Meet the former Wigan schoolboy newspaper columnist now running major business conferences in Ibiza
A Wigan man who first achieved local fame writing a local newspaper column as a schoolboy is now enjoying what some find a surprising success by running major business events on a Mediterranean party island
A former Wigan newspaper columnist who wrote his first article at the age of 14 is now running one of Ibiza's biggest business conferences.
Ian Harris, who grew up in Wigan and was a pupil of Hawkley Hall High School. While there he penned a popular video games column called Bits & Bytes for the Wigan Reporter between 1996 and 1998.
It was his first byline, and the reason he pursued a career journalism.
At the age of 17, having already written for The Guardian, he was appointed staff writer on the PC Format magazine: the biggest PC leisure magazine at the time.
Nearly three decades on, Ian is the founder of Agency Hackers, a community for marketing agency owners, and the man behind the Ibiza Super Summit, a two-day business conference held at the five-star Ibiza Gran Hotel.
This month's event, running on September 23 and 24, is the fourth edition and has completely sold out, with around 200 agency owners flying in from across the UK and the United States.
The Mayor of Ibiza will also be attending and over the years it has proved to be very much a mould-breaking event.
For when it launched, the summit was one of the first business conferences ever to be held on an island far better known for its superclubs than spreadsheets.
Ian admits that it raised a few eyebrows.
"Everyone assumed it would be a jolly," he said. "But agency owners do their best thinking when they're somewhere sunny, away from the office.
“And so, I’m delighted to see, the idea has caught on.”
Ian is clear about where it all started.
"I was a kid from Wigan who loved video games, and the Wigan Reporter gave me a column.
“That was the first time I realised you could get paid for writing about the things you cared about.
“Everything since traces back to that."
And it is not just the writing.
"My love of dance music started on the dancefloor at Princes and The Pier, nightclubs" he said.
"So in a way, Wigan gave me both halves of this story: the journalism and the clubbing!
“Ibiza is just a bit warmer."