The Rising Tide Society has been a huge part of my life the past 3 years as I’ve had the blessing of leading the Scranton, PA chapter. Many of my friendships have come from the people in that group, we meet once a month and our time together is always encouraging! 

Natalie Franke, the co-founder of Rising Tide Society & Honeybook hosted a leader’s retreat in New Orleans this past weekend. Brit Kolo, of Jam Marketing Group, has been attending our local meet ups for a while now & is the new co-leader of our group so we decided to make the trip down to the retreat! 

Let’s just preface by saying, Brit is never going to let me be the one to book flights again. I looked for the cheap ones and paid no attention to the departure and arrival times. Turns out that is a pretty important thing to pay attention to. It was a 3 day trip and we had 2 all nighters mixed into that because of travel. Lesson learned. Still recovering from lack of sleep. But the trip was totally worth it! We had an amazing time! 

We started the trip Friday night at midnight meeting in Tunkhannock to drive to Philly for our 5am flight and we arrived in New Orleans around 8am. We found a cute place for breakfast and then spent the rest of the day walking & eating our way around the French Quarter. Our AirBnb was super cute and comfy in the Garden District! Sunday morning was the start of the retreat and by the end of the day, Brit & I were both in information overload! I went in with no expectations and was blown away with the speakers & content! TravelBank hosted a Masquerade Ball on Sunday night on the rooftop of the hotel, it was fun to get dressed up! We only lasted an hour before deciding that going to a bakery to get cake to eat in bed sounded like a better option since we were so tired! 

The next morning, Brit gave me advice on what coffee to get that takes the least like coffee because the tiredness was kicking in! Our last day of the retreat was inspiring and left us so excited to go home & get to work! Our Uber driver on the way to the airport said to us “Do the right thing for long enough and good things will come. Just keep doing the right thing” which was a perfect summary of all we heard at the retreat. God works in funny ways like letting your uber driver say exactly what you both needed to hear. 

To be in a room with over 100 people who are selflessly serving & making waves in the communities is enough to make your heart feel like bursting! It’s inspiring to hear the stories of all of the small businesses who are succeeding because of the small part we can play in it! For anyone in the Northeast Pennsylvania area that is a small business owner or a creative, I would love to chat with you about the Rising Tide Society! Feel free to send me an email!  

Thank you to everyone who helped make this Retreat possible!

Venue: Pontchartrain Hotel // Planning Logistics: Logan Doerries // Gala Photographer: Trevor Mark // Stickers:The Nap Time Artist // Agate Placard Calligraphy: Romey Marie // Cards: Lily and Grey // Florist: Antigua Floral // Session Photographer: Madison Short // Signage Calligrapher: Anna Kornick // Balloon Installation: Badass Balloon Co.