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Orangewood Children’s Foundation…Our First Cooking Session

0 Comments By Amanda Wernick on March 31st, 2010
Tags: community, Community involvement, Orangewood Children's Foundation, Orangewood Children's home, Outreach, Seven Gables Real Estate Categories: Communitiy, Dining, Social Media

Today was the first Cooking Session of our year long commitment to Orangewood’s Children’s Foundation.

Emails were sent and arrangements were made with regards to who was bringing what and what time we would meet.

Pam, Lisa, Dee Dee and I met there at 9:30 this morning armed with boxes of food! We had rolls, pasta, fruit, salad and LOTS of desserts donated by some of our wonderful Seven Gables Agents.

This is Kristy and she is the go-to gal that worked so diligently with Lisa, Pam and I to put this together.

We chopped, and sliced, arranged and moved things around to make sure that there would be plenty of food for any of the youth that showed up today and tomorrow.

This is Jessica who is now a Pre-Mentor, which means she goes to visit with youth in Foster Homes and explains their options and having gone through the system herself, she has great wisdom and compassion for what these young folks are going through.

A HUGE thank you to Orangewood for allowing us to adopt them and give back to our community and Hugs and Thanks to:

Dee Dee Heath for her contribution of rolls and her time.

Laura Till for her contribution of rolls and brownies

Jocelyn Tan for her contribution of cookies.

Barbara Grandolfo for her contribution of cookies.

Diana Kendall for her contribution of lemon bars.

Melida Canfield for her contribution of the most ooey, gooey, chewy mouthwatering brownie cookie bars

Lisa Greubel for her contribution of time, pasta, homemade sauce, and brownies.

Pamela Huitt for her contribution of her time, oranges, apples, pears and lasagna.

And I’ll even throw myself in the mix for bringing a salad and donating time, which is something I LOVE to do!

If you can help out, we will be getting together once a month on the last Wednesday of each month and next month’s menu will be enchiladas! What can you bring?

Also, please remember that we will be collecting hygiene supplies throughout the month of April for the foundation. ALL are welcome to contribute!

Claim Jumper as a Community Builder……

0 Comments By Amanda Wernick on March 23rd, 2010
Categories: Communitiy, Dining, Social Media

I received an invitation via Twitter to attend a Fundraiser at Claim Jumper….I read the link which was an invitation to Claim Jumper for their Community Support Event to raise funds for Leukemia/Lymphoma fight against blood cancers. Debbi Miller (also known as @TheBigDebowski on Twitter) was putting it all together. Here is a little blurb from her Facebook Page:

“Claim Jumper at South Coast Plaza has generously offered to host a Community Support Event wherein 15% of all purchases made on March 18 with a flyer (found below in the “photos” section) will go toward my LLS fundraising.

What’s even more awesome is that it’s good all day — 11:00 a.m.-10:00 p.m. — and includes food, beverage AND happy hour purchases (pre-tax) AND it’s also good on both dine-in and take-out orders!

The only requirement is that you bring the flyer with you and present it when you order. Go any time of the day — lunch, afternoon, happy hour, dinner — with friends, family or co-workers (tweetups?!); great excuse to go out to eat and support a great cause at the same time”.

I was curious. Was this something that Claim Jumper was known for, or was it the first time they had sponsored such an event? I marked my calendar and set out to get some answers!

I met with Brett Lowe, the Manger of the South Coast Claim Jumper Location.

I found him to be warm and deeply committed to Claim Jumper and it’s far reaching community roots. I was totally unaware until Brett told me that Claim Jumper had been actively supporting different Charities and Organizations for the last 20 years!

Me: What Charities or Events is Claim Jumper involved with?

Brett: Craig Nickeloff actually started contributing to the community 20 years ago through the Special Olympics.

Me: How has this grown?

Brett: We’ve gone from holding Community Support Nights for only the Special Olympics to Girl Scouts, Local Baseball Teams, Pet Fund Raisers, and we’re extremely proud of our “Tip-A-Cop” evening.

Me: What’s that?

Brett: Off duty Police Officers work alongside Claim Jumper Servers to raise money for the Special Olympics

Our next “Tip-A-Cop” Event is scheduled for April 8 and is held at EVERY Claim Jumper Location.

Me: How do you advertise?

Brett: We used to use traditional means such a newspaper and radio but it wasn’t cost effective. We are now using a lot of online media such as Twitter and Facebook.

Me: What does someone have to do to hold a Community Support Event?

Brett: You can contact us via one of our Hospitality Partners

We print out the flyers for your event, or you can put the flyer online and have people print their own.

