At 3 a.m., while most of the city of Long Beach is sound asleep, Rachel Fonseca is driving to Los Angeles’ fruit market on a hunt for the freshest strawberries she can find.
“My berry runs are from three to five in the morning,” Fonseca told California Latino News. “For Valentine’s Day, I literally get there at two.”
For six years, the 25-year-old Mexican-American business finance student at California State University, Dominguez Hills, has balanced full-time school, a job as a payment specialist at a nonprofit child care agency, and a growing chocolate-covered strawberry business known as Strawberry Delights.
What began as an idea to make money on Valentine’s Day between Fonseca and her mother in 2020 has now become a year-round operation that serves customers across Southern California.
“It was actually her who came up with the idea,” Fonseca said, referring to her mom. “She told me she would take a class to learn how to make the strawberries, and I told her, ‘Do it. Learn that. I will help you promote it and I will make a menu for you.’”
“And yeah, that’s how it all started,” she said.
In the beginning, the mom and daughter duo planned to sell only for Valentine’s Day. Fonseca said she never imagined it would last beyond that. Fonseca is now the primary person who runs Strawberry Delights.
An important aspect of Fonseca’s identity as well as her business is the fact that she is a daughter of immigrants. Her mother, Mariana Heredia, immigrated from a city in Mexico called Cuernavaca, Morelos, when she was 11 years old. Fonseca’s dad was 16 when he moved to the U.S. from Guadalajara, Jalisco.
Heredia talks about how watching her daughter build a business from the little idea that she had reflects the lessons she tried to instill while raising her.
“This is a country where it’s like a big pizza,” Heredia said. “You get the piece of the pizza that you want. If you want a bigger slice, you have to work for it.”
Representing Latina business owners in the Wrigley neighborhood of Long Beach holds a place in Fonseca’s heart as she continues to build her brand, especially during times of immigration controversy.
“This country was built on immigrants,” Fonseca said. “There’s a lot of disregarded beauty in the people who contribute to our country.”
Now, with a social media presence of 30,000 followers and thousands of berries later, Fonseca has been working on the expansion of her business.
Her menu now consists of a variety of desserts like cake pops, cupcakes, rice crispy treats, etc. Though there are businesses that are similar, Fonseca feels that her attention to quality and detail is what sets her apart from the rest.
“I always buy my strawberries the day of. I always dip them the day of pickup,” she said. “Even during really busy times, I still like to keep the quality the same as if I was doing one order.”
Since she started the business with her mom, Fonseca has made family a huge part of her mission statement. Her team includes her dad, brother, her boyfriend, and her boyfriend’s cousin.
One of her loyal employees, Long Beach native Niya Canonge, has worked with Fonseca for three years. She attests to the amount of perfection and time that goes into every box of treats.
“Rachel is very, very dedicated to making her company look the best possible,” Canonge said. “Even if it’s a little chocolate heart that fell off the berry, she always makes sure that everything looks good.”
Canonge is responsible for managing Strawberry Delights’ social media as well as customer pickup and drop-off to make sure the experience matches the quality of the desserts.
While customers see polished boxes of treats, they do not always see the labor that goes on behind the scenes. Fonseca revealed that a classic dozen strawberries may take 45 minutes, while larger orders can require up to 12 hours of time in the kitchen.
During these long days, Fonseca admits that she rarely sits down.
“I’m standing most of the time,” she said. “Sometimes I’m like, why do I put myself through this?”
Being a young business owner is not easy. Fonseca shared that she “sacrificed a lot of experiences that one would have in their early 20s,” often working through holidays and weekends.
Regardless, her connection with customers keeps her going. Many of her loyal regulars are Latino families celebrating milestones. Fonseca highlights that she has some customers who have grown alongside her business.
“I have one customer who booked me for her gender reveal, then her baby shower, then her daughter’s first birthday, then her bridal shower, and then her wedding,” she said.
For Fonseca, those moments make it all worth it in the end.
In the future, she envisions Strawberry Delights moving outside of her home kitchen. Her long-term dream is to open a storefront cafe that combines her treats with more baked goods and coffee.
“I have so many plans, so many ideas…but I can’t get too excited about them yet until I graduate,” she said.
Heredia shares that vision for her daughter and the business.
“I think I will be the manager,” she said with a laugh.
Until then, Fonseca continues to make a difference in her Long Beach community and positively represents Latinos one berry at a time.
Breahna Patterson is a senior at California State University, Long Beach, majoring in sports journalism. She has experience in multimedia storytelling and covering community-based stories. She is the business coordinator for Beach Media and an intern with Orange County Soccer Club, where she works in marketing and merchandising.