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.

An Exemplary Legacy 

After living 40, 50, maybe 80 years on this earth, what kind of legacy are you leaving behind?

It’s difficult for many people to think about no longer being here, but it is an unavoidable reality. And if you want your life to mean anything or to be remembered as having made a difference, then you should reflect on how you’ll be remembered after you’re gone. 

Fashion mogul Peter Nygard has been building an exemplary legacy. He’ll always be remembered as the astute business leader who helped to make the free trade agreements a reality for Canada.

He’ll always be remembered for his business savvy in taking 8 thousand dollars and parlaying it into a reported 800 million-dollar business that achieved many industry firsts.

Nygard will always be remembered for having bucked the system when he refused to experience the recession while the rest of the world was suffering, and while a number of his industry colleagues went out of business: through his business brilliance, he managed to experience one of his most profitable years ever.

He’ll always be remembered and lauded for his fight to eradicate cancer; for the thousands of women he has helped with the mammogram machine he donated, for the mobile cancer unit he purchased, for his insistence on celebrating the lives of cancer survivors and having them model his latest fashions, and for the millions and millions of dollars he has donated to the eradication of cancer.

Peter Nygard will always be remembered as a visionary for his work in reverse ageing and scientific discoveries that is revolutionizing that field, and for his biotech company’s work with renown researchers from around the world is a leader in stem cell research and related technology.

He’ll be remembered as the individual who did a lot of the anti-age testing on his own body in a way that’s working—a Harvard University company, which measures an individual’s biological age versus their chronological age measured Nygard to be 56 years old.

Bahamians will always remember Peter Nygard as the most generous kind-hearted adopted Bahamian son, for the many people who he helped with his medical sponsorship, for the sporting programs and athletes he has supported, and for the youth of The Bahamas who will make great contributions to The Bahamas because of his inspiration.

What an enviable list of achievements! Peter Nygard will leave behind a most exemplary legacy.

If you were to ask Peter Nygard if he set out to do all of these things in his life, to have such significant achievements, he’ll tell you, “no”. He has often said that he never imagined where he’d end up or the things he’d achieve.

His only focus was always on just doing a better job the next day on whatever he was working on.

However, what is clear for all to see is that it’s not just his hard work and focus on continuous improvement that brought him to where he is today. It’s character. It’s his kindheartedness in business and with people everywhere, strangers and acquaintances alike. 

Really, it’s his desire to help everyone improve in any way they can. And that’s what builds a great legacy!

What will you be remembered for?

Will you be remembered for kind-heartedness or mean-spiritedness?

Will you be remembered for contributing to your country in such a way that a bright future is assured or for trying to tear your country apart?

Will you be remembered for having spent your life focused on making significant achievements and bettering the lives of others or for seeking to denigrate others?

If more people spent more time building an exemplary legacy, and less time on pulling others down, imagine the heights to which the nations of this world would rise.