Me: What happens next?

Brett: You spread the word and people show up, present the coupon and 15% of your bill is donated to your cause.

Me: How much time in preparation does one need?

Brett: 3 weeks to a month is usually plenty of time to get the word out.

So there you go! Another Community Builder recommendation for you! Do you have someone that is an active Community Builder? Would you like us to write a blog about them? Please contact me:

The Beach Pit BBQ…

2 Comments By Amanda Wernick on February 19th, 2010
Categories: Communitiy, Social Media

I’m lucky, let me start there. Wanna know why? Because aside from working with a Real Estate Company that is embracing Social Networking, I have the opportunity to meet and interview people in our communities that inspire those around them.

One such person is Tim DeCinces of Beach Pit BBQ who donated ALL PROCEEDS FROM THE SALES OF ONE NIGHT OF HIS THREE RESTAURANTS TO HAITI!

Why am I so excited to introduce you to him? Well, for one thing upon meeting him you know there is something special going on his life. We had been playing phone tag for a little while, and yet every time we didn’t connect, he would leave me a voicemail informing me when he would be available, and that between certain times he would be busy with his family….I liked that! A family man!

When we finally did connect, he was just finishing up a Valentine’s Day pancake breakfast at his kindergarten daughters school!

He was also in the middle of a big move changing offices from Costa Mesa to Irvine. With boxes everywhere, he invited me to come on down and have a chat.

I arrived as scheduled and could see that the energy in the office was one of total joy despite the chaos of boxes around them. I was greeted by Carolynn who apologized for the boxes with a large smile on her face.

I walked into Tim’s office and thanked him for making the time to meet me. Seeing that he was busy I got to work right away…

Me: How long have you been involved with BeachPitBBQ?
Tim: “We created BeachPitBBQ 5 years ago in Costa Mesa with a family atmosphere in mind. A community place and made sure to include in our business plan how were going to give back to the community….be it sponsoring or supporting Little League, Soccer Teams, Church Events…whatever it was….we felt our dollars were better served there”.

Me: Tell me about what inspired you to contribute 100% of your sales for one evening from all three restaurants, to Haiti.
Tim: “The Sunday before my daughter decided she wanted to help Haiti somehow and so she put together a bake sale to send the money to Haiti. I thought to myself, ‘What could we do at the Restaurant to help?’ We were a little concerned because the weather forecast called for rain and we have lots of outside seating, but people came from EVERYWHERE, in the pouring rain with a great attitude, excited about what Beach Pit BBQ was doing…it was great for everyone!”

Me: How much money did you raise?
Tim: “We raised 19,322.00 between the 3 restaurants and then Caroline’s Dad who is a minister at Saddleback Church reached out and they matched what we raised and sent a Mission Group to Haiti to develop a water project”.

Me: How long did it take you to put it all together?
Tim: “Natalie does our social media and started tweeting about it, posting it on Facebook and sent out one email blast and in 4 days, we got it together. It’s a difficult time for restaurants but we reached out, and vendors donated food and the staff was so excited to be a part of this, plus my daughters got to get out of school to take pictures for the news coverage of their bake sale and they thought that was pretty cool! Plus some of the people that joined us that evening booked catering events and then donated the money to Haiti, One person created a charity within a charity by booking a catering event with the money going to Haiti and the food to the Orange County Rescue Mission!”

Me: What did you do before this?
Tim: I played pro baseball. I started at UCLA, then went to the Orioles for 4 years, traded to Padres and finished up in Oakland. I loved it and I miss it. The Team, the players. I miss the camaraderie…I was also involved in Residential Development”.

I could tell that he was now working with a great team at Beach Pit BBQ and that he was thankful for the people they have working for them.

Natalie, Tim and Caroline

There is still more to come and I will keep you informed as we go along…in the mean time, if you want to book a charity event contact Natalie Venneri @ nv@beachpitBBQ.com or stop by any of their 3 locations:

1676 Tustin Ave Costa Mesa (949) 645-RIBS
560 El Camino Real, Old Town Tustin (714) 929-RIBS
128 N Glassell St, Old Town Orange

