TBS Education in Barcelona

I chose TBS because I was looking for an experience abroad and I thought it was best to choose an organization with an international outlook and a focus on foreign students. I then chose the MSc Marketing Management B2C because I found the program and educational methods appealing.

My experience at TBS has been one of the most academically relevant of my life. In fact, it has not only been relevant on an academic level but also on a human level. My classmates, the teachers, and even the TBS staff made me feel comfortable from the first day. Compared to the Italian educational system, I found it easier to be in contact with everyone and with people at all different levels of the school.

Now I have returned to Milan to start an internship, but I have been in Barcelona for more than seven months and I can easily say that I have fallen in love with the city. Barcelona is full of beauty everywhere and, as I am Sicilian, being close to the sea is the best plus I could have.

Right now I’m doing an internship, I started in the middle of May and it’s going quite well.

In the future, I see myself as an expert consultant in strategy and marketing for small and medium-sized companies that find it difficult to compete with large corporations. I love the idea of being able to bring value and advantages to smaller companies, to reduce the skills gap they may have compared to large companies. In Italy specifically, 80% of GDP is created by these types of organizations.

As for Covid-19, I was mentally prepared before coming. I did not aspire to enjoy the experience as I would have done under normal circumstances. Since I came with this mentality, the experience ended up exceeding all my expectations. The group of friends that emerged on campus is the biggest reason for it, we spent a lot of time together and were able to do a lot of things, sharing and becoming more friends day by day. We were “obliged” to spend time together because it was difficult to meet new people outside the group due to the restrictions. In turn, this situation made it possible for us to build stronger and deeper relationships with each other. Today I can say that I take with me friendships that I will keep for life from this experience.

Hello! My name is Ari Fridfinnsson, I am from Iceland, and I’m a B2C Marketing Management student at TBS Education in Barcelona.

My experience as a TBS Education student was nothing but great. I got the opportunity to get to know people from all over and widen my horizon which is truly something you don’t get to do every day. I came in with a Psychology background and was going in something new with Marketing Management. However, there was never a problem and I never felt out of place.

The best part of being a TBS Education student is the diversification of programs you work with. I was studying B2C Marketing Management and learned expertise on that. However, there were Fashion and Luxury Marketing, Tourism and Hospitality Marketing, B2B Marketing as well. Working alongside those programs gave you wider perspective on each project. As well in the SESAME project where we worked with international business and finance students, we really could use our individual strengths we learned in the project.

What is your main goal during your program here?

To learn new things and to get to know new people.

What makes you choose us?

I saw the companies TBS Education collaborates with on project and SONY was one of them and I felt excited by that. I got the privilege to work with SONY on our final project which was perfect. Also, the program is short, only two semesters then a Master Dissertation. Finally, the school is in Barcelona and that was it. I always wanted to live in Barcelona and TBS gave me the opportunity to do so.

What expectations do you have after you graduate from your program?

To finally put everything I learned to practice. I feel confident to enter any field and do my best. TBS Education also gave me confidence to create my own company one day.

Message to freshman year students:

Listen to every lecture and enjoy every minute of it. As I said, the time goes by fast, so you better breath in every experience.

I entered TBS at Bachelor level in 2015 because the school was well-ranked and, having grown up in Spain, I was ready to live in the country so when I came across TBS’s program and their campus in Barcelona I did not hesitate! What also convinced me at that time was the possibility to work every year in a different country with the internship periods, and the semester abroad as part of the student exchange program in the second year. Having grown up in different countries, it was important to me to be able to discover more countries and cultures.

After the Bachelor’s, I took a gap year to gain work experience. I then chose to continue with the master’s program at TBS because it was recommended to me by my friends from the Bachelor. Due to the COVID crisis, it was not exactly as I expected but I still learned a lot about the different markets in the Luxury industry, which was my objective to be able to define my professional project. 

I loved my experience at TBS, the promotion I was in at the Bachelor level was very international, there was a nice mix of cultures. Program-wise, I think it was very well structured. We had a lot of group projects in the different classes, this helped us to learn how to work with people from different backgrounds and with different personalities. This was a plus when beginning our actual career.

I am currently in Barcelona, I think there is no other city like Barcelona in Europe. The quality of life here is amazing: we have the sea and the mountains nearby, there is a good student vibe and the city population is very young and international. The weather is warmer than in most cities in Europe all year round. To me, it is the perfect city to study, you can never get bored! It is not expensive, the food is good, there are events every week (out of COVID) and a warm environment in general from the locals. 

I learned a lot from the internships I have done, it allowed me to gain valuable experience for my future career and test the different departments I wanted to work in. I was lucky enough to have good managers in most of my experiences who made me develop my skills and gain confidence in my work and capabilities. I was able to define the career path I wanted to take which helped me chose my master specialization: Fashion and Luxury. Before starting my Master’s at TBS I had accumulated 5 experiences which helped me realized the direction I should take was looking for a position in the Marketing department in a luxury cosmetics brand. I consider myself lucky to have my professional project so clear in my head because I know for a lot of people it takes a year to define, passing from one job to another. 

I am about to start my end-of-course internship at Guerlain in the Operational Marketing department. In the future, I see myself evolving with the Guerlain Maison or within the LVMH group and why not ask to be transferred to one of their offices abroad within a few years!