Sarah Del Rosario opened Little Dimples Playground in Montebello with nothing more than a dream and funds from selling her house. Starting a new business is always a gamble, but hers paid off. Now, Little Dimples has been so successful that she’s launching a second location in Alhambra, slated to open its doors later this year.
“It’s something I really wanted to do, since I’ve been living in Alhambra for a while,” she said. “I have a family, I have two kids. They’re the reason why I started this business in the first place.”
When her kids came along, she began taking them to indoor playgrounds. Back then, there weren’t that many around, but they were busy enough to make her start thinking about opening one herself. “I was at that time in my life when I started thinking, ‘I can’t see myself working in the corporate life for another 20 to 30 years.’ The more I pressed on the idea, the more I wanted it.”
“This is how life is, you start to question everything,” she added. That was the start of her entrepreneurial journey, back in 2019.
Her eldest is now ten years old and Little Dimples is five. It was the first indoor playground and cafe in the City of Montebello and will be the second in Alhambra, following the opening of Sky Zone in March 2024.
Before starting Little Dimples, Del Rosario said she didn’t really have a dream, “What I learned in life was just to get a good job. You can work your best and move your way up, but that’s it.”
Still, working in the corporate world as a project specialist gave her skills that helped with opening Little Dimples. “I definitely think that everything I did up until that point led me to think I’m ready because although I didn’t have any real world experience in opening a business, all the other skills worked and helped me get there.”
Del Rosario had to close Little Dimples for 14 months during the pandemic. She made the difficult decision to accumulate her rent as debt that she would pay back once she was able to re-open her business. “We just waited and waited. That’s all you can do,” she said. “The ones that didn’t just closed.”
Opening soon at 230 W Main St., Little Dimples has unlimited wifi access for parents, along with a cafe offering coffee, tea, and pastries to enjoy while supervising their kids on the playground.
