Priscilla Lavoie

Priscilla Lavoie is the founder of Bida, a subscription-based app that gives its members one drink every day at a choice of bars and restaurants across Barcelona. Launched in May 2017, the app already has nearly 3,000 users in Barcelona and 35 participating venues, which is forecasted to rise to 50 venues in 2018. “Our members get one free drink a day at our partner bars in Barcelona for €9.99 per month. So for €10 a month, you can have up to 31 cocktails in great bars across the city.” 

We meet at Born’s favourite new spot (and participating venue), Big Kokka, just before the lunch rush on a bright November day. Dressed in a wine-coloured, off-the-shoulder jumpsuit, and with a glass of verdejo in hand, Lavoie smiles warmly, sweeps her long, dark hair to one side and sits down to recount her journey. She’s focused and concise, and not a word is wasted.

Born in Montreal to a Sri Lankan mother and French Canadian father, Lavoie and her family moved to Florida when she was three years old, where her parents ran a hotel. “My parents were entrepreneurs,” she begins, “so I’ve always had entrepreneurial tendencies. In the fifth grade, I was already buying lollipops in bulk at Walmart and selling them to my classmates for a dollar a pop—until my teacher told me to stop, obviously!”

The family stayed in Florida for a decade, during which time they moved around. “I think one of the things that really makes me who I am is the fact that I moved 10 times during the 10 years that I lived in Florida. I was constantly going to new schools and having to start again, so I learnt to adapt to new environments.” At 13, the family returned to Montreal. “I didn’t know a word of French,” she recalls, “and I was thrown into a French school, which was another new challenge and new environment.”

After studying finance at university in Montreal, Lavoie found herself working in a technology startup that sold software. “This was 2008 and startups weren’t really a thing yet, in Montreal at least, but I kind of just fell into this opportunity. We were about 30 people and I started working in sales and marketing.” A year later, the company was acquired, an experience that awakened her entrepreneurial spirit once more: “It really opened my eyes to the experience of helping to build a company, grow a company and sell it off to a bigger entity, and I thought it was so thrilling and exciting to be part of it,” she enthuses. “That’s kind of when I started to think about maybe doing my own startup at some point.” 

So, how did she end up in Barcelona? “I had visited Barcelona as a tourist and I actually hated it,” she laughs. “Fast forward to 2012, and I was looking into getting out of Montreal. I’m a sun baby, having grown up in Florida, and I was sick of the cold winters.” After realising how difficult it is to emigrate and start a new job in a new country, Lavoie decided to use the opportunity to study abroad instead. She applied for the prestigious MBA programme at IESE Business School, and landed here in September 2012.

“I spent two years in Barcelona and I fell in love with the city during that time,” she beams, “but I also fell in love with a boy—who’s now my husband—someone I met on the MBA programme.” After finishing the MBA, the couple moved back to Montreal, but it wasn’t long before Lavoie had itchy feet again. “My heart was really still in Spain,” she said, “so I started to look for opportunities.”

One night in October 2016, she saw the light; an idea that would become her passport back to Barcelona. “I was in bed, probably about one in the morning, reading TechCrunch, and I came across an article about a company in the US,” she recalls. It was a company that had attracted a lot of funding, and it prompted Lavoie to start imagining something similar in Spain. “I was reading articles until about three or four. I had to wake my husband up. I nudged him and said ‘Hey Dom, I need to go to Barcelona’.” 

Two days later, the ambitious 31-year-old was on a plane with a one-way ticket. “I had to be on the ground. I spent a month talking to all my contacts: bar owners, restaurant owners, investors, people in the startup industry. Anyone I could get my hands on. When I decided that the idea was worth pursuing, we packed up our lives in a period of two weeks at the end of December and moved here at the beginning of January to begin Bida.” 

Once settled, she hit the ground running. “My business partner, Ivan Peralta, and I started working on the product development process in early January. We put out a beta in early March and launched publically in May,” she explains. “Bida is a spinoff of the idea that I had seen in the US. The idea for the bars is that they get more people through the door, which, ultimately, increases revenues.” And the reaction from bar and restaurant owners has been a pleasant surprise. “When I sit down with a bar owner or manager, I would say that 80-90 percent of the time, they’re willing to take a chance with Bida, and I love that about this city, people are really open to try new things.” 

But it hasn’t all been plain sailing. The Herculean task of getting a business off the ground was made all the more difficult as a foreigner. “I definitely feel like I have become more resilient,” Lavoie observes. “Starting a business here as a resident is challenging, but coming here without a NIE or anything, it was quite a frustrating ride, especially over the first six months. I was working non-stop, dealing with all the bureaucracy, to the point that by June I was almost burned-out. I even kicked a wall once!” 

She took a step back and realised that she needed to make some changes; to practise what she preaches and start enjoying the good life. “There’s the Silicon Valley mentality of working non-stop, but if you don’t take a moment to yourself to enjoy your surroundings, you’re going to be miserable. So, I started going out more, and enjoyed the summer. It really did change my happiness levels, and I started to love this place again.”

Feeling energised, Lavoie is looking to expand Bida to other parts of Spain. “I think the Spanish market as a whole really enjoys going out, it’s such a sociable culture. That’s why I came here in the first place, I saw this app working so well here.” And at just 31 years old, Bida seems like it might just be the beginning for Lavoie. She has had a taste for the entrepreneurial life and doesn’t intend to look back. “I have always wanted to be my own boss, and having this experience, I don’t think I would be able to work for somebody else again.” Giving back, however, is on her agenda. “To give back to the startup community in Barcelona, in the form of being a mentor or even as an angel or VC, that’s something that I would love to do. I think there is such a lack of women in that space and world.”

Business aside, Lavoie holds her family dear and, for her, their approval is the ultimate mark of success. “I just want to make my parents proud. Is that sad to say?! I want them to look at their daughter and think ‘we created her and we’re happy about it, look what she’s done!’” I’m sure they’ll raise a glass to that. Cheers!  

Bida is offering Metropolitan readers one month free—that’s up to 31 free cocktails! All you have to do is download the app and input the code ‘METROPOLITAN’ when signing up (new users only) before February 15th. Don’t miss out!

Very Present Future is a Barcelona-based series of interviews spearheaded by Milo de Prieto. Barcelona has a long history of innovation, progressive thinking and initiative that has defined the city and region for hundreds of years. Milo has spent five years interviewing and videoing interesting thinkers and doers from all walks of life—politics, art, architecture, music, business; local and international—all of whom have had a positive influence in some way. 

Metropolitan has teamed up with Milo to interview more people investing in the excellence of the city, based on three key questions: How did you get to where you are today? What are you doing right now? Where are you going from here?