by Rachel Reeves
[Editor’s note: The following article about Peninsula Chamber CEO Eileen Hupp first appeared in Peninsula in October 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.]
Eileen Hupp thinks of the Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce as the hub of a wheel. Eileen Hupp thinks of the Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce as the hub of a wheel.
“So many times people have come to us and asked for help and we’re like, we know who to connect you to, let me make a call. It’s that role as the connector and the hub of so many things that happen across the Peninsula — that’s what I’m most proud of,” the Chamber president and CEO said.
Hupp spends most of her six-day-a-week, 12-hour days connecting businesses on The Hill with customers, with each other, and with other groups that make a city run, including legislators, bureaucrats, schools and nonprofit organizations.
“I’ve always been a workaholic. But since the pandemic, the work has been relentless,” she said.
At the end of March, when the economy slowed to a near standstill, Hupp organized monthly networking events online and weekly Zoom talks with such speakers as Congressman Ted Lieu, State Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara representatives of the Small Business Administration.
She hosted a virtual sidewalk sale, which she promoted through social media, to allow businesses to sell online. She encouraged local businesses to take the Safe in the South Bay pledge to reassure customers that chamber members are adhering to county and state restrictions designed to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus. She ran The Great Peninsula Takeout, a campaign to encourage residents to order restaurant takeout or delivery twice a week. She’s done podcasts and local TV appearances and videos for social media encouraging residents to support local businesses.
She wrote a 15-page blueprint that was presented to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, advocating reopening businesses on The Hill, where the number of coronavirus cases has been relatively low. In June, she organized a virtual talk by high-profile economist Christopher Thornberg for more than 100 members of the Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce.
There are days, when new county and state regulations cause her to wonder how long businesses can continue to operate at their reduced capacities.
“I’ve literally felt like I was punched in the gut,” Hupp said. “But you keep putting one foot in front of the other and then you get a glimmer of positive news, or a business says thank you so much, we’re going to make it a few more months, you have been our savior, or you get a new member.”
Hupp said her focus now is on encouraging out-of-the-box thinking.
“Businesses that have innovative thinkers and bold leaders will survive,” she said. “I don’t care what sector you’re in — if you’re sitting, waiting for things to return to normal, well, the likelihood that you are going to be around long enough to be part of normalcy is slim.”
Innovating when things aren’t working is one of Hupp’s strengths. Years ago she conceived of “wine walks” at the Promenade and at the Peninsula Shopping Center. Businesses put out wine and snacks for people, who showed up to socialize and ended up shopping.
Hupp also runs the Young Entrepreneurs Academy. The program exposes junior high and high school students to high-profile speakers and mentors, serves as an incubator for their start-ups, and allows them to pitch their ideas to investors. Since its inception, the program has produced four award-winning young entrepreneurs.
At the time of our interview, Hupp was planning three events for the upcoming weeks. On Friday, Oct. 2, at noon, the chamber will host its Annual Legislative Forum. Congressman Lieu, Senator Ben Allen, Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi, and L.A. County Board of Supervisor Janice Hahn will answer questions about the long-term business impacts of the pandemic.
On Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 3 and 4, on the Promenade’s parking lot rooftop, the chamber will organize an open air marketplace for Peninsula businesses
And, in the coming weeks, she will help launch Leadership Peninsula, a program designed to develop leadership skills in people looking to move up in business, the nonprofit sector, or public service.
“I do have very high energy levels,” Hupp said. “I like to have a lot of things going on. I like variety, I like challenges. I like innovation. I always have to be doing new things,” she said.
Hupp grew up in Garden City, an affluent suburb in New York. She earned her bachelor’s degree in economics at Johns Hopkins University and an MBA at the University of Chicago. Prior to heading up the chamber, she was the head of marketing at Pic ‘N’ Save and helped a start-up become listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
In 2004, she and two partners opened a consulting firm, focused on helping small- to medium-sized businesses with marketing, sales, and organization. Five years after its founding, one partner retired to Ojai and the other was recruited by a large company. Hupp noted that coincidentally, she rarely stayed more than five years in one job.
“At that point I was like, okay, what do we want to do?” Hupp recalled. A friend on the Chamber of Commerce board told her the chamber CEO position was open.
“My response was, that sounds great, what’s a Chamber of Commerce?” she said, laughing. “I’m kidding, our consulting firm had been a member of a couple, but it wasn’t anything I’d ever considered as part of my career path. But then I thought, it would be really nice after all these years of jumping on planes and jumping on the freeway to work right here in my community, and give back to the businesses and nonprofits here at home.”
She took the job in the spring of 2011. In the back of her mind, she anticipated moving on after five years or so, as she always had.
“Nine and a half years later, I’ve set a new personal record,” she said. “I love what I’m doing. It is a labor of love. We are an independent nonprofit that happens to be focused on business. We receive no funding from the cities so you do have to be really committed because you’re not going to be doing it for financial gain. You’re going to be doing it because you’re dedicated to the mission and to connecting people throughout the community and to making a difference in people’s lives.”
The only thing she’s prouder of than her Chamber work, she said, are her three children: 30-year-old Robby, 27-year-old Sara, and 23-year-old Emily. “Though they are spread out across the country, the fact that my kids are following their dreams makes me so happy,” she said.
Hupp refers to the businesses that pay dues to the Chamber of Commerce as her “shareholders.”
“They keep the lights on, so everything we do is geared toward delivering value to them,” she said.
The communities she works with extend beyond the Peninsula. Some Chamber members have offices in surrounding cities; some work on the Peninsula and live elsewhere. Building and maintaining networks is a skill that comes natural to her. She remembers whose kids are playing which sports.
“I get my energy from people,” Hupp said. “The more I can interact with people and the more I can do new and different things — that’s what keeps me going.”
In addition to her Chamber work, Hupp is President of the Palos Verdes Peninsula Rotary Club and sits on the board of the League of Women Voters of Palos Verdes. She is a past president of both the South Bay Association of Chambers of Commerce and the National Charity League’s Peninsula chapter. She has served on PTAs, booster clubs, and other nonprofit boards.
Hupp considers philanthropy as important to the fabric of the Peninsula as education. She cries when she tells a story about a volunteer shift she worked at a thrift shop. A man went to the register to pay for two stuffed animals for his kids that cost a quarter each and a $2 shirt for himself. When he realized he didn’t have enough money, he put the shirt back.
“Three miles from us, there are kids who do not have food, who do not have the basic supplies they need to go to school,” she said. “Sometimes people need to step back from some of the things they get wrapped up in, and look at the bigger picture.” Pen
