Great Western Containers News Letter

Welcome to the Summer Edition from Edmonton South Division! The sun is shining and it’s a great day!

Firstly, we have a few introductions to make! We would like to welcome to Great Western Containers our very own Sales Manager, Henry Pater, featured here on his first trip to Fort McMurray…

My name is Henry Pater and I am the second newest addition to the GWC Edmonton Sales Team. Barbara Noster is the newest member and we are fortunate to have her join Greg and Genele on our CSR team.

I joined GWC after spending 10 years in the Food Service Industry; five years as a Sales Representative and the last five years as Sales Manager. I cannot express in words my happiness to stop dealing with rotten lettuce. On the other hand, I am grateful for those experiences, as I will be able to apply the skills I learned to GWC.

In the short but quick two months I have been here, I already see and value the Great people that I am able to work beside. I enjoy the open and honest communication as well as the teasing and joking that Rex (Greg) is always the instigator of.

Ramona is my beautiful wife of sixteen years and the mother of my two wonderful children. My ten year old daughter’s name is Delaney. She is an artist and an athlete. If she is not playing piano at home, she is playing Ringette in the winter and baseball in the summer. She would join more sports if we let her. My son’s name is Lukas and he is seven. He loves his dog Maggie and fights with his sister to have Maggie sleep with him at night. He enjoys sledding in the winter and playing soccer in the spring. Ramona is also an artist who does paintings and loves to pick colors and design people's homes. She works part-time for Chintz, an interior design and home furnishings store in Edmonton.

I play hockey in a beer league so whatever calories I expend playing, quickly get re-applied after the game. Like any parent with kids in sports, we spend a lot our time cheering our kids on. In summer we like to camp (more us than Ramona).

I want to thank everyone I have met so far for their help and their patience during this time of steep learning curves. I anticipate meetings, seminars and other company functions will give me an opportunity to meet and visit each of you at your locations. Hopefully sooner rather than later!

Till then,
Cheers,

Next, we would like to introduce Barb Noster. Barb has joined us as our third CSR and has just completed her first month with Great Western Containers! Barb had a few words of her own to add too…

I'm very proud to be an addition to the Edmonton South Division. I have come from a sales background with most of my experience in retail management. I believe teamwork is the key to meet and exceed all challenges towards success. I would like to thank everyone for their support and welcoming smiles during my training at GWC. I hope I can be there for all of you as I develop my new skills.

A little bit about me, I have two children, Marcella 11 years old and Christopher 17 years old. Parenting has its challenges but I love it and I'm very proud of both of them. The outdoor activities I enjoy are camping, hiking and dirt bike riding. I also like to write. I journal, write poetry and short stories. I often put together plans and strategies to attain goals on paper. I use it to help myself succeed at what may be important to me. I enjoy using this for personal development, fitness, health and so on.

That's probably more than enough about me, so once again I will say I'm happy to be here.

Whilst we’re on the subject of introductions, since there have been so many new faces in the last twelve months, we decided it would be a good idea to get an up-to-date photo of the office staff at Edmonton South. However, trying to get everyone together on the same day proved impossible so we improvised slightly…

Top row (L-R): Gerry Connell, Donna Wardlaw, Maria Mancini, Corwin Esau, Henry Pater, Dave L’Heureux,
Greg Irvine, Bruce Disney, Genele McGaughey. Bottom row (L-R): Dean Winchester, Kate Barclay, Barb Noster.

Unfortunately, we also have to say farewell to one of our faces, Dean Winchester. Over the past year, he has been an inspiration to us all with his very positive outlook on life and the constant smile on his face. He will be sorely missed, and hard to replace, but we wish him all the luck in the world in his future adventures.

Over the past few months, as well as our new additions to the team, we have had a couple of other reasons to celebrate:

Bobby and Kim Royer tied the knot on 19 April 2008. We wish them all the best in their future life together.

For those of you who haven’t met him,
Bobby is the Waste Water Treatment Operator on our Night shift.

On Friday 23 May, the Edmonton South division held our first BBQ of the year. After two days of rain, the sun came out and it was a beautiful day…

Dean and Bruce did a fantastic job cooking the burgers >

Dave and Henry were first in line >

Everyone ate, >

< Kate dished them up.

< Then came everyone else…
(L-R) Roy Fita, Duarte Raposo

< everyone drank
(L-R) Joe Cuhna, Joe Andrade, Joe Paiva and Alberto Ferreiro.

and everyone was merry as we all relaxed in the sunshine (or the shade!) …

(L-R) Picture 1: Mariano Damaso, Joe Cabral, Manuel Narciso, David Janes, David Cordeiro, Roy Fita, Rui Nascimento. Picture 2: Earl Engerdahl, Jedd Hughes, Deepak Kumar, Antonio Martins, Joe Catarino

(L-R) Picture 3: Leo Botelho, Erwin Campbell, Rick Vandenbroek, Kristian Morrison.
Picture 4: Kevin Burtch, Manuel Melo.

(L-R) Picture 5: Linn Pascal, Bruck Fabriss. Picture 6: Antonio Martins, Don Neigel.

Since many of you have not had the privilege of touring our Edmonton Warehouse facility, we thought we would bring it to you…

Welcome to the Edmonton South Warehouse, home of our Warehouse team, Don Neigel and Kevin Burtch and also our Corporate Purchaser, Paul LaBissioniere.

Keep up the great work, guys!

With his own personal kitchen and dining area, we think Paul probably has one of the smartest offices in the whole of GWC!

Our warehouse facility was opened in 2004. It covers 28,000 square feet and has approximately 75 deliveries per day. We have also improved our customer service by recently extending the hours from 7.00am - 3.30pm to 7.00am - 4.30pm, Monday to Friday.

Submitted by Donna Wardlaw

Memory boxes are lovingly painted by volunteers at Hearts Delight Studio where I occasionally go to paint. The boxes are purchased and volunteer painters pay $ 3.00 each and gather together one night, learn new techniques, catch up on news and paint up a storm. It is with great heart that we paint these boxes as they are used by parents to bring possessions of their newborn child home from the hospital, unfortunately the child does not come home themselves.

How it started:

The Memory Box Program is an all volunteer effort to provide boxes for families of infants that pass away in the hospital so that the families do not leave the hospital without any representation of that child's life. The programs run all over Canada and the United States. To date, the program has provided boxes for infant bereavement programs free of charge.

The purpose of the program is to affirm that life for the family. As crafters and artists, each box is created with great love and a sincere wish to reach out in support and understanding. We know each infant is special and very, very loved, regardless of how long the child lived.

Lorraine Fletcher, the owner of Hearts Delight Studio, received a thank you from the Royal Alex Hospital expressing their gratitude for the last shipment and complimenting us on the wonderful quality of the lovely boxes.

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