Marie Claire Vasquez Durán and Maria Victoria Abreu, born and raised in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, studied Economics at the Pontificia Universidad Católica Madre y Maestra (PUCMM), and as adults immigrated to the United States, each pursuing their own personal goals and professionals.

Marie Claire moved to California in 2008, where she earned a master's degree in international public policy studies from Stanford University and then a Ph.D. in the same area of study from the University of Maryland. She worked for several years on research related to democracy and development in Latin America, as a consultant for the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the World Bank and the Brookings Institution, and then radically changed her career, dedicating herself to being a wedding planner and designer. , recognized by some of the main and most prominent media and publications in the industry (Martha Stewart Weddings, Vogue, Brides, among others). On a personal level, Marie Claire married a Dominican engineer, also a doctor in her area, and had a daughter, who is now 8 years old. She has always been very artistic, passionate about classical ballet and the piano.

For her part, María Victoria, after graduating from PUCMM, moved to Spain where she studied a master's degree in International Cooperation for Development at the Complutense University of Madrid, and later received a Fulbright scholarship to obtain another Master's degree in International Political Economy and Development. at Fordham University in New York City. He has spent many years consulting with international organizations such as the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the World Bank and the IDB, as well as non-governmental entities, both in the Dominican Republic and internationally. Since 2014 she has lived in Maryland, where she married an American engineer (wedding organized by Marie Claire!), and they have a 3-year-old son. María Victoria loves to write and enjoys urban art.

In the summer of 2020, Marie Claire and María Victoria met again in the middle of a different situation: due to the COVID-19 pandemic, both were going through very different work circumstances at their usual pace. The wedding industry was completely crippled by social distancing mandates, which gave Marie Claire's business a moment of pause; and the entity where María Victoria worked until then in Washington, DC, had to lay off all its employees due to the economic impact of the pandemic.

This situation, added to the need to entertain their children at home for longer periods of time, made them discover a gap in the market: they could not find creative, fun and healthy ways to play with their little ones while transmitting the cultural richness of their Dominican and Latin roots. All the games they found in US stores and online were in English or evoked personalities and cultural elements from outside of Latin America (except for a few stereotypes). Without much thought, they decided to go ahead and take on the challenge themselves and create what they wanted to offer their children.

And so Dutidú was born ( @DutiduOficial ,  www.dutidu.com ): A company that celebrates Latino culture and brings inclusion and diversity to the card and board game industry for the whole family. Dutidú products have a beautiful aesthetic and, very importantly, they are in Spanish and made with stellar quality.

After a crowdfunding campaign through the IndieGogo platform for entrepreneurs, Dutidú launched the production of its first game: Dutidú's Feria Latina puzzle. In 500 pieces, the whole family can discover numerous mini-scenes from Latin American daily life. The puzzle is for sale on our website  www.dutidu.com .

“For us, Dutidú is a dream. We created what we needed to be able to pass on to our children the love for our Latin culture, and to be able to share it with the rest of the world is just amazing,” says Marie Claire. María Victoria adds: "With Dutidú we want to share the best of our region, and at the same time give opportunities to Latin American artists, who are the ones who exclusively design our pieces."

Dutidú's second product is already in the manufacturing process, and it will be a memory game about Latin Attire, and it will be available in the coming months.