"Winning is overrated. The only time it is really important is in surgery and war." ~Al McGuire

In order to take our minds off of a busy work week, some of us in the marketing and sales departments decided to have a fun contest during our lunch break. We just finished the first annual "Arby's Roast Beef Sandwich Eat-A-Thon", and to my dismay, I finished last. There were five competitors, Brendan Hughes, Ken Barhoover, Josh Schinagle, Jeff Tippy, and myself. We each invested in the "5 for $5" deal from Arby's, and had a contest. The rules were simple, whoever eats 5 roast beef sandwiches first wins, and if no one finishes 5 sandwiches, whoever eats the most wins.

As the contest started, Josh and I dug into our first sandwiches neck and neck, while Brendan and Ken started slowly with the intent to pace themselves. Jeff, however, took a different, maybe smarter approach. He combined his first two sandwiches into one, and began to inhale. After the first sandwich, Josh had a slight lead, while I was staying close behind. However, this was the beginning of my downfall. I unwrapped my second sandwich and started to eat. By the time I looked over at Josh, he was finishing his second, I knew I would have to keep up. I scarfed my second sandwich down. While unwrapping the third sandwich, I realized I should have paced myself like Ken and Brendan. I slowed down big time. Ken had no trouble catching and passing me at this point. In only a few minutes, Josh finished his fifth, and final roast beef sandwich. He is crowned as the official "Equity Trust Arby's Roast Beef 5 for $5 Eat-A-Thon Champion". Jeff's creative eating style was enough for him to earn second, followed closely by Ken. They both finished 4 sandwiches. Brendan was able to take 2 bites out of his fourth sandwich, totalling 3.25 roast beef sandwiches, which was enough for him not to be tied for last with me, at 3 sandwiches.

Other than the horrible feeling we felt after overindulging on roast beef sandwiches and Arby's sauce, I would say the contest went well. We had a great turn out this year, and I hope everyone can make it next year. Congratulations to all the competitors, who all gave their best effort in this year's contest.

"I order the club sandwich all the time, and I'm not even a member."

My name is Ryan D'Arcy, I am the Marketing Intern here at Equity Trust Company. I work at our Berea office, one mile down the road from the glorious and prestigious Baldwin-Wallace College, where I am currently a student. As I approach my final two semesters at BW, I am starting to realize how lucky I am to take part in this internship program. In school, I have a hard time narrowing down the specific area of marketing I want to work in, and this internship has given me the opportunity to experience all of them.

This is not the type of internship where I am getting people coffee, doing my boss's laundry, or surfing the Internet in an attempt to appear busy. At ETC, I get to take part in real projects, most of which will still be around long after I am finished. And the best part is, each of my projects has given me experience in a different area of marketing. I have researched state specifications for lawyers, accountants, and financial ad visors to gain continuing education credit through the classes and webinars we offer. I have created a new HR brochure from scratch using Adobe InDesign and Photoshop, and also created a new logo for our Equity Trust Careers page on Adobe Illustrator. I have created marketing reports and analyzed how well each of our marketing efforts have been generating leads for the sales team. Currently I am helping promote and "re-create" our careers page and finding new ways to market it on Facebook and Twitter. I am also currently working with many of our high level managers to put a brand new online tax lien investment process into place. In my time here, I have had the opportunity to meet with all of the channel managers, and even the President and CEO of our company.

It seems my blog has only talked about the "work" I do, I did not even mention the fun. One of the core values of ETC is "We have fun at what we do", and it is no lie. If you work here, be prepared to laugh daily. You'll get to take part in Indians games, cookouts, and happy hours. All in all, this is a great place to work and be an intern.