Social Media Stars Making a Social Impact: Why & How Maximo Garcia-Tunon of The Hotel Boys Is Helping To Change Our World
When doing something, have fun and do it right. And if you truly love something for the right cause success will come to you, your community, and goals.
Asa part of my series about leaders who are using their social media platform to make a significant social impact, I had the pleasure of interviewing Maximo Garcia-Tunon.
Maximo Garcia-Tunon is a fifteen-year-old, Miami-based actor, influencer, and entrepreneur. Maximo started his acting career in 2011 by joining Area Stage Theater company and starting in over ten productions, including Little Mermaid, Alice in Wonderland, Aladdin, The Wizard of Oz, Annie, and Fantastic Mr. Fox — to name a few. In 2017 with his parents’ support, Maximo established a social media company, TheHotelBoys. He has been managing and growing his platform for the past five years, which includes collaborations with large brands such as Goya, Topo Chico, Rip n’ Dip, and local favorites that help the Miami community. In 2022, through TheHotelBoys, he joined forces with Glassies, a start-up that creates screen protectors with positive messages that is currently sold through major retailers and schools. Maximo is presently a sophomore at Belen Jesuit Preparatory, pursuing a career in acting and entrepreneurship. This summer, he has been accepted to attend Columbia University’s summer Film and Theater program to continue to expand his knowledge and sharpen his craft. Maximo is a tenacious professional with an immense passion for his Miami community with big plans for the future.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series Maximo! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
I love the arts, fashion, and have an entrepreneurial spirit. I have been very fortunate to grow up with two parents in the hospitality business, my parents and I wanted to share my cool experiences on social media since we had the opportunity to travel a lot. Separately, as an aspiring actor, I decided to take over @thehotelboys, our private and small account. This allowed me to start posting clips in the theater, exploring fashion, acting and auditions. Then the pandemic hit. With the world on lockdown, I started to learn to cook online, evolving my account into a full circle lifestyle blog. Over the course of a year I was able to create a brand for myself, getting recognized by local and national companies leading me to some amazing opportunities, including a partnership with Glassie, the world’s first personalized screen protector.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began this career?
The most interesting story would probably be, when I saw one of my mentors, who’s a model, entrepreneur, actor and social media influencer, @Neels Visser promoting a product called Glassie, a personalized screen protector. I DM’ed Glassie over Instagram and received some product in return for a post. After my post, they DM to thank me and in my reply, I mentioned that I had an idea I wanted to pitch for a secondary Glassie product so they quickly scheduled a zoom call. To my surprise, it was Neels himself, who I didn’t know was a cofounder, together with his business partners Christian Sagert and Cameron Oehlers. From there we hit it off, I explained my idea of creating a similar screen protector, but personalized with a school’s logo since many schools have gone digital and textbook free working off of iPads. Neels, Christian, and Cameron helped make it a reality, while I landed the first Glassie for iPads roll out school wide at my school and now in talks with several other schools across Miami and the US. I am very fortunate to be partnered with Glassie and I’m still a bit star struck.
It has been said that our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
The funny mistakes are all left on the cutting board… not making the cut for social media between me and my brother Roque, The(other)HotelBoys, as we spend hours taking pictures and videos to try to get the right take and we just start to get silly and mess around, making fun of each other. However, as to the actual mistakes when we were starting, not taking advantage of several opportunities that came my way proved to be a mistake as we missed out on connecting with other influencers which would have helped our reach. At the beginning, I also lacked the confidence in my content so did not promote my account as much as I do now. There have been many lessons along the way about keeping my audience engaged, creating the right content, and understanding Instagram insights.
You have been blessed with success in a career path that can be challenging. Do you have any words of advice for others who may want to embark on this career path, but seem daunted by the prospect of failure?
If you really want something, you have to put in the work, hours and dedication to achieve it. The shortcut is doing the work, meeting the right people, letting yourself be teachable, being open to collaboration and not taking no for an answer. Lastly, as my mother always tells me “how you do one thing is how you do everything” — expect excellence from yourself every day and commit to high standards. You can only achieve extraordinary things by being brave enough to face your fears.
Ok super. Let’s now jump to the core focus of our interview. Can you describe to our readers how you are using your platform to make a significant social impact?
Local impact is extremely important to me. I love my city and everyone in my community. I use my platform to promote small and local businesses; I also love doing community service through my school and have many future projects that will help the people in Miami as well as the environment. We live in a connected world so the well-being of my neighbor is my well-being.
