Members in front of the Ginger Bread Ship at the Ritz-Carlton, Amelia Island.

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What a rich history we have here on Amelia Island, the Island of 8 Flags. According to Michael Harris’ presentation the French were the first to arrive in 1562. Thereafter we were ruled by the Spanish from 1565-1763. The British took over from 1763-1783 and the Spanish came back in 1784-1821…. Back to the British, the French, the Spanish, etc. until today the U.S. No wonder we have so many pirates still hanging out here today. Isle the Mai, Santa Maria or whatever it was called at the time to us it is Amelia Island and it is a great place to be. Click here for more about the History of Fernandina Beach.

Amelia Island Museum of History

... the never ending challenges in renovating an old Victorian Home.

Nancy Rossiter invited the EABC group to the new home of the Learning Community of North Florida. We were all intrigued with this historic building formerly known as "the Kelly House". Nancy is working hard on the process of restoring this Victorian era home to its former glory.
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The new location of the
North Florida Learning Community

August 10, the European American Business Club held their meeting at the new location of the Waterwheel Gallery. Members who are also artists were asked to bring a piece of art not larger than 16” x 20”.  Attendees voted for their favorite piece and the winning art was displayed at the gallery for the remainder of the month. 

There was a tie and two pieces were chosen to be hang to the end of August on the walls of the Waterwheel Gallery. The first was a beautiful photograph of an old door by Peggy Albrecht; the other winning piece was a detailed rendering of the artist’s home around Atlanta by Steve Rieck. – Congratulations to both artists.

Lila Keim was the winner of the drawing for the $50 gift certificate towards a framing job from the Waterwheel Gallery.

This meeting at the beautiful Oyster Bay Yacht Club provided ideas and good advice from the following panel;

• Pamela Brown; Pam is Financial Advisor with Edward Jones and is focusing on a personal approach to investing and retirement planning for long term financial goals.
  
• Mark Dennis; Mark is the President of A1A Wealth Management, an independent financial planning and small business consulting firm. He specializes i working with business owners to build and protect their wealth.
• Carlos Serrano; Carlos is the SunTrust Branch Manager on Amelia; SunTrust Banks Inc. is one of the nations largest financial holding company and serves individual and business owners.
• Vicki Beaudry; Vicki is Executive Vice President and Senior Lender to First Coast Community Bank. She is perhaps the leading expert in SBA lending in northeast Florida and is quite knowledgeable about the SBA's export programs.

Overall the panel suggested that there are strong indications that things are getting better. They felt that if people/businesses are looking for loans they are out there. It is a good time to take advantage of these financial opportunities thanks to low interest rates and availability.
(read more...)

Members of the European American Club met in June at the Hoyt House where co-owner Myrta Defendini talked about the 10-bedroom mansion that was built by entrepreneur Fred W. Hoyt in 1905. The group was then entertained by local duo "Evolution" featuring Dave Ferraro and Han Ramakers. (read more...)

Click here to visit the Hoyt House

In his presentation "The Fourth Option" or "Outthink your Competition" Helmut showed how successful companies innovate beyond their product to pricing, sourcing, people and processes. It covered the importance of developing a playbook to become and to stay competitive. Based on 7 strategic patterns the audience had "Edison Moments" by better understanding how market leaders have revealed unorthodox solutions that everybody can use in their company and career transition.
Click here to check out Helmut's informative presentation.

Helmut is a certified innovation coach and communication facilitator. He is an experienced sales and marketing executive and change agent with extensive business development capabilities, acquired through his career in Europe and North America. With his company Headway International Consulting LLC. he also helps German small to midsize companies to start their business in the U.S. He finds his creative balance in fine arts photography

A special THANK YOU goes to the Cafe @ the Hamptons which hosted the event and treated the EABC members with fabulous Hors-d'oeuvres. Make sure to visit the Cafe, it is located at 95742 Amelia Concourse, Fernandina Beach, Florida - (904) 491-5229

April 13 the group met at The Learning Community of North Florida where they listened with great interest to
Deb Cottle from A World on a String, Inc. talking about
her proven 4STEP GUTS FORMULA. Deb reminded everyone that simple common sense ideas and daily applications go a long way.

Deb has successfully motivated individuals and groups in major corporations, associations, and non-profit organizations to exceed personal and professional expectations.

She definitely motivated the members of the our Club.

The March meeting treated us not to one but two excellent speakers. Both have a lot of background in the aviation industry.

Richard Johnson has over 45 years of aviation experience including 35 years of airline operations and network development experience at Delta Air Lines before retiring in 2000. Over his aviation career he has served on many airports and industry committees (IATA, ATA, ACI, and AAAE) both within the U.S. and worldwide. Fro the past 5 years he has been the Airport Manager for the City of Fernandina Beach and manages the local general aviation airport. He reminded us of how lucky we are having this municipal airport and that we should and could as a city capitalize on it a bit more.

Nick Feakes was born and raised in Stanmore (near Harrow) about 150 miles fro NW London. Nick joined British Airways as a pilot in 1973 flying DeHaviland Trident. He has given us some valuable insight on the history of flying as well as the operation. We were also intrigued to learn that he even flew Queen Elizabeth and her staff.
He retired in 2005 and moved to Fernandina Beach where he joined the Civil Air Patrol and later became commander of the Fernandina Squadron. He resigned from the Civil Air Patrol in 2010.

Almost next door to where it all started just a short year ago at the Amelia Island Chamber of Commerce, the European American Business Club held its first anniversary celebration last week at the offices of the Compass Group in the Gateway office park. <read more...>

July 14, 2010 Caroline Blochlinger (www.studioCBphotography.com) presented "A few Thoughts on Marketing" at the beautiful Oyster Bay Yacht Club. She finished her presentation with the following clip.