Building a Business in Vietnam Together: Our Story as Married Christian Couple
- Good Ground Digital
- May 27
- 9 min read
The Reality of Running a Married Christian Couple Business in Vietnam
We get asked this question constantly: “How do you work together as a married couple without driving each other crazy?”
The short answer is: intentionality, clear boundaries, and surprisingly, the fact that we chose to build our life in Hoi An.
The longer answer involves understanding why we built our business from Southeast Asia, how we structure our days, what nearly broke us, and what has actually helped us thrive together.
This is our story.
The Beginning: How Faith Shaped Our Marriage and Business
Earlier this year, we made a decision that seemed unconventional to most people in our lives. Dubai was no longer sustainable for us, mentally, financially and emotionally. Grace's digital marketing job at the university was well paid but did not feel right anymore after departments were restructured. I was taking on freelance gigs after leaving a safari tourism company who was constantly late in paying its staff.
We couldn't help but wonder "What else is there left to explore in Dubai? What if we could do something on our own? What if we could truly build something we both love?"
We prayed and God answered us with Isaiah 55:12 and it has become the anchor verse for our new season:
For you shall go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. (ESV)
We decided to take the leap of faith and move to Vietnam, sight unseen:
Build a digital business with no office
Base ourselves in Hoi An, Vietnam
Run the business as partners and spouses
Bootstrap with minimal overhead
We spent February quietly building the business. Singapore was where the systems came together: the offer, the structure, the early client work, the foundation we'd need before we could move anywhere.
Then in March we made the move to Vietnam, with Tokyo and Junior, our two small dogs, relocated smoothly into Da Nang.
Thanks to D'Pet Squad Dubai, the pet move alone was supposed to be a logistical headache, and instead it unfolded with a calm we still can't quite explain.
What we will never forget is the way the door to Dubai closed behind us. On 28 February, Iran started a regional conflict that turned the next 48 hours in the Gulf into the kind of news cycle nobody plans a relocation around.
Our first flights to Da Nang were cancelled on 16 March 2026 due to a fire at the international airport. All roads to the airport were closed and we were turned back to an empty house with no water and electricity. Our neighbors graciously took care of us while we waited for our next flight out.
Da Nang was our first base in Vietnam, and we are grateful for it. But after a few weeks of settling in, we realised we wanted something quieter. Less city noise. More green. A pace and a culture that matched the kind of life and business we were trying to build. Below is a glimpse into the local food we tried and some of the places we loved during our time in Da Nang, Vietnam.
So we packed up again and moved south to Hoi An for the rice fields, the old-town lanterns, the slower rhythm and the local culture that has shaped how we work ever since.
Friends around us in Dubai asked reasonable questions: "Isn't it risky? Is it safe? How do you keep work and relationship separate?"
All valid. All something we've navigated. If we're being honest, we kept coming back to one passage in those weeks of deciding.
And the Lord said to Abram: "Go forth out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and out of thy father's house, and come into the land which I shall shew thee." (Genesis 12:1, DRA)
We weren't Abram. But the call to leave the familiar for a land we hadn't yet seen felt like it had His fingerprints on it. And when the doubt crept in, which it did almost daily, we held onto
Jeremiah 29:11: "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."
That verse carried us through the weeks where the numbers didn't add up on paper but the peace did.
But here's what happened instead: We built something neither of us could have built alone. The location choice gave us the financial runway to focus on strategy, not survival. And the marriage framework made us accountable to something deeper than a business partnership. It made us accountable to the One who sent us.
The First Year: Marriage Meets Business
The first five months were humbling.
We quickly realised that building a married Christian couple business in Vietnam came with a unique kind of pressure. There is no clocking out. No office you leave behind at the end of the day. Every business frustration becomes part of the dinner conversation. Every win gets celebrated together, which is beautiful. But every setback gets processed together too, and that can be emotionally intense.
We learned very quickly that “working together” and “being married together” are not the same thing.
We made mistakes:
Different Pacing
Grace came into this with a strong background in digital marketing and a clear sense of strategic direction, while I was still trying to understand AI, content systems, and social media. We were operating at different speeds. Whenever I asked Grace for help with content, she hardly complained, but I often felt like I was slowing us down.
The Blurred Boundaries
Business slowly became part of every conversation. We would unpack mistakes over lunch, analyse decisions over dinner, and carry work into moments that were supposed to belong to our marriage. Instead of celebrating the life we were building, work became the backdrop to almost everything.
The Different Work Styles Clash
Grace is a visionary who thinks in months and years. I naturally focus on execution, systems, and what needs to happen today. Thankfully, we rarely fight. And when we do disagree, we try to approach each other with tact, patience, and consideration rather than ego.
The Unequal Workload Conversation
Even though we both said we were partners, the actual work allocation revealed itself slowly. Grace was handling marketing, website, social media and strategic direction. I was handling operations, client relationships, speaking coaching, and financial management. What we did not fully recognise at first was the invisible load each person was carrying behind the scenes.
The Structures That Helped Us Work Together Without Losing Our Relationship
Instead of ignoring the conflict, we did something that probably saved our business and our marriage: we got intentional. We implemented systems that sound simple but were revolutionary for us:
Put God First, Before Everything Else
We start every day with daily devotional and prayer together.
Matthew 6:33 states, "But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you".
