Business Spotlight: Thank You, Lady

Sept. 16 has been proclaimed “Say Thank You Day” in Springfield in part by the efforts of LaDonna Greiner, aka the Gratitude Queen and the Thank You Lady. This probably wouldn’t be the case if she hadn’t been laid off from a 20-year fundraising career in February 2015.

After leaving Holt International Children’s Services in Atlanta, she took a little time to figure out what actually made her tick. Now, a motivational coach, speaker and creator of the 21 Reasons to Say Thank You series, she wants to make her mark and her living by teaching others how to spread happiness, appreciation and gratitude – partly by breathing life into the dying art of handwritten notes.

“I’ve always worked for nonprofits,” Greiner says, “but this is more about leaving a personal, meaningful legacy to my friends, my family and everybody I meet.”

Her path to founding LG Consulting & Training LLC began by starting to write a book on marriage. She was confronted with eye-opening statistics when researching the fourth chapter on gratitude. Studies show that grateful people statistically are happier, healthier and also improved employees – she quotes from a collection of sources: They live seven years longer with 10 percent fewer stress-related illnesses, 12 percent lower blood pressure and seven percent increased income.

“Their attendance and … retention is better in a workplace that practices employee engagement and appreciation,” she says.

Meanwhile, she also was attending 1 Million Cups, a free weekly networking and educational meeting for entrepreneurs. Soon, she was presenting her own idea: notebooks for gratitude. But researching the costs of the notebooks led her to decide on a high-quality box that includes an entire gratitude toolkit: cards, envelopes, a pen and a book with tips on what to write.

“What I like about it is it’s not just informational, but it puts it into practice,” says Brent Gilstrap, a licensed counselor with an emphasis in positive psychology, who is now a real estate agent with Carol Jones, Realtors. “Sometimes, we can live our lives in such an entitled way that we take things for granted.”

When it came time for manufacturing, she first sought to have the boxes created in the Ozarks but couldn’t find a company for the job.

“It held me up by six months when I discovered that I had to go overseas to get them,” she says.

In the interim, she presented her idea at 1 Million Cups throughout the Midwest and in Tampa, Fla. Feedback from those presentations created another course-correction.

“I discovered that I really am a motivational coach and speaker and the product is my support for coaching and speaking,” she says.

Before long, she was speaking to organizations and churches locally and traveling to South Korea to speak with children about volunteering.

Greiner believes well-meaning handwritten notes have the power to change people, so her kits coach everyone from parents to managers on how to express gratitude in writing.

Jim Anderson, CoxHealth’s vice president of marketing and public affairs, says the health system encourages the exchange of handwritten notes between employees and administration. It even provides the cards.

Anderson writes a note of appreciation almost every day and has for most of his career.

“In this day and age, to get a handwritten note in the mail,” he says, “is very impactful.”

Anderson keeps some of the notes he receives.

“When you’re having a bad day and need to get context and perspective, you pull that file out and read some of those notes,” he says.

According to the most recent data from U.S. Postal Service surveys, there was a 23.5 percent drop in personal letters and a 16 percent decline for nonholiday greeting cards 2010-12.

Greiner knows many people think they can write the letters and find inspiration on their own.

“But how many people actually do it? It’s like a diet. We all know we need it. We all know how to do it,” she says.

Greiner’s goals are to continue to gain national and international speaking engagements and to make Springfield the City of Gratitude with her Gratitude is Great Campaign. The campaign has been suspended as she focuses on getting her young company in the black after investing tens of thousands of dollars. Declining to disclose company revenue, she says the kits retail for $40, books are $17 and cards $25 for 10. Product is sold online, at the farmers market at Farmer’s Park and retailers, such as Gearhead Outfitters in northwest Arkansas.

Greiner has high hopes for the boxes of personal notes of gratitude, currently imported by Stingray Worldwide Imports. She likes to imagine kids packing up their parent’s things when they’re moving into assisted living and finding a box full of cards. She imagines their joy as they discover a window into a different part of their parent’s lives: an accumulation of kindness extended to others during a lifetime.  

She smiles: “I know that sounds sappy.”