“At do good marketing we measure our success by our ability to use our marketing talents to do good marketing for our clients and use those skills to do good for others,” said Haviland. “What better way to do that in a coordinated effort than to get as many people as possible to do something nice for someone else on do good day?  Imagine what it would be like if everyone in the world decided to do something nice for someone else all on the same day?  Who knows, maybe the world would break out in peace?”

Last year’s response to the first annual do good day was overwhelming. Participants were not only located in New Jersey, but all over the nation.  “The stories were touching,” said Haviland.  “One woman donated her car to a needy family for six weeks and another paid the toll for a vehicle behind him on the Garden State Parkway!”

While the inaugural event generated nearly 1,500 participants with very little effort, for this year’s event, do good marketing has established an integrated communications plan to maximize participation.  In addition to traditional public relations strategies, do good marketing will be using social media platforms to disseminate information to participants before, during and after the event on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. A dedicated do good day page has been established on do good marketing’s Facebook page (search Facebook: Do Good Day 080410) where volunteers can register, post messages or photos; a Twitter hashtag has been created so all participants can monitor do good day activities prior to, during and after the event (#dgd0804); and Haviland will be posting video blogs or vloggings about do good day to the Facebook page and YouTube sites.  All participants are encouraged to join the conversation leading up to the annual event, post pictures, videos and encourage their friends to join in.

With more than 400 million active users on Facebook these days, Haviland wants to fully utilize the social media platform to increase participation in do good day, hoping that the message will go viral to friends of friends, colleagues, and families all over the world.

“To date, we have over 1,000 people registered for do good day,” said Haviland.  “The number one question I get is, ‘what if I’m not here on do good day?’ Anyone can participate and do something nice for someone else and it doesn’t matter where you are!”

The offices of the do good team marketing team will be closed on August 4^th to enable all to participate in various philanthropic activities.

Do good marketing, llc, established in 2008, is a virtual marketing/advertising firm.  While the do good world headquarters are in Glen Rock N.J., the virtual structure draws upon people and organizations located across the country. Do good clients receive top talent, but only pay for what they need.  Michael Haviland, 49, is the founder and managing partner and has over 25 years’ worth of advertising experience including some of the big firms in New York City and New Jersey. Current do good marketing clients include: Aurora Energy, Bergen Catholic High School, Children’s Aid and Family Services, Lenox Hill Hospital, Makai Events, Morris County Surgical Center, NAPA Auto Parts, Nutley Auto, Nyack Hospital, onebaddecision.com, Saint Dominic Academy, the Center for Alcohol and Drug Resources, Tuxedo Park Library and Tuxedo Park School. For more information, visit www.dogoodmarketing.com.

How many of you were once aspiring musicians? Wannabe rock stars?

The opportunity to create a roster of willing musicians with large enough garages or basements to hold monthly jams is too good to pass up. Use the comments section to let us know who you are and what you play. In addition give yourself a quick rating so the right folks can get together (e.g., I play trumpet and am an intermediate level player).

As more comments come in, this blog and the comments section can serve to connect those folks together and hopefully spur some new Glen Rock parent bands.

Rock on!

Not surprisingly, many residents are not thrilled with this decision. Some have gone so far as to put up a website and petition to attempt to halt this plan here: http://www.keepbergenbluelaws.com/ .

Where do you stand on this issue? Should we keep our blue laws or should we repeal them and open businesses up on Sundays? Tell us in the comments.

Photo courtesy of northjersey.com

How did you fare? Did you lose power? Are you still without power?! That was some storm last weekend and Glen Rock certainly took a beating. From the comfort of our homes perhaps it didn’t seem as vicious as it was (unless of course something fell on to your house). The aftermath however proved to be disruptive to most Glen Rock residents. 80% of homes lost power in our town according to the town web site. That’s significant. In addition, all schools were closed for a couple of days. This of course made any kind of transition back into the work week, a bit more challenging.

