It has been quite some time since we’ve been able to surprise a new girl with a birthday party, and it’s always so much fun when they experience Southgate birthdays for the first time. Today, March 5, 2013, Southgate Coins is honoring our newest employee, Emily, on her 19th birthday. Although she is one of the lucky people who get to have multiple celebrations (since her birthday actually falls on March 6), that doesn’t stop our crew from living it up—she’s been the star around here all day!
Read on to see how the festivities went.
This morning, Emily was treated to the back office being decorated with Happy Birthday signs and banners, a Happy Birthday balloon, and a potted yellow tulip plant, complete with mini-balloon and big, yellow bow. Since she’d never been here for anyone’s birthday (although she came close by being hired right before Marie’s birthday), the decorations were shocking. So much so, that she opened the store a little more quickly than normal and raced back to take some personal pictures with her iPhone. Needless to say, we told her there would be plenty more pictures to come!
Now, for each employee’s inaugural Southgate birthday, it is our goal to surprise them. You know, truly surprise them. So, shortly after arriving back at the store from her post office run, I (Maya) busied Emily with some computer work, and loaded up her to-do list for the rest of the evening. Like the trooper she is, she simply rolled up her sleeves and dug into the tasks at hand. Little did she know, Nicole had already arrived (while she was at the post office) and was hiding in the conference office, waiting for her signal to come out.
When the music played over the store’s sound system, Emily showed her characteristic, elated reaction, and I ushered her over to the “party zone.” There, she found all of her birthday decorations, plus a cellophane-wrapped bundt cake with a large, decorative yellow flower in the center and two paper flowers with a “1” and a “9” on them. On cue, Nicole appeared from her conference office hiding place, and surprised Emily by wishing her a happy birthday. Emily was all smiles.
Nicole then presented her with her decorated birthday card, and Rusty unwrapped the cake to place and light the candles. Rusty dished out the cake (and vanilla bean ice cream), and we all enjoyed the succulent lemon flavor. As we told Emily earlier, we took quite a few pictures to commemorate the occasion!
It was so refreshing to everyone how genuinely grateful Emily’s reaction was to our special event. She repeatedly thanked everyone for their involvement, and was so warmed by our special touches. It goes without saying that we hope this marks the first of many special occasions we are able to put on with and for Emily in the years to come.
Happy 19th birthday, Emily! We’re glad we got to be first to honor you on your important day!
Maya, Nicole, Rusty, and Marie