Business, culture and community combine at BizNet Expo 2009
by Vincent Schilling

Edwina Bergano, executive director of Connecting Business and Community LLC, in conjunction with the Philippine Cultural Center of Virginia presented a Filipino American event on March 21 celebrating the accomplishments and lifestyle of the Filipino community while providing a way for small business owners to network with people in Virginia Beach and businesses in the Hampton Roads areas.

To open BizNet Expo 2009, Dr. Manuel Hipol, chairman of the board of the Council of United Filipino Organizations of Tidewater, Virginia Beach Councilman Ron Villanueva and event sponsor Jerilyn Lubitz of Prudential Towne Realty made welcoming remarks.

Once the activities began, visitors entering the Philippine Cultural Center, a gathering place for Filipino American social and community activities including wellness programs, performance arts and others, were able to partake in the many different activities offered by the vendors and businesses present.

Specifically, vendors offered a large variety of services to visitors ranging from real estate, legal and computer services to travel and education.

In addition, visitors were able to sample an array of Filipino American cuisine items, get a basic health glance by checking their blood pressure, glucose or cholesterol levels, enjoy a martial arts, dance or singing performance or watch a fashion show put on by local students.

The mood was light-hearted and the crowd seemed in good spirits. To Edwina Bergano, coordinator of BizNet Expo 2009, the event was an excellent place to network. She said she wanted to reach out to the Filipino American community.

“We created this event because we found businesses were not marketing to us in the Filipino American community,” Bergano said. “In order to have a strong community and a strong family and in order to be better citizens, we wanted to create a liaison between the community and businesses.”

Bergano said she also wanted the event to have a person-to-person connection not often experienced in today’s business world.

“We need that connection that you can’t get from television, that you can’t get from the Internet or media; you have to get it from that one-on one approach. The Philippine Cultural Center and the BizNet Expo brings that all together. When businesses and people come together, we forget that that is how it all started. In today’s’ society we forget who we really are.”

Bergano said there are things to consider as a Filipino American doing business within her own community. “Within the BizNet Expo we actually go beyond the Filipino community

because when you work just within your own community it is too polarized,” she said. “It is interesting that if you work within your own community you have small conflicts but if you work outside of it and people see what you are doing they come around.”

Bergano said the economy affected participation within the BizNet Expo. “This year has been particularly challenging because of the financial situation, but we got really creative and got youth clubs involved and told people that if we didn’t get their support we can’t do this next year,” she said. “As you can tell, we got many people out here and many youth clubs that are representatives of our next generation. We are connecting with the youth our entire community and our business community.”

One of the youth groups at BizNet was a group that called themselves Teens for Hire. The young group comprised of predominantly Filipino American entrepreneurs offered their skills to earn wages.

“This is an organization that we recently created in an economy that isn’t doing so well right now,” said Maryanne Matel of Teens for Hire. “We are encouraging our teenagers to get together, reach out to the community, and help them out. We want to provide an alternative to a really expensive babysitter or to mow their lawn if they don’t have time.” Matel mentioned that people interested in hiring the teens could reach out to Bergano at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Other attendees of the expo also commented on the event’s success.

“I’ve been with the Latino community Chamber of Commerce for six years and I have found that this event ties the Filipino and Hispanic business community very well,” said Frank Gonzalez of Video Email Marketing. “Through my business, I offer Webcasts to promote this unity and I am able to promote businesses using current Web video.”

Jason Ast, a co-emcee of the expo and financial service representative at SunTrust, said it is important to connect with the community.

“SunTrust’s stance is to reach out to the community, not from a sales perspective but to embrace the community with a sense of goodwill and to touch base in a responsible way,” Ast said. “We did not even bring sales material; we just want to make our presence known.”