Ever wanted to see a perfect Latin Trade story? Here's your chance:
Mike Ceaser filed his final story from Caracas hitting the
Chávez land-grab story head on. It's all here, from high to low, the squatters, the land administrators, the government, environmentalists. Lots of the better-known newspapers in the United States wrote this story at about the same time; none of them did it better. Nice headline from News Editor
Forrest Jones, too.
Analysis is our strong point.
Tim Rogers in Managua shows us how by giving his Central America free trade focus a nice, strong angle: Industry is ready, but
small business and government are not. Many publications simply covered the fact that the deal was done. Tim moved on to write about what has to happen next. It's harder to appreciate online, but the magazine version of this story included some great design work from Creative Director
Bryan Cooper and in-depth numbers from Research Director
Gabriela Calderon.
Our man in Montevideo,
Diego Stewart, hit a great short item for our Radar section this month with his reporting on an
Uruguay software supplier landing a big deal with a Chinese hospital. Besides being well reported and written, this one meets all our standards: 1) crosses borders -- lots of them, 2) explains how the deal got done and 3) points the way for other executives in other countries to think big. It doesn't get much bigger than China.
Direct from the middle of nowhere,
Paul Harris files a great example of the "destination-as-business" travel story, this one about
rich hippies looking to bliss out under the northern Chilean sun. What makes this work was asking the numbers questions. No, it's not big numbers, but when he talks to the private observatory owner, and the winery couple, and the restaurateur, he asks the basic questions: How big is your business? How do you make money? Sometimes reporters can feel like these kinds of questions are rude. They are not. Most small business owners obssess about their model, what works, what doesn't, and are thrilled to unload their obssession on anyone who is curious. Always ask, even if you think it might not be central to the story. Get enough of this, and your story is richer just the same.
Everyone once a while a story happens into your inbox that really makes the case for business journalism. Departed Latin Trade intern
Alex Ragir was poking around for ideas and happened on a snippet in our Panorama Weekly newsletter (if you are a Latin Trade correspondent,
ask me to subscribe you to this). "Would this work?" he asked. Sure, I said, start with the CEO. "Uh, the CEO?" Yeah, I said, call him up. What followed was an exclusive with the boss via cellular phone in Ibiza, Spain (on vacation), cross-Caribbean reporting with an archrival, then as the reporting matured we got to hurricanes, trash-talking, lawsuits and, finally,
a grudge match over cricket sponsorhips. Whew! Fun story! And, if you follow wireless in the region, you have a new company to watch. It all started with a press release and native curiosity. Good work, Alex.
