By Gregg Cohen, CEO

Happy July to our wonderful Clients, Friends, Family and Staff! Because many of my best friends and family who have strong ties to Pittsburgh read our blog, I thought I’d take a minute to recognize the best team in baseball (as of the time I’m writing this)…the Pittsburgh Pirates! Who woulda thunk it?

As someone who actually did cry in 1992 when Francisco Cabrera of the Braves drove in the deciding run in the National League Championship Series which sent my beloved Buccos into a 20 year losing skid (although I guess you can’t really call 20 years of futility a ‘skid’, can ya?), I think all Pirates fans deserve this moment of glory. And yes, I do realize that we have a long way to go in the season and it’s a stretch to call it a ‘moment of glory,’ but the truth is that we have gone 20 seasons without a winning record. So the idea of ‘glory’ is truly relative.

(UPDATE – So, we lost a few in a row and now we’re the 2nd best team in baseball, but the theme still applies!)

Jumping now into news from inside the company walls, I’m very excited to announce that our company has officially re-launched our brand and organized all of our companies under the “JWB Family Of Companies” umbrella. This was a decision that was first inspired by the marketing possibilities of such a move, but also by our long-term vision of our company’s ability to become a well-known brand in our local Jacksonville market.

In addition to our investment business (formerly Jacksonville Wealth Builders), we also have an acquisitions arm (Progress Home Buyers), a construction company (Main Street Construction), a property management company (Peace of Mind Property Management) and we are managers of a private placement fund (BellaCoop). Obviously telling people who we work for was about as clear as mud for our connections in the community and our vendors. Sometimes even our own teammates would get confused as to who they worked for. We realized that if our own team doesn’t know, no one else in the community is connecting the dots either. And all that means is that we are missing opportunities.

We also started to think about the sheer amount of signage we can now advertise. Because of our different companies, at any one time there are probably 500 properties that could have our company’s brand displayed on signs. We expect that number to continue to grow as well. And because we concentrate our acquisitions, construction and property management in specific neighborhoods in Jacksonville and the surrounding areas, it’s only a matter of time before people really take notice of the JWB brand in and around their neighborhoods.

At the same time, our team has been committed to serving the community by volunteering at least 400 hours this year. We have also been blessed to receive many local and national awards over the past few years including the #12 Fastest Growing Real Estate Company in the US by Inc. Magazine in 2012, one of the Fastest Growing Companies in Northeast FL for the past 3 years, and the #8 Best Places To Work In Northeast FL in 2012. All of this recognition should play a part in our rise as a prominent local company here in Jacksonville.

Of course, our goal has never been to become the biggest. We have always wanted to become the best. However, it certainly doesn’t hurt to become well-known in the process. We think this new JWB brand will help us do just that.

This move also speaks volumes about our long-term vision of our company as well. When I speak with clients, many times they ask if we are planning on leaving Jacksonville or if we have plans of selling out. The first thing I always tell them is that we love what we’ve built and who we work with, so we have no plans of giving that up any time soon. I can tell you that we have always envisioned our business as one of those businesses that is around for 20 or 30 years, or longer. We believe that when you build a business to be around for 20-30 years, you’re probably going to make better day-to-day decisions because of the focus on the long-term. By us investing more in our local brand, this is another move that speaks to our long-term focus to become one of Jacksonville’s best and brightest companies.

If you have any questions about the re-branding efforts, please reach out to your Lauren Traxler at (904) 677-6777 or lauren@jwbcompanies.com.

Gregg Cohen is the CEO of Jacksonville Wealth Builders. JWB serves clients in 9 countries and 31 states who have invested in over 450 investment properties since 2006. In 2012, Jacksonville Wealth Builders was recognized as the #12 Fastest Growing Real Estate Company in the US by Inc. Magazine. To learn more about our team and our investments, please call (904) 677-6777.