The Family Business CEOs to Watch Class of 2023 recognizes 23 exceptional business leaders. The CEOs honored run the gamut of family business leadership, from entrepreneurial founders to fifth-generation stewards of a multifaceted enterprise to non-family executives trusted by the family ownership group to lead and expand their operations.
Ana Maria Quintero Lowry
President and CEO | First generation | A & P International Inc., Orlando, Fla.
Ana Maria Quintero Lowry founded A&P International in 1989. The company, certified as a Minority Business Enterprise, assesses and develops diverse suppliers through business coaching to become pre-qualified vendors to A&P's corporate and government clients.
A native of Colombia, Lowry received her bachelor of law degree from Pontificia Universidad Javeriana (Bogotá, Colombia) in 1981, and a master's degree in social economic sciences and international trade the following year. She received a certificate in the DISC behavioral model and human behavior training from Personality Insights in 2009 and executive coaching and training certification from Nehemiah Project International Ministries in 2020. She has also received numerous other certificates for training and programs that have served as additional stepping stones toward becoming the leader and facilitator she is today. She is the author of Cross-Cultural: A New Thirst for Diversity Engagement and coauthor of The Maturity Stages of a Trusted Diverse Ecosystem. She has expertise in DEI, cross-cultural communications, conflict resolution and DISC.
In 1989, she and her sister, Patricia, founded Asesorias y Producciones in Bogotá, with the goal of consulting and training entrepreneurs and eventually opening the market for these businesses in either Colombia or United States. Sadly, Patricia, the “P” of A&P, died on June 11 of the same year in an airplane crash on their first nationwide project. Ana Maria was committed to finishing the project and continuing the business they started.
Later that year, she opened A&P International Inc. in Florida and continued to help diverse entrepreneurs grow and expand. After 30 years, the business not only lives on as a memory of Patricia but also now includes her engineer husband, Tony Lowry, as CFO; her nephew (Patricia's son), Juan Pablo Benítez, as translation services coordinator; and her son, Samuel Lowry, as marketing and communications manager.
“Ana Maria has built a strong multicultural team with a heart for serving others,” says Susan Schramm, coauthor with Lowry of The Maturity Stages of a Trusted Diverse Ecosystem. “The company is a trusted partner to global companies such as Wyndham, Turner Construction and Universal Studios, as well as to hundreds of small-business leaders and their teams. Based on the needs of their clients, their offerings have expanded to include translation services as well as a non-profit arm.”
“She has helped hundreds of people create legacies for their families and has inspired me in how to not only create a profitable business, but create and build an organization that serves people and the community,” says Samuel Lowry.
“She lives out a phrase we have on our office wall: ‘A good coach can change a game, but a great coach can change a life.' Living day-by-day with faith and determination, she has become and continues to be a woman of influence, transforming the lives of entrepreneurs, business owners and families with the power of business.
“The legacy she has built is what I aspire to further grow. I want to lead A&P into a future that continues to be life-changing through acts of service, financial stability and caring more about people than how high my profits can go.”
Ana Maria Lowry says that when she was confronted with the difficult life decision of whether to pursue a family or a business, she said to herself, “If I have one heart and two passions in life, I do not have to choose one or the other.”