Starting a business, any business, is hard work. It takes time, skill, more than a little bit of luck, and usually the business you end up with isn’t exactly the one you dreamt of from the beginning. Meet Marissa, she’s the CEO of Rafi Nova, an ethically minded, fair trade fashion company that purchases handmade textiles from women in rural Vietnam, and turns them into fashionable and family-friendly travel accessories.

Marissa and her husband Adam met during a year abroad program in college, and bonded over their mutual love of travel. They continued to travel as their family grew, mostly between Vietnam and the United States, and dreamt of starting their own company—one that would design beautiful accessories for working families on the go, made from textiles locally sourced in Vietnam, the country they’d come to adopt as their second home.

Last year, they took the plunge, and began planning the launch of Rafi Nova—named for their two sets of twins. But then the COVID-19 pandemic hit Asia, and then the United States. The travel industry collapsed overnight, and so did the market for travel accessories.

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