Letter from the SLD President

WELCOMING CHANGE

Yogi Berra once said that baseball was “90% mental and the other half is physical.” As someone who always appreciated the complexities of such a simple game, Yogi lost me on this one. But as I watch highlight after highlight during the baseball season, I wonder how much the game has changed for someone like Yogi Berra. What differences would he see in today’s game versus the game he played years ago?

As The Southern approaches the 100 year mark, I wonder of the changes this great organization has seen over that time. Did you know the price for a pack of Camels in 1920 was $.13? Or that the Baby Ruth bar was originally only sold for a nickel? We pay a little more than that now. The truth is that our business changes by the minute, by the day. It’s easy to see it when you look back over the last 100 years, but it is happening on a continuous basis. I am very blessed to be a part of a family business that is approaching the same 100-year milestone as well as an organization like The Southern.

As President of the SLD for the past two years, I have had the privilege of meeting a lot of new people and learning from their experience in the dynamic atmosphere we work in. We have made changes to our committees, our board, and future schedules that we believe will make the SLD meetings that much more successful.

Last November in Hilton Head was a great meeting for us that started off with Scott McPherson giving us his “advice from the corner office.” His experience in the industry was something we all were able to learn from. Scott has set a high bar for Marty to hit in this year’s meeting. We then had an education session with Spencer Taylor centered around optimizing the people around us and optimizing the bottom line. Brandon Mohr once again led the Meetings with a Mission for us and did a great job. Thank you, Brandon, for all your work on this and your contributions to the SLD. On day two, we had two education sessions with Evan Carroll and Stan Phelps about customer service. This was something we as a group wanted to zero in on due the need to be able to stand out from competition.

We had several new members join us in Hilton Head and look forward to seeing the SLD continue its growth. This year’s meeting will be taking place in Grand Rapids, Michigan as we tour a H.T. Hackney facility and Red Stamp. Thank you to Marty Howell and Steve Stomel for setting this up for us. While the weather in Michigan is about as good as their football teams, I know this meeting won’t be one to miss. We hope to see you there.

Thank you, Jake Stewart SLD President