Despite A Year of Change and Lockdown, Cook & James Still Out and About Helping in the Community

by Kara Cook

Winston Churchill said, “to improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.” Stephen Hawking said, “intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.” By the markers of those two legendary thinkers, at Cook & James we’re not only improving by the day, but are perfectly intelligent!

Not to sound like we’re on our high horse or anything but, coming up on a year since the world went crazy with pandemic shutdowns, Heather and I did some reflecting and we’re pretty dang proud of what we’ve been able to accomplish despite significant headwinds. We think it’s because we kept calm, didn’t forget who we were, and stuck to our Canons, sayings like “there’s more than one way to skin a cat,” “swing for the fences,” “come hell or high water” … you get the drift.

And it really was “come hell or high water” sometimes to conduct the main business at Cook & James: getting closings done. While much of the economy was cold, the real estate market was hot and we had to figure out how to get the job done…social distanced, masked, sanitized, and gloved.  We were deemed an essential business and needed to ensure our people and our clients stayed safe come hell or high water…and we had plenty of both! We had to change in many ways, even quickly innovating the curbside closing.

Beyond our core business, Heather and I refused to bail on our commitment to bring our special brand of fun, personality and community support to the closing table and, indeed, to each and every encounter with us. And, despite the changing headwinds, we kept innovating.

Virtual classes and social events

Gone were the days we could meet in person for continuing education classes, chili cook offs, golf outings, lunches and other networking events. So, we dove headfirst into the brave new virtual world. We offered a robust roster of online CE classes on GAR contract changes, license law, real estate ethics and more. We figured out how to “take attendance” on zoom calls so everyone received their proper CE credit and we fulfilled the strict guidelines for instructing ongoing education.

Beyond CE classes, we offered plentiful opportunities to let our hair down together – our virtual classes were total hits with Taco Tuesdays, wine tastings and even a mixologist sharing the craft of cocktail making online. These casual meet ups were so popular that we’re planning more. Watch your inboxes and alerts for a St. Patty’s Day-themed zoom cocktail event in March featuring Irish whiskey and another in the spring, where we’ll explore lighter, more refreshing drinks with gin and vodka. All these special events are first-come, first-served with a limited number of participants to keep it manageable in terms of zoom overload and the fact that we personally hand deliver our now-famous purple boxes with all the fixins for the event.

Also on tap in the near future are more virtual class offerings, including four in just the next month: Bryce Linden’s license law CE class on Feb. 11 that satisfies the three-hour course requirement by GAR for CE toward license renewal; a free webinar tutorial for real estate pros using the Canva design tool on Feb. 22; a class on GAR contract changes on Feb. 23; and a free CE class on social media for real estate agents on March 10.

A Helping Hand

And through it all, as we were busily changing and developing online tools and virtual platforms to get business done, we kept giving back. Another couple of our Canons - “the buck stops here” and “always do the right thing” - remind us that giving back and kindness are in our DNA and must stay front and center.

Throughout 2020 we donated food and supplies, bought meal cards to support restaurants, gathered household supplies for the Volunteer Aging Council, filled backpacks for students, picked up trash in our little section of the Keep Roswell Beautiful program, and recognized the wonderful front-line workers from Amazon, FedEx, UPS and USPS that make essential deliveries daily. Read our summary of quarantine activities here.

During the holidays we helped assemble food for the Thanksgiving dinner outreach at North Fulton Community Charities, packed stocking stuffers for kids through the Salvation Army’s Angel Tree Foundation, and gathered toys for low income Cobb County families through Cobb Christmas, Inc.

And already, barely 30 days into 2021, we have already invested hours at the Giving Garden, when Market Developer Sam Holt dug in the dirt to help feed neighbors at this community garden outreach site in Mableton. We have no intention of slowing down our giving. We have multiple events planned for 2021 with GAHBA (Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association) including spring and summer golf tournaments and various meeting sponsorships. Atlanta Communities and the Association of Realtors in Cobb, Cherokee and Atlanta, are always great groups with whom to partner and we look forward to multiple chances for social and business networking opportunities with them and many others.

We’ll continue our monthly Act of Kindness initiative and focus on worthy causes like cancer, heart-health, foster care, homelessness and more. Our support of local neighbors in need will not wane and we fully intend to fill more backpacks for kids, assemble more holiday dinners and gather more items for angel giving trees. We’ll monitor for ways we can help students at local schools, and if you have a suggestion, please let us know.

All these activities will be done through the lens of kindness for neighbors, colleagues and our very own employees without whom, we could not survive. So, we plan to keep our sense of humor and openness to change, no matter what 2021 throws at us. We look forward to having you – our friends and colleagues – along for the ride. If you have ideas about tangible ways we can help, please call or email the office. Reach us at info@CookandJames.com or 404-704-0440. Stay safe. Stay healthy. Stay kind.