What’s Happening at PCG?
From donut parties to happy hours, and holiday parties for every occasion.
It’s always happening at PCG.
News
Summer 2012
In the children’s classic story Tuck Everlasting, we read that “the first week of August hangs at the very top of summer, the top of the live-long year, like the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning.” We’d like to take that pause at the height of summer to share some exciting new developments at PCG! To start, while we have recently said goodbye to some valued team members, we are more than overjoyed to introduce the newest members of our dynamic staff: Maya Lonchar, Cliff Johnson, and Jade Arias. Maya Lonchar is PCG’s new Office Manager. She will be taking over the role of our internal office functions such as accounting, human resources, and IT. She brings lots of start-up office experience as well as an incredible sense of humor to our team. Cliff Johnson is the second Operations Manager for our growing accounting department. Cliff is sharing a wealth of knowledge in accounting and consulting with PCG. And last but not least, Jade Arias has joined PCG as our newest Marketing Intern. She is a student at Dominican University here in San Rafael and will be able to help PCG grow its marketing efforts. In other news, many members of our staff had the privilege of attending the art show of our office administrator, Kathleen, in San Francisco at the beginning of August. Kathleen has been painting for many years and we were so grateful for her to share her passion with us. More of her art can be found at her website:www.katabell.com. We also celebrated a BIG milestone for our valuable IT Manager, Ike Nam, who has been with PCG for 5 years. Coincidentally, his 5 year anniversary happened to be the same week as his birthday so we threw him a surprise birthday/anniversary party at Country Club Bowling in San Rafael. We aren’t sure if we were able to pull off the surprise but we definitely all had a blast! To close, we would like to invite everyone to our next Marin Business Forum event, “Collaborative Entrepreneurship: How Networks of Small Companies Can Do Big Things,” on September 20th in Larkspur. For more information, please see the MBF website: http://marinbusinessforum.com/. Hope everyone is having a fun and safe summer!
Spring 2012
As PCG celebrates its 9th anniversary, we are finding that we have much more than just that to celebrate! At the beginning of March, TJ was asked by the Entrepreneurs’ Organization to give a short presentation on the growing pains of Employee Development at their monthly “Guru” event. At the end of March, Franka (along with two other industry leaders, Nina Gardner and Pete Woodring) presented the second Marin Business Forum event where they discussed “How to Turn Your Company into a Hiring Machine” with expert John Younger, CEO of Accolo. To celebrate the occasion, a fun social wine tasting took place after the discussion provided by Peju Province Winery. To hear more about upcoming Marin Business Forum events and to get on the mailing list, check out the website!
In other news, we have recently welcomed two new members to the PCG Accounting Team: Ashley Brunner and Jamie Dumont. Ashley joins us as a Controller with many years of corporate accounting background. Jamie joins our accounting bookkeeping backbone with energy and eagerness to help support the team. What better way to commemorate new employees than to also recognize the anniversaries and birthdays of our current staff. Dory and David, two strong members of our accounting team recently achieved one year of service with PCG. Also recently hitting the one-year mark is our office admin Kathleen! Finally, hitting the 6-year mark is our fearless leader of the Employee Development and Business Consulting Department, Gail! We also celebrated birthdays for Franka, Sarah, and Jamie! Last but definitely not least, we want to share our most recent team-building events. To the joy of all our sports enthusiasts, we took in one of the final pre-season baseball games at AT&T park where our team was split between cheering for our two local MLB teams, the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland Athletics.
Fall 2011
As leaves begin to fall outside, PCG is still bright and sunny. September was a particularly busy month for the PCG Staff. Earlier in the month, Pacific Crest Group announced the acquisition of Compass Accounting of San Francisco. By adding Compass’s foodservice client base, we are able to broaden our accounting services client portfolio in the San Francisco Bay Area’s restaurant sector. Being that a good amount of PCG staff members are self-proclaimed food lovers, we couldn’t be more excited! Speaking of food, we were fortunate enough to celebrate three birthdays in the recent weeks of some very active employees. What better way to celebrate than with a running shoe themed birthday cake! In our last news update, we announced the Marin Business Forum. In late September, Franka Winchester, one of our fearless leaders, presented to a group of 30+ bay area business owners about the strategies behind using outsourcing to help grow a small company into an industry leader. To read more about upcoming Marin Business Forum events, visit our blog. Finally, as one of our most recent and most unique team building events, we took a sunset cruise around the SF Bay on a catamaran boat. It was a great way to end the week and spend some time together where we just got to relax and enjoy the view.
