Julia Carrillo & Fabiola Lomeli, owners of Chingona Entertainment. Photo by Marco Flores, JEFAS Magazine.
By Christina Fernández-Morrow
More than 6,000 people packed the 2024 Midwest Chingona Fest in Omaha, Nebraska — now the country’s largest celebration of Latina strength and perseverance — but the woman behind that grand vision once sat in her basement workshop overwhelmed by anxiety, questioning everything and feeling like a fraud selling empowerment she didn’t feel.
Julia Carrillo, surrounded by colorful mugs, tote bags, and pins ready to be emblazoned with empowering messages about being a chingona, was recently divorced and facing the challenges of raising an autistic son on her own. She wanted to better embody the strength and power represented in her online brand, Soy Chingona
From Basement Workshop to Business Partnership
With little time for self-pity, Carrillo pushed forward, moving her products from screens to shelves at local events and shops around Omaha. That’s how she met Fabiola Lomeli, a boutique owner who was also facing some tough life choices. Their conversation veered from Carrillo’s products to her dream of a chingona festival.
“I wanted a festival to celebrate chingonas in the community and awards to honor badass women and raise money for scholarships, but I didn’t know how to go about it,” recalls Carrillo.
“Let’s do it,” encouraged Lomeli.
That conversation launched Las Chingonas Entertainment, which now hosts events like the Midwest Chingona Fest, celebrating Latino culture across the Omaha metro area. What started as two women’s shared vision has become the largest festival of its kind in the country, creating space for the community to celebrate resilience in the face of mounting challenges.
While that might sound like it happened overnight, the success of this festival — and the corresponding business — was a labor of love that took nearly a decade.
Carrillo had been thinking about it since 2013 and met Lomeli in 2021. The women planned the 2022 festival while working full-time jobs and raising families. Lomeli has five children and works in accounting. Carrillo works from home, selling her products online to have time for appointments and care for her special-needs son. Together, they embody some of the most inspiring elements of being a chingona: perseverance and action in the face of fear.
What Does Chingona Really Mean? Redefining Latina Strength
“I don’t have it all together; I don’t have a lot of money. I’m a mom who is trying to make it. It’s hard to concentrate right now with all the breaking news,” says Carrillo. “That’s why I don’t agree when people say a chingona is fearless. We’re all afraid of something. Many of us are trauma survivors, but we get up and try every day. That’s what makes a chingona.”
This definition of strength resonates with her partner. Lomeli, who had to close her boutique to focus on her family and career, has grown to embrace Carrillo’s definition.
“It used to mean strong, badass, amazing, successful,” she says. “The more I work with different people, I see that chingona represents all of us who have faced struggles and persevered. Even if we have thrown in the towel a few times, we’ve picked it right back up and kept going, trying to be a good person.”
Julia Carrillo & Fabiola Lomeli, owners of Chingona Entertainment. Photo by Marco Flores, JEFAS Magazine.
Building the Midwest’s Largest Latina Festival
That resilience is the backbone of their signature event, the Midwest Chingona Fest, where Chingona Awards honor moms, grandmothers, teachers, and everyone in between — including men (chingones) who demonstrate these traits. What makes these awards unique is that the categories are broad to ensure all have a chance to be nominated. They are not limited to Nebraskans or Latinos.
“We require them to live in the Midwest, that’s pretty much it,” says Lomeli.
From there, dedicated volunteers who launched Las Chingonas Network cast their votes to choose the winners. Lomeli and Carrillo are not involved in the selection process.
This network, which began with women who heard about the festival and wanted to help, is described by Lomeli as “a tight-knit group of women who show up for each other.” The network has inspired her and Carrillo to expand their mission. They envision more opportunities to bring women together.
“We have so many women looking for something to do and a way to give back to the community,” says Carrillo.
With the largest chingona festival in the country — and a growing Tacos and Tequila Festival that had its largest gathering in 2025 — Las Chingonas Entertainment is on the precipice of explosive success. But current events have forced difficult decisions.
Looking Ahead: The Future of Chingona Fest
For now, the focus is on rebuilding in a political climate heavy with fear, a community hurt by immigration raids, and talk of massive detention centers in Nebraska. They postponed the 2025 Midwest Chingona Fest to keep the community safe and are planning for 2026.
Looking to the future, Carrillo and Lomeli take it one day at a time.
“We’re always learning and growing,” says Lomeli. “Our ultimate goal is to empower women to show them what they’re capable of, whether that’s through business or their personal lives.”
Guided by the lessons learned from past events, they remain focused on bringing communities together and creating space to celebrate their accomplishments, no matter the setbacks. After all, as both women have learned, a chingona always gets back up and tries again.
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