I build worlds where women
become unfuckable with.
About Vanessa
Vanessa Santos is a founder, executive, investor, and activist who has spent 20+ years at the intersection of culture, technology, and human gathering — building the worlds, the platforms, and the pathways that a broken system failed to provide.
Her career is a study in scale and consequence. She co-led Gilt.com's international expansion to 120+ countries. At Mastercard, she spent six years as an executive driving global product innovation — including a CES Innovation Award-winning IoT commerce experience and a co-developed digital API platform that reached 12 million students across six Latin American markets. As CEO & Partner of #WeAllGrow Latina, she led the platform through transformation and transition, culminating in its acquisition by HACE in 2025 — contributing to $20M+ in economic impact and creating 30,000+ professional pathways for the Latina community.
Only 3% of Latino-owned businesses ever reach $1 million in annual revenue. Vanessa built one. Then she asked the harder question: why isn't that number higher? The answer is the system. The work is the correction.
Today she is the founder of Build The Dream Collective — a media, community, and advisory platform for women who scale without self-erasure. She writes Letters from the In-Between, a weekly newsletter for women who refuse to self-sabotage on the way to success, hosts the Glow Up Connection Hour, and advises founders and executives through pivots, transitions, and major transformations.
Her next chapter is putting more capital into the hands of women and underestimated founders building the communities and cultural infrastructure of the next decade.
Women are not broken. The system is. Vanessa builds pathways to correct it.
You were never the problem.
You were in the wrong world.
The exhaustion, the self-editing, the feeling that you have to justify your ambition to people who never had to justify theirs — that was the system extracting your excellence while keeping the ceiling exactly where it was. You didn't internalize weakness. You responded to a structure that was never designed to hold what you're actually capable of.
Vanessa Santos has built companies across four continents, led platforms to acquisition, won a CES Innovation Award, and keynoted Forbes. She has also given too much, torn herself apart, and chosen to rebuild — in public, without apology, and without pretending she has it all figured out.
Because that's the thing nobody says out loud: the women building the most important things right now are not doing it from a place of arrival. They are doing it in motion. Figuring it out. Setting the boundaries that should have been set years ago. Learning, finally, that the dream and the human are not in conflict — that you can honor both at the same time.
That is what this world is. A place where we don't do lanes. Where we don't shrink to make others comfortable. Where ambition is not a dirty word and boundaries are not a weakness. Where we build the dream — and we honor the human doing the building.
This is the world that should have existed already. We're building it now.
Build The Dream. Honor The Human.
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Build The Dream. Honor The Human. ✳
Selective by design. Transformative by nature.
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Letters from the In-Between
A newsletter published every two weeks for women who refuse to self-sabotage on the way to success. Where Vanessa thinks out loud — about building, the system, and what sovereignty actually looks like in practice. Join →
Glow Up Connection Hour
A free monthly gathering for ambitious women. Come to think, connect, and remember that you are not building alone. This is where the world begins.
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Some rooms change you. This is one of them. The Table is an intimate monthly working session for women who are building something cool and need real eyes on it — not more content to consume, not another framework to follow. You bring what you're building. Vanessa brings 20+ years of knowing how to move it forward. Eight seats. Intimate on purpose.
What's included: a 4-hour live working session · personalized strategic guidance · two 1-hour accountability check-ins · a private Telegram group with Vanessa actively present · eight women who know your work and won't let you quit.
$650 · Cohort of 8
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This is having Vanessa in your corner — a thought partner who has scaled companies across four continents, led platforms to acquisition, and rebuilt from the ground up. She works with a small number of founders and executives navigating growth, major pivots, and transformation. You don't need another framework. You need someone who has been in the room, will tell you the truth, and will stay until it's built.
Engagement is monthly, ongoing, and direct. Vanessa is with you, not a team, not an assistant.
Selective · Inquiry only
THE HUMAN
Writer: Letters From The In-Between
Founder, Glow Up Hour community
Taurus 🌞, Cancer 🌙, Capricorn 🌕
First-Gen Dominicana & Ecuatoriana, NYC born & raised
Reflector in Human Design — my sensitivity is my superpower
Two fur babies: Elvis & Teddy 🐾
Creative peak: in nature — mountains or by the water and slow mornings
I light up when I speak—but I'm selective with my energy
When I win, I share the notes.
Queer. Multifaceted. Uncategorizable.
I'm not one thing, and that's my power.
THE RECEIPTS
Former CEO & Partner of #WeAllGrow Latina(acquired 2025)
Co-led transformation contributing to $20M+ economic impact, co-created 30,000+ professional pathways
CES Innovation Award winner for an IoT shopping app (Mastercard)
Co-Developed a digital API platform serving 12M students in 6 Latin American markets (Mastercard)
Inked first and largest multi-million dollar brand partnership (Gilt.com)
Co-Led global expansion to 120+ countries (Gilt.com)
Inaugural Entrepreneur of the Year, Kennedy Center (Nationwide x Hispanic Heritage Foundation)
Keynote: Forbes Most Powerful Women of Latin America
Board Member: Wellness For The People Foundation
Investor: Bloomi, Nopalera, Lil' Libros, Agua Bonita, Earth Rides
You don't have to choose between building your business and becoming yourself.
You don't have to break apart to prove you're worthy.
You don't have to be loyal to who you were when you can choose who you're becoming.
I'm building it. In real time.
With 20+ years of proof that I know how to build…
and the audacity to do it without self-erasure.
Come with me.