Since launching in 2008, the Dana Point Times has proudly published its annual Best of Dana Point People’s Choice Lantern Awards, highlighting all the businesses, individuals and groups that you, the readers, deemed the finest this town has to offer.
In that time, we’ve seen numerous locally owned shops and Dana Point-based organizations receive recognition for continuing to make our little slice of South Orange County special, unique and ever-so charming.
It’s been an incredible honor to present winners with their medals, and we know it also means a lot to many who get to proudly display their awards for patrons to see.
While the local business community has experienced many high points, it’s also had to overcome some lows—most recently, the economic impacts of the coronavirus pandemic beginning in 2020.
Recovery has, at times, felt slow, but there continue to be signs of promise. Unemployment in the area is down, the downtown corridor is buzzing, and new stores and restaurants keep popping up, in turn, giving us as a news team plenty of opportunities to report on fun and exciting changes.
It’s in that vein that we here at Picket Fence Media have decided to take our annual “Best of” awards in a fresh, new direction.
Many of our loyal readers have undoubtedly opened previous Best of Dana Point issues and enjoyed the photos of delicious eats or smiling business owners, as well as the overall aesthetic and graphics.
Then there are our brief write-ups on the winners—emphasis on the word brief.
With nearly 100 categories to feature, each comprising two finalists, the editorial team has had limited space in what we could write, creating the unfortunate consequence of hardly getting to the heart of what the shops and hard-working individuals have to offer our city.
To remedy that issue and give readers a more comprehensive and interesting view on many of the winning organizations, we’re moving away from those brief descriptions and are instead going to highlight just a handful of the categories.
This will give us the opportunity to sit down with some of the Gold and Silver Lantern winners, for more in-depth features and profiles, allowing them to tell us their unique stories and history. It also presents a path to tell these stories visually through photo galleries online and video packages on our social channels.
Without revealing too much of what’s to come in the new issue, which drops on March 17, I’d like to add that under this new format, we’ll be able to shine a light on some of our legacy businesses that have collected dozens of Gold and Silver medals over the past 15 years.
So, who chooses the categories and businesses that will be featured? That would be myself and the rest of the editorial team—with input from PFM Publisher Norb Garrett, along with the design and sales departments.
That selection was based on multiple factors, including, to name a few, how many overall medals the winning business has taken home in their respective category; whether the winner has established a dynasty or even unseated a dynasty; and reader appeal.
It’s important to state, though, that while some categories may not get a spotlight one year, there will be opportunities in the next.
Change can be tough, and I expect to receive a few voicemails and emails from those disgruntled voices who oppose our decision. To them, I’ll stress that it’s been our mission to make sure our readers’ voices are heard by choosing who, what and where deserve the honor of “Best” in Dana Point.
That mission will continue to get represented in the upcoming issue. Every business, person, group or location that’s receiving a Gold or Silver Lantern Award this year will still be listed and recognized.
The new issue is just under two months away, and we’re excited to present it to you. We’ve been hard at work putting it all together, as well as the upcoming Best of San Juan Capistrano and Best of San Clemente issues. We hope you enjoy and appreciate these unique stories told in our new format.
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