KRISTY RAM­NAR­INE

Kristy.ram­nar­ine@cnc3.co.tt

Danielle Bou­caud-Hen­rique is some­what of an in­tro­vert who wears many hats. She’s the Brand Head of Car­ni­val band BLISS and a free­lance Project Man­age­ment and Strat­e­gy con­sul­tant. Add to it wife of Ran­dall Hen­rique and moth­er of two, Jax­on and Zara.

The UWI grad­u­ate, who spe­cialised in Ac­count­ing, start­ed work­ing with TRIBE–the par­ent band of BLISS–when it was just a sec­tion in the now-de­funct Poi­son.

“I was in­vit­ed to join the com­mit­tee when TRIBE was formed,” she said.“I got in­volved in tick­et man­age­ment for events, and in 2006 I got more in­volved and start­ed work­ing with the band full-time in the front of­fice.”

The move was no sur­prise, as her de­ceased grand­par­ents Ot­to and Joyce Ray­mond were Car­ni­val stal­warts–judges for many years, dat­ing back to when the Guardian Need­i­est Cas­es man­aged the Mon­day and Tues­day Pa­rade of the Bands com­pe­ti­tion.

“My grand­par­ents were huge Car­ni­val in­flu­ences in my fam­i­ly,” she said. “My grand­moth­er ac­tu­al­ly died two weeks ago at the age of 101. By the time I came along, they were over that phase. But I grew up in Belle Smythe Street in Wood­brook, and my ear­ly mem­o­ries of Car­ni­val were go­ing with my grand­moth­er and her fold-up chair to Ari­api­ta Av­enue by her sis­ter to watch Car­ni­val, spend­ing the night by them when my par­ents went out for J’Ou­vert and see­ing the J’Ou­vert bands pass­ing.”

While Bou­caud-Hen­rique did not play Kid­dies Car­ni­val, she first donned a cos­tume for ‘big peo­ple mas’ in 2000. Fast for­ward to 2025, Bou­caud-Hen­rique is now a dri­ving force be­hind the op­er­a­tions of one of Trinidad’s large bands, BLISS.

“I’m in­volved in the de­vel­op­ment of tech­nol­o­gy so­lu­tions for the band,” she said. “I’m al­so re­spon­si­ble for the over­all ex­e­cu­tion of the BLISS band and BLISS the brand. From reg­is­tra­tion to dis­tri­b­u­tion and every­thing that is in­volved in get­ting ready for that process. That starts with a con­cept, de­vel­op­ment of the theme, con­tract­ing de­sign­ers, work­ing through the de­sign process, man­ag­ing the pho­to shoot, band launch, putting cos­tumes on sale through reg­is­tra­tion, go­ing through the reg­is­tra­tion process and every­thing we do to get ready for the road.”

‘Chief prob­lem solver’

Bou­caud-Hen­rique is con­sid­ered the ‘chief prob­lem solver’ at BLISS.

“Cre­ative prob­lem-solv­ing is where I fall in, which is dif­fer­ent from your tra­di­tion­al cre­atives,” she said. “Every­body hears BLISS and they think I de­sign. My son’s school’s first ques­tion was, can you help us make cos­tumes? That’s not what I do. I’m part of the en­gine run­ning the op­er­a­tion be­hind the cre­atives, and you re­al­ly need both sides to work hand in hand.”

The BLISS brand head said the band was cel­e­brat­ing 15 years in the Car­ni­val are­na.

“It is amaz­ing to see where BLISS has grown, how we found our foot­ing over time,” she said. “BLISS is now the pre­mi­um ex­pe­ri­ence in the group, we are called the ‘cham­pagne band’, and our ameni­ties are top tier on the road to en­sure ex­cel­lent ser­vice.”

While mas­quer­aders get ready for the road on Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day, Bou­caud-Hen­rique and her team have been work­ing year-round to en­sure that the ex­pe­ri­ence is sec­ond to none.

“I don’t think peo­ple can un­der­stand how much work it takes to get a Car­ni­val band on the road,” she said. “The amount of work it takes to ex­e­cute the lev­el of ser­vice that we have right now ... Our team meets year-round, we are al­ways tweak­ing, look­ing for cus­tomer feed­back. We are a very cus­tomer-dri­ven band, and we will ask what you want, what you want to see on the road, and that’s what we try to de­liv­er on a whole.”

And while BLISS takes a lot of her time, Bou­caud-Hen­rique con­tin­ues to bal­ance her con­sul­tan­cy and be­ing a wife and moth­er, with con­tin­u­ous sup­port from her hus­band. She cred­its her team at BLISS for mak­ing the job fun and ex­cit­ing de­spite the rig­or­ous hours be­hind the mas.

“It is def­i­nite­ly not a one-man show; we have a great team at the mas camp,” she said.“With­out the en­gine that runs the band, the peo­ple that are in­volved, the peo­ple we have to de­pend on, we will go nowhere. Car­ni­val is such a mas­sive un­der­tak­ing that you can­not ac­cred­it it to one per­son.”

Come Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day, Bou­caud-Hen­rique will join her team in man­ag­ing the band on the road for the great­est pa­rade.