Today we’d like to introduce you to Morgan Sereno and Sydney Rokas.
Morgan and Sydney, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
Of course! We first met as freshmen at the University of Texas where we lived just four doors down from each other at the San Jacinto dorms. By the end of our first year we had begun dating, and six brief years later we are now engaged!
Our bond has always included a passion for doing. Sydney truly embodied this throughout college as she pursued a double major, competed as a member of the Texas Dance team, and split her spare time between multiple jobs – serving as a campus manager for University Tees, a dance instructor at Lonestar Dance Center, a camp director and choreographer for Half Time Entertainment, and baby sitter to a lovely family in town. Similarly, Morgan balanced finding his way to a Corporate Finance degree from McCombs with earning his real estate license, serving as a student real estate locator, participating in a men’s organization, and engaging in his own summer jobs and internships which ultimately led him to a career in software.
In addition to all this, we have long intended to join forces on a venture of our own. Between Sydney’s background in the dance world, working with children, and leading large teams to Morgan’s soft skills and experience in financial planning and business development gained from McCombs and his primary work, we are eager to finally team up on this new opportunity at Austin Sleepover Tents.
Denise has built a beautiful and respected business that serves the Austin community and brings a trusted joy to so many families. Now that she is deciding to dedicate more of her time to her own family and primary career, we could not be more thrilled to continue her mission of providing memorable experiences for any occasion.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
As with any young folks in their 20s, it of course has not been easy! Our first few years out of college have included figuring out the paths we intend to take personally, professionally, and also as a unit that’s soon to be wed and starting our life together.
Taking over Austin Sleepover Tents represents our first foray into entrepreneurship, and we know that this will present challenges of its own. That said, we could not be more excited at the opportunity together and within our community.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Our primary careers are what have positioned us so uniquely for success, and we both take immense pride in them.
Sydney has a background in events and corporate planning, first serving as the Director of Corporate Strategy for Half Time Entertainment. In this role, Sydney managed a staff of several dozen while organizing large scale dance competitions and week-long dance camps. Likewise, Sydney served as the Associate Producer on the Dallas Holiday Parade, the largest single day outdoor event in the state, and also supported the Rose Bowl Parade.
Today, Sydney is the Events Program Coordinator at the University of Texas School of Social Work, continuing in her journey of putting on grand events & academic happenings.
Morgan, on the other hand, took his background in corporate finance into the technology sector. Today, Morgan serves as Director of Cloud Sales for ClearBlade, an Austin-based IoT software company. As an enterprise sales leader, Morgan’s success comes from his organization, persistence, and effective systems. He hopes brings the rigor and business development experience to lead business processes for Austin Sleepover Tents, while also having the soft skills and coachability to be Syd’s right hand man come event day.
What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
The things we love about Austin are what brought us back here. We both actually lived in the mid-cities of DFW for two years post-graduation but returned as soon as possible!
We love the sense of community that Austin offers. As much as it’s grown since we arrived here for the first time, it still feels extremely manageable – like one big neighborhood – to us. The amount of great local restaurants and the access to nature offered by Austin contribute massively to our joy here!
In our free time, you will find us at every UT home game in DKR, in addition to a litany of other Longhorn sporting events, Austin FC games with friends, and spending time with our black lab, Buddy.
We’re tempted to be cheesy and complain about all the folks moving here and growing pains from that, but we get it! As long as we’re in Texas, this is home for us.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.austinsleepovertents.com
- Instagram: @austinsleepovertents
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/austinsleepovertents
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/austin-sleepover-tents-austin
Image Credits
Denise Garcia