Throwing Technology at the problem

2 Comments By Eric Duncan on January 19th, 2010
Categories: Social Media

I have been immersed in technology from as far back as 1984. I was in 4th grade installing 80 column cards into Apple IIe computers so we could play Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego? Move up to 1990, I was college classes in CAD, and I was optimizing each workstation and upgrading the network and graphics for all of the machines in the classroom for the professor. Why? Because with the speed increases, we spent more time learning, and completing our projects, instead of waiting for the computer to load and move to the next screen. Now it’s 1996, and I am a programmer for a Motorola Affiliate that launched Nextel’s first systems. I had to rummage through the office to find the fastest machines that would allow us to use the newest programming software, as we were programming hundreds of phones a week. I worked with our Rental division, and then our Rental sales team. We tied their CRM program (Act!) into the service/rentals systems so we all knew when customers were expecting their equipment, increasing our customer service, and our internal efficiency. We reach 2006, we build out and setup a brand new office. AT&T installs a cutting edge VoIP system with all the capabilities imaginable, an advanced voicemail system that ties into Microsoft Outlook, bringing incoming faxes into your email. Soft phone capabilities, the works. It’s amazing. We are on the heels of 2010 and that office uses 10% of the capabilities of that system. Why? The staff using it didn’t see the value, and decided to work around it.

I know this sounds like a micro-biography, but the point I am trying to make is, in certain respects, you can throw technology as certain issues, and you can remedy the problem. Investing thousands into a new network, or phone system, or just buying that new cutting edge Mac book is not going to fix all of your problems. You have to look at the people aspect of things. How are people using the technology you have in place? How are they working AROUND it? What are the bottlenecks? Who needs training on the systems you already have in place? These are detrimental questions that you have to ask and find answers for, before you invest your time and money into a new technology solution. The same can be said with Social Media.

I have quietly watched Social Media sites grow, with a unique perspective, as I was very involved in the early nineties with BBS systems and spent time online with Genie, AOL, and Prodigy back in the days. I viewed MySpace, Friendster, and Facebook in the same manner, another networking tool, never the holy grail of advertisement and promotion. In recent years I have attended several “Social Media” events and have met some very talented and creative people. I did enjoy a few “BarCamp” and “Tweet-up” events, but never felt compelled to become fully engaged as some are. I appreciate the efforts and the free exchange of ideas and information, as I follow many of the great people I met on Twitter and Facebook. I think my reluctance in embracing the whole idea, is amongst a crowd of great, brilliant minds, are some self-proclaimed experts that have self-serving intentions, that have in the past, taken advantage of those that have been sold that immersing yourself in SM will guarantee you revenue. Social Media is a form of networking and exchanging information. You can build a following and promote your products and/or services to those that are willing to listen. Those that don’t can easily opt out and turn a deaf ear, and a blind eye to your promotion.

The platforms of SM are indeed a technology, and I just want people to realize that with any technology you apply to your business, you need to be educated on how to use it to your best advantage. Be aware of the snake oil salesman out there. Much like losing weight, there is no magic pill, you have to make the sacrifices, do the work, be consistent, and reap the rewards.

Social Media is here to stay and I believe it is a good thing!

0 Comments By Amanda Wernick on January 13th, 2010
Categories: Marketing, Real Estate, Social Media

Social media is the new rage….just like the telephone!

Why does this matter to you? You’ve probably been hearing all about this:

SOCIAL MEDIA IS WHERE YOU NEED TO BE!

The question is WHY and why should your Realtor be involved in it?

We all have to admit that the internet has changed the way we gather information.

As a buyer, you no doubt start your home search on Google or Yahoo. You type in “Real Estate” and up pops a slew of pages with Real Estate Company’s, Realtors screaming from every page “PICK ME PICK ME”.

The truth is that unless you KNOW them, you won’t trust them with possibly the biggest purchase of your life! Referrals are great so it’s a good idea to ask someone you know who they used. Saying that though, what if you don’t know anyone who has purchased a home? What to do then?

This is where Social Media can help you decipher and locate an agent that will work well with you.

If you’re on Facebook, or Twitter or even if you’re not but have heard of YouTube, it is much easier to see WHO these people are before you choose someone to represent you!

It is no secret that you can gaze into the lives of these agents and decide to set an appointment based on testimonials given by past clients, but even more importantly, it will help you look at their personalities.

Mastering Social Media is no easy feat and there are constant conversations online about how it should be used or not used. Some are valid points, others just personal opinions.

What should you know about it?

You should know that Realtors that are actively engaged in Social Media have developed online relationships with people that they have not even had a chance to meet face to face…YET! At some point though, and without being able to explain how this happens, meetings are set to meet face to face. To be resource for one another. To engage in Real Estate.

The reach is so wide that people constantly refer one another. Someone moving out of state will connect with a Realtor they’ve developed a relationship with and ask for assistance.

If you’re a seller, imagine the power of the hundreds if not THOUSANDS of online relationships your Realtor has!

Social Media is here to stay and I believe it is a good thing!