own business.