There are still many trees down around the neighborhoods and it’s not clear whether everyone has power back. The outages, at least for the younger children can cause confusion and anxiety but once that wears off the fun of candles, flashlights and perhaps a trip to grandma’s for some heat, light and warm food brings on a small sense of adventure.

So, how did you make out? What accommodations did you have to make on Monday and Tuesday since the kids couldn’t go to school? Tell us in the comments.

Any parent (not just a Glen Rock parent) will tell you that a good babysitter is worth her weight in Lucky Charms. Babysitters are the great equalizers. They allow you, the parent, to shed that title, albeit for a fleeting set of moments and become, dare it be said? An adult!

Yes, an adult who can dress up a bit, get a drink, see a movie, watch a band, grab a late-night meal, cut a rug and generally put the (extremely rewarding) monotony of parenthood away for a bit. Babysitters make that happen. Yet finding the right one for your family is a challenge.

What is the best way to find a babysitter in Glen Rock? Ads? Word of mouth and referrals? Should we focus on high school kids for this? We all used to be high school kids. Would we trust our former selves to watch our current kids?

This is one of those resources that most parents won’t share with others. Availability has to be maximized and the more parents that have a babysitter’s number the lower the chance she will be available to help you out when you need her.

So what do you do? Who do you use? Can you make any recommendations? Tell us in the comments.

Thanks Glen Rock and nice work. You made the job of being a Glen Rock parent that much easier this winter.

Central School is nearing it’s 100th day of classes this year. To commemorate this milestone the kids at the school have split into groups and are putting together efforts based around the number 100. One group has decided they would like to raise funds for the victims of the Haiti earthquake. This group of 1st graders are focusing their efforts on building shelters and new homes for the residents of Haiti.

The group has chosen Habitat for Humanity as their charity to support focusing specifically on their Disaster Response arm. According to their web site, the mission of Habitat’s Disaster Response arm is:

To develop innovative housing and shelter assistance models that generate sustainable interventions for people vulnerable to or affected by disasters or conflicts. In addition, Disaster Response builds the capacity of the global Habitat community in the areas of disaster mitigation, preparedness and recovery through education, training and partnerships.

To symbolize their support for the organization, the group from Central School is nailing 100 nails into 4 boards (one for each child) to kick off the building of new shelters and donating $1 per nail for a total of $100.

If you would like to help the team please consider donating to Habitat for Humanity as well.

The intent here is not to ridicule the kids. They’re kids after all and likely have absolutely no desire to sell cookies! The point is to take a look at this tradition with new eyes and not just go through the motions “because you did it” or “we’ve done it every other year.”

Many folks’ experiences typically end up as follows:

-       hit up the neighbors

-       bring the order form to work and guilt trip your co-workers with cute pictures of your kids (along with promises of kid delivery when cookies arrive)

-       guilt trip your local family into ordering

-       and, when all else fails, buy a bunch of boxes yourself

What does this teach our girls? Some would argue this sets up an educational opportunity where goals can be set, achievement plans created and success measured and rewarded. In reality, this usually doesn’t happen.

Your scout will agree to a quota and make attempts to sell to neighbors which is limited to your immediate vicinity since it’s Winter in Glen Rock and walking around the neighborhood is not very much fun.

You can’t ask your friends to purchase because they are likely going through the same dance. You child’s “network” is not large enough to promote enough sales. That’s where the parents step in.

The race is on to be the first at work to bring in the order form and spam the inboxes of your colleagues. Even if you get to be the “cookie person” at work, your child has zero exposure to this (perhaps only on delivery of the cookies they may get to see their buyers). Ultimately, you end buying an unnecessary amount of cookie boxes that, after months of gorging and re-gifting, you end up throwing away.

Again, what does this teach our girls? It likely teaches them nothing.

Do you have tactics you’ve used in the Glen Rock area to get your girls to sell more cookies? Have you had different experiences?

