Hawaii Business: Fifty and Counting

Hoyt Zia

Unlike personal birthdays, we believe the old saw "you're not getting older but better" actually is true for businesses. Starting with this issue, you will note some design changes on our cover and inside that are intended to keep our "look" current and our content easier and more interesting to read. We will be introducing some new material in 2005, like our gala 50th Anniversary issue in June and our first Best Places to Work in Hawaii list in April. We also plan to celebrate this anniversary all year long by having events that will allow us to give back to the community and to thank our readers, advertisers, and those who have served as the subjects of our stories and photographs.

Also unlike birthdays, we are thinking about and looking forward to the next 50 years. While I cannot predict what those next 50 years will bring, I can say what we intend to do in 2005: we will remain focused on bringing our readers information they can use, providing our advertisers with an audience that can benefit from their products and working harder to establish relationships with other business organizations who share the goal of improving Hawaii's business community.

To that end, you will note in this issue that we have begun a partnership with the Chamber of Commerce of Hawaii to publish its monthly newsletter, the Voice of Business, in HB. The chamber exists to represent the business community in the state, and the more people who become familiar with and involved in its work, the more effectively it can serve us, and we are delighted to spread the word. Similarly, with the Hawaii Institute for Public Affairs, the Hawaii Council on Economic Education and Junior Achievement, we want to help develop the next generation of community leaders and ensure they have a firm grasp of how to maximize the output from our economic engine. Given the chance, we would also like to help elevate our state within the Pacific region, by employing ideas such as "smart-growth" to redevelop our downtown and Waikiki so that they become models of sustainable communities and magnets attracting people and businesses to the state.

None of us has a monopoly on what it takes to make our state's economy boom, and it is a subject on which we encourage a thousand flowers to bloom. Let me know your ideas for making the next 50 years for Hawaii business even better than the last 50. If we like them and can help give them wings, we will. Help us celebrate 2005 by making it a truly memorable year to look back upon 50 years hence.