The Best Way to Spread Cheer

Well team it’s officially ELF season in the Ellenberger household.?

Elf can now be watched an unlimited amount of times. We have a household rule that you cannot watch elf until after Thanksgiving.?

This is partly for Faith's sanity and it gives us something to look forward to.?

Usually I wait to start the Christmas movie leadership series, until it’s at least December.?

But since it’s close enough let’s….. wait you know what I will wait. You’ll have to wait till next week for an ELF lesson.?

This week as we close out November I want to talk about a Biltmore Christmas which is actually a movie premiering tonight on Hallmark, Faith is recording it.?

Anyways, while we were gone for Thanksgiving we went to the Biltmore for their Christmas display.?

If you don’t know what the Biltmore is, you should watch the movie number 1. It’s the largest home in America. It’s 175,000 square feet, 250 rooms, 35 bedrooms, 43 bathrooms, and 65 fireplaces. It was built by George Vanderbilt in 1889 and was first open to family and guests on Christmas Eve 1895.

During the tour you have a little radio that you plug the number in and the curator tells you a brief history of the room you are in. We did not go into all 250 rooms. I think in total we visited about 25 different stops along the way.?

There are so many fascinating things about the Biltmore, but I want to focus in on one thing, but first I want you to fully understand the scope of the Christmas experience.?

There are:

67 decorated trees just inside the house.?

A 35 foot tall Fraser Fir in the banquet hall that requires 50 staff members to carry and raise into place.?

45,000 lights and 282 candles inside the house and 850,000 lights around the estate.?

400 hand lit luminaries line the front of the house?

The banquet hall tree has 500 ornaments alone, the rest of the trees collectively have 13,870

238 fresh wreaths around the property?

Around 1,600 feet of garland is used in the house?

9,510 yards of ribbon is used primarily to form bows?

I think you get the point. This wasn’t put together over a weekend, a month, even a quarter.?

Planning for this event is a 12 month process. And spans across many departments.?

As I walked through and looked at the details and grand scale of the decorations. It got me thinking about our planning and teamwork.?

Do you have 50 team members willing to help you carry a 35 foot tree into a house without bumping into a single historic artifact, raising it into place and centering it just perfectly. Have you ever put a 7 foot tree into a tree stand? Ok… so now think 5 times the headache!?

Do you have a team willing to hand light 400 luminaries, while raining and 30 degrees??

Do you have a team who can hang 50 ornaments? That’s 450 less than just one tree at the Biltmore.?

Willingness is something I talk a lot about. Are you willing, are they willing, are we willing to pick up our part of the tree. Because we know the impact that tree will have.?

The Biltmore will welcome over 300,000 tourists from November to January. Do you know how many pictures will be taken of that tree? Do you know how many families and couples will have their Christmas photo taken in front of that tree??

The Biltmore team understands the impact they have behind the scenes working as a team to prepare everything just right.?

Let me ask you a question:?

Do you know how many miles will be run on our treadmills from November to January??

Do you know how many meters will be rowed??

How many dead bugs and crunches will be done on the floor??

How many showers will be taken??

How many breakthroughs and PR will happen??

Do you know how many people will say yes to us as their fitness solution??

I do….. more than we can count or even think up.?

Why is this important? Because, just like Faith, I paid to go to the Biltmore to take a picture of that tree, and stood there in awe of the moment that didn’t disappoint.

Your members paid to run or walk those miles, row those meters, and sculpt their core. Did they do it on dirty treadmills, a rower not working correctly, or a floor that has hairballs on it? Or, did we do a Great job as a team to step up and not disappoint our members??

The point is managers, you can’t do it alone. Just like I can’t do it alone. You need a team of willing people who understand how many’s will take place in that studio and care enough to make each of them special and count.?

The challenge for all of us….. all 100 plus OTF904 team members to pick up our side of the tree. Because we know the power of the impact on our members how many’s.?