On a Saturday afternoon, on the 38th floor of CapitaGreen in the heart of Singapore’s Central Business District, dozens of entrepreneurs, founders, influencers, and content creators mingle in an Art Deco-inspired cocktail bar and lounge modelled after New York’s vintage jazz clubs—all plum velvet and gilded accents. The bar is part of Centre of the Universe (COTU), one of the city’s hottest new multi-concept food and nightlife establishments. Called The Whisper Room, it’s anything but quiet.
The crowd is unmistakably Gen Z. A sea of young men sporting wolf cuts, broccoli perms, and wide-legged pants, alongside a handful of self-assured young women. They’ve come for Gabe Chia’s first in-person networking event, “Coffee with Gabe”. Gabe, 25, a dropout from the Singapore Management University (SMU), is an internationally known content creator and founder of The Viral Haus—a content agency helping businesses go viral. Gabe scored The Whisper Room for free through one of his contacts. He invited 17 people. Around 200 showed up.
They introduce each other through Instagram handles, not name cards. “What content do you create? What business do you have?” is the usual opener. I meet a poly student who does branding and styling for User Generated Content (UGC) creators; a founder of a 3D-printed, plant-based lamp start-up; and a DJ creating an app to link creators and automate Instagram channels.
As the event winds down, Gabe, muscled and in his trademark black T-shirt, takes the floor. The crowd presses in, eager to capture him on their phones. “A year ago, I was sad. I’d just gone through a breakup. I didn’t want to live anymore. But in the last 10 months, I decided I wanted to take action—I left Singapore, built my personal brand, and put myself out there. It changed my life.”
Later, he posts a version of the speech on LinkedIn; comments roll in: “It’s lit”, “Main character energy”, “Even when it feels delulu—this is how real community gets built.”
My first foray into this community, this hustle-and-hype creator economy which can also feel like a bro-culture-dominated boys’ club, began when a Jom reader tipped us off about some young self-taught barbers creating waves online. At a small Ramadan bazaar in Marsiling this March, I met 17‑year‑olds Osman and Rizki, ITE College West students working under the Good Barber Fades brand. They were reserved at first, but lit up when talk turned to how their barber videos “blew up” on social media, some clips hitting 29,000 likes. “I want to get my name out there—Mothership, all the big platforms,” Osman told me. “I want people not to know me as a barber, but as an influencer. I want to get rich. I want to work for myself, no stress, just be in a position where the money comes in. But you’ve got to start from the bottom. That’s why my handsome boss, Samuel, will help me.”
Enter 21-year-old Samuel Joshiah, founder of Good Barber Fades. Wiry and quietly self-assured, he now juggles several service-based ventures projecting half a million dollars in annual revenue. After National Service, Samuel skipped a costly Australian business degree and poured S$25,000 of savings and family support into a string of businesses, including recruitment and outsourcing firms, eventually making his first S$100,000. Today, his most lucrative play is an outsourcing company linking a network of 300 Filipino remote workers to Singapore SMEs for digital marketing, admin, and customer service at about S$8 an hour. For Samuel, the days are long—his phone doesn’t stop buzzing even at 2am—but the margins are good.
