LOS ANGELES -- For Southern California business owners, All-Star Week 2022 offered a unique opportunity for professional growth.

Major League Baseball and the Dodgers on Friday hosted the inaugural “Doing Business With Baseball” event, a luncheon and network reception held at Dodger Stadium’s Stadium Club and emceed by Billy Bean, MLB’s senior vice president of diversity, equity & inclusion. Attendees included entrepreneurs and representatives from over 30 local businesses, representing a wide range of industries, including food and beverage, promotions and infrastructure.

Different as these businesses may be, they each had at least two things in common. All are helmed by underrepresented business owners (including Black-owned, Latino/a-owned, Asian-owned, women-owned, veteran-owned, LGBTQ-owned and other underrepresented small businesses). And all are vying for future or continued partnerships with Major League Baseball.

“One of the commitments I made to [Commissioner Rob Manfred] was a more concerted, better effort supplier in the supplier diversity space,” said Bean. “Because I really believe that investing in communities and representation is the way we continue to put that message [of the importance of inclusion and equity] out there and show baseball that.”

Formed in 1998, Major League Baseball’s Diverse Business Partners program has cultivated new and existing partnerships with underrepresented businesses. The program increases opportunities for women-owned or minority-owned business enterprises to participate in procurement activities of MLB entities and MLB clubs.

Since the formation of this program, MLB and its clubs have spent nearly $2 billion with diverse-owned businesses.

Each business owner in attendance on Friday had the chance to share a little about themselves and their company’s services, essentially making an elevator pitch for why they’d be a good match to work with MLB, the Dodgers -- and each other.

“This is just a chance for MLB to give you guys an opportunity and a chance to showcase the work that [you do],” said Maverick Palabasan, MLB’s manager of diversity, equity & inclusion. “So this is not only chance for us here at MLB to do better, because we can all do better. But also, it's just a chance for everybody to network with each other. If it’s not business with us at MLB, if it’s not business with any of the 30 teams, it's potentially going to be business with a lot of people.”

Speakers included Lisa McShane, the Dodgers’ director of purchasing; Marlene Nantell, vice president of external affairs for the Southern California Minority Supplier Development Council; and Alan Lin, the owner of a printing company and winner the Dodgers’ 2022 Most Valuable Diverse Business Partner award. A recurring theme of the day was the importance of equal opportunity, regardless of personal background.

No one knows this better than Bean. As a once-closeted gay man who played from 1987-95 -- a time when blatant homophobia was commonplace in the sports world -- Bean noted how much has changed in the industry, both on and off the field, and he emphasized the need for work environments that are accepting of all and safe for all. That includes in MLB, at every level.

“I'm big on representation and I love having the most voices in the room possible to try to make a wonderful collaboration,” said Bean. “Because it's fun when you see something really great come together.”