Summer 2011
PCG has been having quite a busy summer and we are excited to share all the news with you! The summer started with one of our newer employees taking off to chaperone a teen runners’ study trip consisting of a 4 ½ week journey through Egypt, Turkey, Greece, Italy, Austria, and Germany sponsored by Drake High School. Dory Weston, who took this trip herself 12 years ago, was eager to give back to a new generation of runners and help to introduce them to other cultures in a hands-on way. For more information on her trip see the great online article at the Marin Independent Journal. We continued into July with a team bonding experience while wine tasting in Sonoma Valley. Through lots of laughs, we were able to taste some great food and great wine with most of our team members. On this fun day trip, we also able to recognize a special occasion for one of our employees… our IT Manager, Ike Nam, who celebrated his 4th anniversary with PCG. We don’t know what we would do without him! Most recently, we are happy to announce that our Office Admin is now a happily married woman! On July 30th, Kathleen Bell officially became Kathleen Bell Buck! We wish her and her husband Jacob all the best! Lastly, Franka Winchester, co-founder of PCG, will be co-presenting to members of the business community on Outsourcing Efficiencies as part of the Marin Business Forum on Thursday, September 22nd. More information to come!
Fall 2010
Things are looking very bright at PCG! Firstly, you are now looking at our brand new website! We knew that our old website wasn’t accurately portraying Pacific Crest Group’s level of professionalism and superb, comprehensive menu of service offerings. The new website was launched in December 2010. Let us know what you think! We continue to add new members to our team. No surprise here! Recent additions include Patrick Teixeira in Accounting, Carolyn Pettit in Human Resources, and Cole McGowan in Marketing. Welcome, all! T.J. Van Voorhees, a co-founder of PCG, presented to members of the Entrepreneurs Organization about “Exit Planning” on October 21st. This very successful presentation actually evolved into a similar and more recent event titled “Buying, Dying, or Selling? 10 Ways to Increase the Value of Your Business.” Held on November 18th and hosted by Pacific Crest Group, T.J. and guest speaker Danny Krebs delivered key points on how to increase the value of a business, to a packed house! Attendees called the presentation “Extremely Valuable” and “Essential Information for all Business Owners.” PCG also made an appearance at the bowling alley, where we had too many strikes to count! And, of course, we can’t forget the company picnic, below. Go PCG, Go!
Corte Madera Park
Summer 2010
We recently celebrated PCG’s seventh anniversary with a company trip to Sonoma. Wine tasting, tours, and dancing in the party bus on the way home made for a great day together.
Fall 2009
PCG’s Gail Merz appeared on local CBS affiliate KPIX Channel 5 during a segment on sick leave policies and the H1N1 virus. Watch the video. Our accounting team continues to grow, with Accounting Associate Laura Olcott joining PCG this fall. And in traditional company fashion, we celebrated Halloween in style. Princess Lea and the Witch won best costume awards.
Summer 2009
Franka returned to work full-time in August and shared stories and photos of daughter Trinity. She was born May 23, at 8 pounds 14 oz and 21 inches, with a little blond hair and bright blue eyes. She is a growing girl; this picture was taken during a family trip to Santa Monica last week. Trinity enjoyed her first plane ride and bike ride.
Earlier this summer, we celebrated PCG’s sixth year in business by visiting the Gundlach Bunchu and Buena Vista wineries in Sonoma.
February 2009
The new year has gotten off to a very healthy start at PCG: January was our busiest month ever, and we’ve recently brought on a new hire. Our team now includes accounting associate Jeff Lo. To celebrate, we hosted a dinner for everyone to get to know one another.
October 2008
Olivia Woods came on board as a new Accounting Associate. She is already an essential part of our internal accounting and is doing a wonderful job maintaining the systems of many of our clients. We had a great time at our annual Halloween Potluck
March 2008
On March 17, Client Services Associate Staci Bonaso welcomed June-Bella Fraye Bonaso!
June 2006
Pacific Crest Group moves to its new location in the Wood Island Building Complex overlooking the Larkspur Ferry Terminal. More elbow room for everyone! And great views of Mount Tam.