In 1967, a young couple fled Lebanon with only what they could carry onto a plane. The Khabie family landed in Minneapolis. The father was charming, a hard worker, good with his hands.
He opened a tailor shop in their basement at night, working days as a retailer. He’d eventually become the beloved, go-to tailor for some of the city’s biggest names (like Twins legend Kirby Puckett). The mother was strong-willed and community-driven; she brought Lebanese food into the neighborhood. They had five children. Four became doctors, lawyers, and fashionistas. One of them became Dan.
Dan was mischievous and curious, wired for survival. Once, he did what many kids have done or thought about doing: walked into his local Target, stuffed a highly prized toy (an Evel Knievel action figure) into his winter coat, and strolled on out. (He likes to say he borrowed it, because he eventually paid the store back.) Instead of playing with it right away and risking questions from his parents, he buried it under three feet of snow. He waited. And waited. Months later, the spring thaw revealed the new addition to the Khabie toybox. Even then, Dan held tight for his parents to discover it and bring it to him.
“That way, they were accomplices to the crime,” he says.
It’s a cute story about light childhood larceny and lessons learned. But it’s also about instinct and strategy, knowing your terrain, and believing in the long game.
Dan grew up and married his first-grade crush (the long game continues), and the two of them moved to San Diego with $100 to their name. He was told no one could build a global marketing agency from San Diego.
So, in 1997, Dan and his partners did exactly that. Today, Dan is one of our “50 People to Watch” because of his and his partner Kenny Tomlin’s newest global-scale idea. Their company CourtAvenue is shaping what happens when challenger brands gather at the intersection of AI and marketing, right here in San Diego.
I open with Dan’s story because it raises the question that guided us in creating this issue: What does it mean to have influence in San Diego? What developments—big and small—will mold life here today and in the years ahead? What ideas born here will put some San Diego DNA into the world? And who are the people playing a critical role in those changes?
For a long time, influence was easy to spot. It came with a title, a corner office, a mic. For a while, it looked like a blue check mark on your social profile—until that, too, became something you could buy. But real influence can’t be purchased. It’s earned, over time, through stakes, craft, and the steady work of making something that transforms how people live, think, and see the world.
To create this issue, our editors spent months mapping the cultural and structural shifts across the county—the biggest headlines and fascinating developments dictating what San Diego is and what it will soon become. From scientific breakthroughs to billion-dollar tech unicorns. From massive public-facing projects that will alter the face of the city to a kid who built a global video empire from his parents’ living room in Mira Mesa. The people in business, entertainment, sports, science, tech, politics, culture, every realm central to San Diego’s beating heart.
“People to Watch” isn’t an award. It’s an observation and a prediction of what’s about to enter SD’s bloodstream. These people are different ages, from different backgrounds, working in different lanes, chasing different versions of success. You may feel the impact of their work immediately. Others you won’t sense until later—when the season changes and the snow finally thaws.
San Diego Magazine has been documenting the charm and complexity of this city for 78 years. If we’re doing our job right, you’ll finish this issue feeling more connected to where you live, with a clearer sense of what’s around the bend. We hope you’re proud, maybe a little challenged, definitely curious.
PARTNER CONTENT
I found a few new heroes in these pages, and I hope you do, too. I hope you see yourself somewhere in the story. And I hope this issue leaves you excited about what San Diego can be, because you’ve already met some of the people driving its evolution.
Happy New Year. Here’s to the builders, the risk-takers, the don’t-tell-me-I-can’t-ers—the ones who make the rest of us look up from our routines and think, What if?
