Page 26 - South Mississippi Living - February, 2017

PEOPLE no better offer
SOCIAL
Friends meet on Fridays if there’s No Better Offer
story by Lynn Lofton photos by Teddy Lewis
Five p.m. on Fridays is a time that’s welcomed far and wide as it’s typically the end of the work week. It’s time to kick back at home or meet friends for some congenial repartee and
possibly some libations.
Some groups of acquaintances get together
by happenstance while others are loosely organized. A group of Biloxi and Gulfport professionals is a little more than loosely organized; in fact they even have a name and bylaws. It’s called No Better Offer and
has met most Fridays at 5:30 p.m. at various establishments in the two cities for more than 10 years.
The premise is that you meet the group
for drinks and dinner if you have no better offer. It began in 2002 when two friends, Roy Mattina and Jose de la Fuente, started meeting after five on Fridays to kick off
the weekend. Now a financial advisor with Edward Jones, de la Fuente came to America 33 years ago from Belize.
“I was his first tenant,” de la Fuente says of Mattina who has an insurance agency
NETWORKING
26 SOUTH MISSISSIPPI Living • February 2017 FOR MORE REFLECTIONS OF THE GULF COAST >> www.smliving.net