Before business goals, financial pressure, uncertainty, or anxiety, we chose to prioritise God’s direction above our own understanding. It reminded us that provision does not come from striving alone.
Clear Roles and Responsibilities
We wrote down: who owns what. I founded the Confidence Speaking Mentorship programme, stakeholder relationships, networking and operations. Grace owns marketing strategy, creative direction, and financial planning. We still overlap in major decisions, company expenses, and hiring, but there is no longer confusion about who drives which areas of the business.
Business Office Hours
We set specific times for business conversations. 7am-1pm is deep work focus hours. Evenings and weekends are protected for marriage. At first, it felt overly structured. But in reality, it gave us freedom. We could be fully present during work hours without letting business consume every part of our relationship.
Regular Marriage Check-in
Separate from business, we started asking:
How are we doing as partners?
Are we still connected?
Do we need more quality time together?
Is there unspoken resentment building?
These conversations usually happen outside the house, often during evening walks or by the beach, where we can speak honestly without the pressure of work sitting between us.
These structures may sound procedural, but they became the foundation that allowed us to remain both business partners and life partners without sacrificing either.
Why Hoi An, Vietnam Made This Possible
Here's something we didn't expect: location actually matters. Hoi An gave us something we couldn't get in Dubai or Singapore or Bangkok: space.
Not just physical space (though the cost of living is a fraction of the Middle East). But psychological space. In a city where we're outsiders, we're more intentional about everything. We don't have the distraction of a social scene demanding our time. We don't have pressure to "keep up" with peers. We don't have the ambient stress of a high-cost city.
The cost of living in Hoi An is so low that we could afford to be selective about clients. We could say no to business that didn't align with our values. We could invest in systems and people without the pressure of needing to hit certain revenue numbers by certain dates.
This created space for both partnership and business.
Hoi An, with its rice fields and old-town lanterns and slow Sunday mornings, has been the most literal version of "led forth in peace" we have ever experienced. The peace was the point. We didn't recognise that until we had it.
Does it work the same way everywhere? I don't think so. The city we chose shaped how we work. The financial cushion the low cost of living provided shaped what we could build. The slowness of Hoi An shaped how intentional we could be.
The Reality: It's Still Hard
Let me be clear: this is not a perfect arrangement.
There are still days when Grace and I feel the pressure of running a married Christian couple business in Vietnam, and that frustration inevitably spills into our marriage.
There are projects only one of us feels deeply passionate about, which can create imbalance. There have also been seasons where we unintentionally prioritised the business over our relationship and had to consciously recalibrate.
What changed was not the disappearance of the challenges. What changed was that we developed a framework for navigating them together with greater intention, communication, and faith.
We have God.
We have biblical grounding.
We have structure.
We have intention.
We have also learned to be honest about this reality: building a marriage and a business at the same time is harder than doing either one alone. It demands deeper communication, clearer boundaries, and far more intentional decision-making than most people realise.
But for us, it's been transformational.
What We'd Tell Couples Considering This
Don't do it for the romance. Romantic notions of "building something together" will crumble when you're arguing about marketing spend. Do it because you complement each other strategically, not because you love each other. (You might also love each other, which helps, but that's not the driver.)
Get clear on roles. Not "we'll figure it out as we go." Decide upfront: who owns what? Who's the tie-breaker in conflicts? How will decisions get made? Write it down.
Protect your marriage. The business will consume everything if you let it. Explicitly protect time together that's not about business. This is not optional.
Get separate work spaces. Even if it costs money. The psychological benefit of separation during the day is worth far more than the cost.
Have a conflict resolution process. Because you will have conflicts. Decide in advance: how do we argue? When do we table a conversation? Who facilitates if we're stuck? Make it easy to handle conflict when you're in the middle of it.
Consider your location intentionally. We chose Hoi An because we needed space and low cost. That might not be true for you. But think about: does this location support or undermine what we're trying to build? Are we here by design or default?
The Unexpected Gift
What we didn't anticipate: building a business together has made us more aligned in life.
We share goals. We understand each other's stress. We celebrate wins together. We process failures together. We've had to develop communication skills that have transformed not just our business, but our entire relationship.
Most couples don't have that. Most couples are siloed in their work. What they do at the office stays at the office. The marriage exists in a separate sphere. We can't do that, so we didn't. And it created something we weren't expecting: a fully integrated partnership. Not just in business, but in life.
And honestly? We don't take credit for any of it. We didn't choose this path because we were clever or brave.
We feel chosen for it, and we say that without apology. John 15:16 has been the thread running through all of it:
You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain... (NKJV)
Whatever fruit comes from Good Ground Digital, the marriage, the work, the founders we get to serve, we want it to point back to the One who appointed us to go. To Him be the glory.
If you're a couple considering building a business together or wanting to strengthen the partnership you have, we get it.
We've been there. We've made mistakes. We've learned hard lessons. And we've watched God use all of it.
My free 20-minute guide gives you the four chapters he wrote after two decades of speaking on international stages: The Freeze, The Voice, One Structure, and The Recovery. Instant PDF download. No fluff.
If you want personalised support, I also run a four-week 1:1 Confidence Speaking Mentorship for working professionals, executives, and founders. Four sessions, one hostile-audience simulation and one recorded final talk you keep. USD 300 introductory rate.
