By Leony R. Garcia
THE BusinessMirror’s grand anniversary night was one for the books. There was hardly a need to look back to where the country’s leading business daily all began, as a bore would have it. It was straight from the hip, a celebration befitting a hip happening place that is the House Manila at Remington Hotel frequented by equally hip cult mob of people.
The night was all for the good times (really, Sandra, let history tell its own story) and all inclined going onward, perhaps toward the next 10 years, perhaps forever and ever amen. BusinessMirror Publisher T. Anthony Cabangon said best things have yet to come, one being the maverick business daily’s up-and-coming-up-up-and-away partnership with the New York Times, on a biggie commemorative (a coffee-table book? No, please!) that is the Turning Points.
Published in over 40 countries, Turning Points is the original year-ahead licensed glossy featuring exclusives on global figures. The maiden Philippine issue of Turning Points will take on the political, cultural and economic movers, who look at trends and new ideas in the Philippines and from around the world to identify key, well, “turning points” and how they underlie the year ahead.
The second announcement hovered on the maverick innovations in all these areas, The Millennials and The Broader Look for instance, the newspaper’s newly integrated sections—an unprecedented take on the good read and a brilliant deviation from the otherwise bland and the boring. Take the BusinessMirror’s Millennial anniversary theme “When I was 25,” which was not just a success, but a phenomenon; it was not just read and enjoyed in the comforts of who knows where, it was celebrated.
The BusinessMirror’s discussions with the who’s who in today’s business—government and foreign guests have also evolved to become the so-called BM Coffee Club, gathering over a little coffee tête-à-tête, and making light and making sense of all the news of the day.
And now that we’re 10 and have ever matured for all these years through the wringer of business, economics, politics and lifestyle, there’s no more slant in just talking about news, but, as Cabangon puts it, “we will help create news.” How does the daily intend to do that?
Apart from the BusinessMirror’s multi-angular swipes at issues and constant egging to think younger, Cabangon announced the BusinessMirror’s newest corporate social responsibility project in support of the country’s over just a million owners of small businesses. These budding entrepreneurs never run out of ingenious ideas, but funding and want of retail space for them have always been a challenge.
The country’s business reporter has dished out concept BM Pop-up Store to give these businesses a chance to score a monthlong contracts for actual retail spaces in a mall or wherever all consumers congregate. These businesses will also be iconed in the newspaper, vis-à-vis promotional, and will receive constructive feedback from the BusinessMirror’s pool of experts to further help them.
And because it’s a good time, the BusinessMirror’s top 10 outstanding dealers from January to June 2015 were recognized and each given a Rolex watch, and, what do you know, two really lucky souls at the House went home drunk in a brand spanking get-away Toyota Wigo. Can they beat that, they said. But they woke up the next day on a hang, but otherwise on a brand-new car.
Indeed, the best has yet to come and there would be more reasons to bring out the champagne. The night, after all, was young and 10 years old.
Image credits: Roy Domingo