Nygard’s Golden Jubilee Review
It’s not an everyday occurrence to discover an individual who has pulled himself up by his bootstraps to achieve phenomenal success with a business that’s still breaking barriers, still achieving firsts, and still innovating fifty years later. What does it take? How did he achieve it all? And how can we achieve similar successes?
That’s what we’ll explore in this tri-weekly series. We’ll break down fashion mogul Peter Nygard’s achievements and look at how his accomplishments can serve as practical applications to others in business and life.
“His Contribution To The Athletes Is Monumental”
What’s remarkable about fashion mogul Peter Nygard is his willingness to unceasingly share the wealth he has accumulated over his fifty years in business. Peter Nygard has given millions of dollars to many different causes in The Bahamas during his more than forty years here.
In the words of former Bahamas Olympic Committee President Wellington Miller, Peter Nygard’s “contribution to the athletes is monumental.” Miller has said, “I don’t think any other private citizen has done what Peter has done.
Some of the specific sports contributions include,
$100,000 to a sports fund in 2000
$25,000 to the Golden Girls in 2000
$10,000 to Golden Knight Chris “Fireman” Brown
$10,000 to Golden Knight Michael Mathieu
$10.000 to Golden Knight Ramon “Fearless” Miller
$10,000 to Golden Knight Demetrius Pinder
$10,000 to Men’s National Volleyball team
These examples of giving alone total almost $200,000. There are many other examples such as sponsorship of Bahamas boxing sensation Tureano Johnson. Nygard paid for Johnson to live and train in Cuba for quite some time.
Peter Nygard has been donating to various causes since he’s become a permanent resident in 1978. That’s forty plus years of giving! In a 50th Anniversary Interview with CEO Wendall Jones on JCN television, Nygard said of his generous giving to sports,
“I have been an athlete nearly all of my life. My ambition was to be a track and field athlete when I was growing up. I am so close to the world of athletics, and when I saw this tremendous skill level here; the genes that we have here per capita is perhaps one of the best in the world.
“It just gave me such a thrill to live vicariously through these athletes—the Golden Girls, the Golden Knights, Volleyball players and Boxers. It didn’t matter which athletes came; I was their supporter.”
With donations totaling over $4 million to various causes in The Bahamas, beneficiaries over the years include,
Acklins Regatta
Amateur Boxing
Andros Community event Donations
Bahamas Beach Volleyball
Bahamas Volleyball Team
Boxing Federation Donation
Boxing Team To Martinique
BVP Weekend World Class Tournament
Caribbean Amateur Boxing Assoc. Sponsorship
Cat Island Regatta
Exuma Regatta Sponsorship
King Eric Race Sponsorship Regatta
Men’s Silver Team 4 X 400
Olympic Association Donation
Rugby Association
Special Olympics
Stapledon School for Special Education
Triple Jump Athlete Donation Anthony Williams
Valentino CAC Gold – Boxing
This list does not include the health donations made to Bahamian families including to Bahamian icon Gus Cooper, Carlos Mackey and others. And it doesn’t include the donations made to the youth groups and programs that also involved Nygard sponsoring many events for local groups at Nygard Cay.
While Peter Nygard’s millions in donations have helped many causes in The Bahamas, what he has given is so much more. He has transformed the lives of individuals. The impact of assistance to individuals with medical challenges is obvious—it lengthens life expectancy.
However, the impact to the lives of others is just as meaningful. Consider the youth program events held at Nygard Cay: One of the clear messages coordinators focus on communicating to the youth from the local communities during their events is ‘you too can start with nothing and achieve great success.’
That’s an invaluable gift to the youth of our nation who can be inspired to achieve far more than they ever thought. Imagine if that inspired even just a few individuals from each event. That would be hundreds of Bahamian youth who would be driven to strive for great success.
When you consider that the youth of a nation are the country’s future, Nygard’s giving is worth so much more than its total in dollars.
Bahamians are forever grateful to Peter Nygard, this Bahamian son, who truly made The Bahamas his adopted country and demonstrated his deep love for Bahamians and commitment to the country’s growth and development through his millions of dollars in giving.
