Trendsetters - Dec. 2006

Collects: Ethnic arts and crafts and dolls from foreign countries. "I don't see myself retiring."
Frequent-flier miles: 1.5 million. "I give them away all the time."
Wish list: More trade show space in Miami.
Early business: A partner in a Burger King franchise.
Home: Coconut Grove.

Charlotte Gallogly's running late and is a bit breathless. The Miami-Dade County commissioners decided suddenly to take up a plan to contribute $600 million for a $1.2-billion tunnel that by 2013 would move trucks from the port to I-395, bypassing the current, messy trip through downtown Miami. She wanted to be there to support the plan. It passed. "It's fabulous," Gallogly exalted. "It's a green light for the tunnel."

Gallogly, 61, has been cheering on trade since 1987 when she became president of World Trade Center Miami, a non-profit with a $3-million annual budget. Its focus, since 1998, is its trade shows such as the IFE Americas-9th Americas Food and Beverage Show, the Air Cargo Americas and Seacargo Americas that will draw a combined 15,000 buyers and vendors to Miami next year.

A self-described "military brat" born on a now-shuttered Tennessee air base, Gallogly had a fascination with things foreign. "You know that expression 'far away places with strange-sounding names'? That's me." She spent part of her childhood overseas before coming to Miami-Dade in 1972 to join the county government. She ran Miami's economic development, international trade promotion, protocol and public information departments prior to taking the Trade Center post, seeing it as a natural progression for a "peacenik from the '60s." Trade engenders peace among nations, she says.

Ahead, she is studying the possibility of a trade show for arts and crafts from the Americas, a major interest of foreign governments. "International trade is the most exciting industry in the world," she says.

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