Reetu Gupta is in charge of future strategy for her family’s real estate and hotel business, The Gupta Group, and recently took over management of the Gupta Family Foundation. Her family is one of the largest developers and hotel operators in Canada.
How did your family create wealth?
My parents came to Toronto from India with $108. My father worked three or four different jobs, but he always dreamt of building hotels. There was a truck stop in a small town east of Toronto. My Dad saw the truck stop as an opportunity. He acquired the land and built his first hotel. He also installed a gas station that became the highest-revenue gas station in all of Canada back in the 1970s. It became one of the most widely known truck stops on the way to Ottawa. We now own, develop and manage 25 hotels. We also have a high-rise-condominium division.
How did you make the decision to enter the family business?
In South Asian families, the choice is frequently the family business or becoming a doctor or lawyer. I was going to the office when I was young, handling phone calls and doing filing. I loved learning about the business from the back end — accounting and operations. When I turned 15 or 16, I worked at the front desk and later worked in every department to absorb as much as I could. I completed my MBA and came back into the company in 2008. I've held various roles, from VP to CEO, and currently oversee the future strategy of the business, taking it from gen one to gen two and beyond.
How is your family office run?
My brother started Rogue Insight Capital, a VC and private equity firm, which was the starting point of our family office. We like to invest in minority startups, female founders and those with social impact. We had this idea five, six years ago to help entrepreneurs that don't have the same access to capital. So that is our focus. My brother is the CEO and president of Rogue Capital. He and his team do all the heavy lifting and the due diligence.
When it comes to making decisions on deals, we sit down, look at everything together and then make decisions together. We work well together, so even if our opinions differ, we both say: "OK, why are you thinking this way? Let me see if I can understand it."
How do you handle disagreements related to the family business?
Involving nonfamily members in the business always helps, because if it's just a family decision, it tends to go back and forth in circles and not get resolved. Getting executives, like our CFO and operations team, to weigh in allows us to look objectively at the numbers and see what makes sense, as opposed to emotion-driven opinions.
What’s your role within the foundation?
I run it now, but my parents started the foundation back in the 1980s. They've built eye camps in India, and they've helped around 50,000 people in small villages in India get eye exams and eyeglasses. Growing up, we really saw our parents do a lot of philanthropy. A few years ago, I wanted to expand the foundation’s work beyond India and make philanthropy a bigger part of the family business. We have supported projects in Jamaica, Egypt and, of course, Canada.
Was there any resistance?
There was a bit of reluctance in the transition from my parents running the foundation, but they were proud that I wanted to make philanthropy a bigger part of our company.
I look for projects focused on empowerment and education. If I have a new endeavor for the foundation, we will have a board meeting with the family, where I present what I would like to do and why. If they really don't agree with something, I won't move forward with it.