We’d love to hear from you in the comments.

* The views expressed in this post are those of the author based on experience both as a seller of scout-related goods and a parent of goods-selling scouts. Your mileage may vary.

Children have no problem making friends almost instantly (teenagers are a slightly different story) – it’s actually quite amazing. Adults, however, have a harder time. After all, this isn’t high school or college anymore and, while parents may run into each other here and there, we certainly have no obligation to hang out together. The toughest part for Glen Rock transplants is making a connection with a clique of parents who have known each other since childhood. The folks have shared history and very clear ideas about who their friends are and what they bring to the friendship.

So how do you break in? How long does it take?

Parents see each other at the drop off/pick up lines at school, birthday paries, the train station, the store, the gym etc and at some point have to take that awkward step, introduce themselves, see if there’s any chemistry and decide if there will be any future contact.

The easiest way to break in is the play date. You bring a kid. They bring a kid. Let the hang out begin. The kids provide a source for conversation as well as distraction if the hang out isn’t going well. Another effective way is to volunteer for a school or local activity. Making yourself the point of contact for a school event instantly gets your name out there and provides valuable interactions with the other parents. These are precious networking opportunities that should be exploited.

A very unscientific poll conducted by this blog recently revealed that it takes between 2 and 3 years to truly get established locally. The first two years are spent familiarizing with the town and its offerings. The 3rd year, you become a fixture on the scene and the conversations begin to flow much more readily. In many ways, 3 years is a long time to wait. More than 2 years of alone time is not exactly fun but in the end it sems to be worth it. Obviously certain personalities thrive on introducing and meeting strangers. These folks seem to be the exception rather than the rule.

So how do you do it? How do you break into the social circles in Glen Rock so as not to talk about kids and diapers and poop all day? Tell us in the comments.

Depending on the age of your kids, the decision on which local restaurant to patronize can be a tedious one. In this post, there are some suggestions for where to go locally based on the editors’ experiences. However, the surprisingly large number of places to dine in Glen Rock (and surrounding towns) means that there is always room for more reviews. Here are 5 options:

• Jalapeno’s (930 Prospect St.)- what was once a Mexican restaurant, then a Greek place and now, back to Mexican is pretty much the only Mexican place around here. Given that fact, one could say it is the best Mexican restaurant in the area. The food here is fairly good. The kids like the tortilla chips and, as a bonus, those same kids eat free on Sunday.
• Mangia (918 Prospect St.) – Italian food with great variety is not hard to find in Northern New Jersey but Mangia adds a nice home-cooked feeling to their food. The strip mall location (a stone’s throw away from Jalapeno’s) takes a bit of the authenticity out of the experience but the quality of the pizza and the food make up for it. Service is typically very good though their recent 50% price hikes have made it a far more expensive night out than it used to be.
• The Glen Rock Inn (222 Rock Rd.) – A local institution, the Glen Rock Inn serves up classic American fare in a familial setting. Those who go there seem to continue to come back. Add in the Cheers-style “everybody knows your name” vibe when you step in, and this nets out to be a pretty good place for a family dinner.
• Rock Fuji Sushi (186 Rock Rd.) – Local, authentic and delicious – not to mention they cater to the little kiddies with spring-loaded chopsticks and other treats. The prices are reasonable and the proprietor, waitstaff and chefs are so friendly, it’s worth going just for that.
• Chicken Kebab (898 Prospect) – This mom and pop Mediterranean place focusing on Turkish foods is short on table space but long on flavor and value. The food is homemade and prepared in an open kitchen format. Again, a strip-mall location doesn’t help the atmosphere of the place but it does allow you to relax and let the little ones run around a bit should they get restless. The pita, hummus and, well, chicken kebabs are fantastic and the price is absolutely reasonable. Toss in the warmth of the owners and it’s an easy choice for a casual dinner out.

Who did we leave out? Put it in the comments.