Entrepreneurship · 4 min read
From doctor to entrepreneur: Carla Barber built a €12M group with no investors
A doctor who became one of Spain's most powerful self-made entrepreneurs. How she built clinics, e-commerce and a supplements brand on cash flow and a 1.1-million community, with no outside money.
Updated
Most doctors never start a company. Carla Barber did, and she built one of the most powerful self-made groups in Spanish aesthetic medicine along the way.
She left medicine, rented a 20-square-meter office, and turned it into Grupo Barber: a group of clinics, an e-commerce brand and a supplements line that today turns over close to €12 million a year, growing around 120%, without a single investor. In this episode of Nova Podcast, Ramón Rodrigáñez talks with Carla about building on cash flow, turning a 1.1-million community into demand, and why time is the only thing she really protects.
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From a 20 m² office to a group doing millions
Carla’s start was small and self-funded. She began in 2016, working a couple of afternoons a week in a clinic that wasn’t hers. In 2017 she went out on her own, and the group everyone sees today grew from there.
“In 2017 I rented a 20-square-meter office inside a clinic, and six months later I founded my first company, Clínica Barber.”
Carla Barber
From that single room, Grupo Barber became a chain of clinics across Madrid, Las Palmas, Valencia and Bilbao, plus the cosmetics e-commerce SECRETS and the supplements brand MATER. The group now turns over close to €12 million a year and has been growing around 120%.
She left medicine on purpose
Carla trained as a doctor and did part of her residency abroad before coming back to Spain. Leaving clinical medicine wasn’t an accident, it was a decision about value and conditions.
“The Spanish health system doesn’t give doctors the salary or the working conditions they deserve.”
Carla Barber
She is blunt about the economics she saw early on: by 19 she could earn more in a single modeling campaign than in a month working as a doctor. That gap pushed her to build something of her own rather than wait for a system to change.
Cash flow was her only investor
The most striking part of the story is how she financed it: she didn’t. There is no fund behind Grupo Barber. Clínica Barber, she says, is the “lungs” of the group, and its cash flow paid for everything that came next.
“That cash flow let me invest in other things with no need for any business angel or investor at all.”
Carla Barber
Building for profitability from day one, instead of raising money, is what let her keep full ownership and move fast. Everything the group has done, it has paid for itself.
Her community became the engine
Carla built an audience before it was obvious that doctors should. When she came back from Supervivientes she had around 6,000 followers. She started showing her actual work, honestly and without hiding anything, at a time when almost no professionals in aesthetic medicine did.
That honesty compounded into a community of 1.1 million people, and that community became demand: patients, questions, and, during the pandemic, the push into e-commerce when people kept writing to ask for her products. Attention, built on real work, turned into a business.
Wellness and longevity, the next bet
Carla doesn’t see the group as an aesthetics company. She frames it around integral care, wellbeing and wellness, and she is already moving the group toward longevity inside its own clinics. It’s the same pattern as the rest of her story: spot where things are heading before it’s crowded, and build there.
What she values most
After all the growth, the thing she guards hardest isn’t revenue.
“The most precious thing I have in my life is time.”
Carla Barber
Watch the full episode
About the guest
Carla Barber is a doctor by training and the founder and CEO of Grupo Barber, built around the Clínicas Barber aesthetic-medicine chain, the cosmetics e-commerce SECRETS and the supplements brand MATER. She reaches a community of 1.1 million on Instagram as @dr.carlabarber. Connect with Carla on LinkedIn.
This episode is part of Nova Podcast, hosted by Ramón Rodrigáñez, CEO and co-founder of Nova. Connect with Ramón on LinkedIn.
Frequently asked questions
Who is Carla Barber?
She is a doctor by training and the founder and CEO of Grupo Barber, a group built around aesthetic medicine. Before building her companies she won Miss España and took part in Supervivientes. She is the guest on this episode of Nova Podcast, hosted by Ramón Rodrigáñez.
What is Grupo Barber?
Grupo Barber is Carla Barber's group: the Clínicas Barber chain of aesthetic-medicine clinics (Madrid, Las Palmas, Valencia and Bilbao), the cosmetics e-commerce SECRETS, and the supplements brand MATER. The group turns over close to €12 million a year, growing around 120%, with no outside investors.
How did Carla Barber build her business without investors?
She funded growth with cash flow. Clínica Barber generated the cash that let her invest in new ventures without any business angel or investor. She built for profitability from the start rather than raising money.
Why did Carla Barber leave medicine?
Because, in her view, the Spanish health system doesn't give doctors the salary or the working conditions they deserve. She saw she could build something bigger on her own, and did.