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Business Breakdown

FOX Business Network journalist Rebecca Gomez is working hard to make her show, Happy Hour, the first stop after the day’s business is done.

Rebecca Gomez is all business, sort of. During one live airing of her cable business news show, Happy Hour, in Miami Beach, away from its usual home in New York City, it’s easy to see why people would want to tune in to see shop talk at the close of business. The newswoman co-anchors the program with Cody Willard, a former hedge fund manager and adjunct professor at Seton Hall University. If he’s a “suit,” he sure doesn’t look or act the part; but neither does Gomez. More on that later.
Launched in October 2007, the hour-long show airs on the FOX Business Network (FBN) weekdays at 5 p.m. (EST), and for now, is seen in about 35 million homes across the U.S. The show came about when FOX executives gave some thought to what to cover when the market closes, Gomez explains.
“From five to six, people go to happy hour and wait at the bar,” she says, and they usually talk business and politics while waiting to be seated for dinner. With this in mind, Happy Hour was given a shot, and what better setting for it than in a bar. The show is broadcast live from the posh Bull and Bear Steakhouse and Bar at The Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York City. And while the show goes on, so does business at the bar, which often creates atmosphere and spontaneous moments for the cast and crew.
Gomez recounts one incident. Some FBI guys had lunch at noon, and stuck around; by 5 p.m., they had been drinking for a while. Award-winning actor John O’Hurley, who played J. Peterman on Seinfeld, was one of the Happy Hour’s guests that day, promoting his latest children’s book. The FBI crew started screaming at him on-air, “Mr. Peterson, where’s George and Elaine?” Some celebrities, such as Whoopi Goldberg, like to hang out at the bar after finishing their segment. It’s all part of the show’s vibe.
Gomez sported a sundress for the Miami Beach show, which was broadcast poolside from The National Hotel. Gomez and Willard look more like friends you’d meet for drinks, rather than a pair a of network anchors. The show is fast paced, and the interviews are quick yet insightful—all part of the strategy to appeal to a younger audience.
The show is accessible and easy to understand for those of us who are not financial gurus. “We make it approachable for everyone,” Gomez says. “You don’t have to work on Wall Street.” In fact, an array of topics is covered, from entertainment to sports—but always with a business angle.
The Miami Beach show, for example, featured NBA stars Alonzo Mourning and Dwyane Wade, who talked sports while Heat cheerleaders strutted their routines for the camera. But the duo also talked about their ventures off the court—their foundations, investments and Wade’s plans for a sports bar.
The towering figures seemed at home with Gomez, who is down to earth and approachable.
Gomez grew up in San Jose, California. Her family is from Guadalajara, Mexico. “I finished high school and had no idea what I wanted to do,” she says. She was a waitress at a steakhouse and enrolled in a community college.
It was while watching the news with her then-boyfriend that she decided she’d like to pursue a career in journalism, and so she applied for and won a scholarship to the University of Maryland, where she graduated from the College of Journalism. “I had never been out of the state,” she admits, adding that no one in her family had ever graduated from college.
Gomez paid her dues, first as an intern at the Associated Press, a position she obtained through a minority-training program. (She would later work for them as a business writer.) She logged time as a reporter and anchor for various local television affiliates at stations in McAllen, Texas, Phoenix and San Diego.
Then in 1996, FOX News Channel was launched, and Gomez joined the team as a news update anchor. A few years later, she got an amazing opportunity to work with two legends—seasoned journalist Deborah Roberts, and the late entertainer and activist, Dana Reeve, widow of Christopher Reeve—on the show, Lifetime Live, a lifestyle news show that aired on Lifetime Television Network.
“We covered longer pieces focusing on women’s issues, not the daily grind,” recalls Gomez, who worked as a reporter for the program. It was short-lived, lasting only a season and a half before sending Gomez back to California as a morning news anchor in San Diego.
The morning hours can be brutal for any journalist, but Gomez had her sights set on covering business news. This was around the time of the Internet boom. So she packed her bags and returned to New York where she signed herself up for some business classes at New York University.
She took a year off to study. When finished, she turned to her Rolodex and reached out to her old bosses at Associated Press, and was hired as a part-time business writer and to do radio reports.
Eventually, she returned to FOX News as a correspondent, and covered the war in Iraq. Fast-forward to today, where Gomez’s co-anchoring duties on Happy Hour account for most of her airtime.
It’s a role that suits her well. She put billionaire real estate mogul Jorge Pérez on the spot when he was a guest on the show, asking him tough questions on the real estate downturn and his turnaround forecast. At one point, he commented on the media scaring people, to which Gomez replied that the media is “showing the reality of it, too.”
“You present both sides and let the people at home decide,” she says.
At FOX, the timeslot defines the tone of the content. Daytime programming is more conservative, while the evening programming showcases the more opinionated commentators such as Bill O’Reilly.
“People do want some guidance and direction,” explains Gomez on the evolution of news programming. Rather than just reporting the news, “now we’re hearing opinions and perspective.” And while the role to be a watchdog has not changed, the delivery has. “We’re the eyes and ears of the public, but we can’t be boring.”

THE TICKER

Who: Rebecca Gomez and Cody Willard
When: Monday through Friday, 5-6 p.m.
Where: FOX Business Network (FBN)
Why watch: “Everyone cares about money and where their paycheck is going.”—Rebecca Gome