Can you tell us a story about a particular individual who was impacted by this cause?
There is no one individual to highlight, but there are several who repeatedly expressed their gratitude for our support and assistance. During the pandemic, many people lost their jobs and started small businesses from their homes. We helped them promote their product as people started baking at home, making ice cream in their garage, and some really cool gift ideas like embroidered everything by GT Stitchery. Helping local small business makes me feel like I am impacting our community.
Another story that sticks out was partnering with the Greater Miami and the Beaches Hotel Association in their annual United Way Christmas Toy Drive where Roque and I, through our account, raised over $1,300 + $200 sponsorship I negotiated with Target to buy much needed food and toys for the United Way Holiday Toy Drive.
Was there a tipping point that made you decide to focus on this particular area? Can you share a story about that?
I started my Instagram account as an aspiring actor trying to grow a following. Once the pandemic hit I started seeing the local community ask for support, which gave me a sense of purpose.
Are there three things the community/society/politicians can do to help you address the root of the problem you are trying to solve? MY PARENTS ASKED ME NOT TO GET POLITICAL SO PLEASE OMIT THIS QUESTION.
Why do you think social media in particular has the power to create social change and create a positive impact on humanity?
Social media allows people like me a platform to freely express emotions, along with bringing unity to communities and people in general.
What specific strategies have you been using to promote and advance this cause? Can you recommend any good tips for people who want to follow your lead and use their social platform for a social good?
With anything in life, you do what you love and you do it right. With that you will succeed. This is what I stand by! Staying humble and true to yourself allows others to see who you are. Networking and partnering with other like-minded people, influencers, and companies allows you the opportunity to extend your reach and spread your word.
What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and why? Please share a story or example for each.
When doing something, have fun and do it right. And if you truly love something for the right cause success will come to you, your community, and goals.
Nothing is over night- I would get frustrated in the fact that my account would not grow, but I kept working and eventually I saw results.
You need to sacrifice- Honestly, sometimes I don’t want to go out to film, I would rather just stay at home and relax or hang with my friends. But, I still push myself to go and create content, because at the end I know that going out and putting in effort to shoot and film things will provide better reward, contrary to sitting on my couch doing nothing. If you don’t water a plant, it won’t grow. I feel I need to water my account in the same manner.
Not everyone’s going to be a fan of your work- One of the largest struggles I faced with social media is the number of trolls and hate I would get from secret accounts. At the end, I learned how to have thicker skin and just ignore the hate in general.
It takes time and effort to grow a following- As said earlier, success does not come overnight. It takes dedication, scheduled posting, new and fresh content, and overall professional work.
Stay true to yourself- though it is good to follow trends, what people like to see is genuine and new content. Another struggle I had was finding myself in my brand. Seeing how I could change the media’s perspective and show them something new, I feel like this is what sprouted my success and differentiated me from other influencers.
You are a person of enormous influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
I would love to inspire a movement that affords all kids in the world access to best-in-class education including after school help and all the technology they need to be successful. Education is a human right that can collectively make a better world. I working on making this dream a reality, together with my partners at Glassie where our mission is to ensure that underprivileged children across the globe have access to education and all the necessary supplies to thrive in their educational environment. Developing and fostering a safe, healthy and technology-based learning environment, once finalized, the initiative will be tracked on the www.glassie.co site where proceeds will be tallied. Those who wish to donate without purchasing a protector can also do so on www.glassie.co
Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a power lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂
Easily, Timothee Chalamet. I aspire to be a working actor like Timothee who is one of the most talented actors of my generation along with being recognized by Vogue for being a fashion icon. He pushes fashion boundaries and takes risk with his own personal style. I aspire to be in a movie with him, so HI TIMOTHEE.
I would also love to have a power lunch with Kris Jenner. I’ve always known of the Kardashians, like heard of them and seen them on social media, but it wasn’t until I saw Kris Jenner’s Master Class that I noticed what a force Kris is. She literally is a brand maker. Her ability to come up with ideas, leverage her social media to collaborate on others, and negotiate deals for her family, clients and herself has made her an empire.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
You can follow me on Instagram @thehotelboys 🙂
This was very meaningful, thank you so much!
Social Media Stars Making a Social Impact: Why & How Maximo Garcia-Tunon of The Hotel Boys Is… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.