Category Archives: Uncategorized

Road To a Better Community – Rainbow Families

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For LGBTQ plus families often, support when it comes to raising a family is hard to find. However, the organization Rainbow Families has been doing fantastic work that is now being recognized and awarded.

Sequoia and Shay Taylor El began looking for an option to create the family they always dreamed of in 2015. It may seem easy for parents to create families; however, that’s not the case. They often have to go through a different legal process and pay more money to get the same protection as regular parents.

They were introduced to Darren Paul Vance, the executive director of Rainbow Families, as a support system during their difficult journey. Rainbow Families’ goal is to continue evolving and growing to make sure that they are meeting the needs of the LGBTQ plus community.

For 40 years now, Rainbow Families have celebrated LGBTQ plus families with educational classes parrot for training workshops, picnics, play dates, and its annual family conference. To continue their fantastic work in the community, Easterns Automotive Group surprised Rainbow Families with $2,000.

Meet the Easterns Team: Brandon Fennell

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Brandon Fennell

Brandon Fennell has been a manager with the Easterns team for a year, and he constantly strives to provide our customers with the best car buying experience.

Brandon loves to travel and has lived in several states, but his favorite is Frederick, Maryland, because of the beautiful weather. He has always had a love for cars. Before moving to Frederick from NE Pennsylvania, Brandon was a mechanic and restored off-road trucks. His passion for restoring trucks started with a senior project in high school, and it has grown from there.

Brandon’s favorite part about working at Easterns is the wide variety of vehicles, as well as the people he works with at our Frederick location. “We spend a lot of time together, so we really have created a family atmosphere, and for the best experience, we try to convey this friendly environment to our customers as well.”

Meet the Easterns Team: Glenda Bradley

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Meet more of our Easterns Family! Glenda Bradley has been helping customers find their perfect ride at our Temple Hills location for eight years. However, she has been in the automotive industry for 13.

What car would Glenda recommend for new drivers?

When assisting families or helping first-time buyers find the perfect vehicle, her go-to recommendations are Kias, Toyotas, or Hyundais. She explained, “Toyota’s are the best with regular maintenance. They will last forever! While Kia and Hyundai have the best warranties of all manufacturers. Hands down!”

Her favorite aspect of working at Easterns is the family atmosphere. When she is not finding the perfect match for customers, she loves to cook exotic foods in her free time. We are grateful to have Glenda as a part of the team. Thank you for all of your hard work, Glenda

Pay It Forward – For The Kids

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Crofton, Maryland natives, Mike Thomas and Gary Heldt, got together to form For The Kids MD, an organization that helps support local families who have critically ill children. Every year, their team selects a deserving family and holds fundraisers and a charity golf tournament where 100% of the proceeds goes to assist them with medical costs. For the last 22 years, they have raised almost half of a million dollars for children every year. 

It’s important to them that they help someone local and this year’s beneficiary is Sabrina, a 1-year-old girl battling many serious illnesses. Her mother Gianna has been unable to work the past few years because her focus has been caring for her daughter. For The Kids MD along with Truman Charities kicked off this year’s fundraising efforts with a Happy Hour at Tommy Joe’s in Bethesda on July 15th. 

Joel Bassam joined with a special message for For The Kids. In awe of what they have been able to achieve every year to help families in need, Easterns donated $2,000 to support Sabrina and their family’s medical expenses. 

If you know someone who should be featured on Pay It Forward, you can nominate them here. In your email, be sure to include who they are and why they deserve to be recognized.

World Photography Day: Meet Roy & Oscar

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Today is World Photography Day, and where would we be without our amazing photographers! At Easterns, our facility puts out 30 to 40 cars a day, and our photographers take 80 photos per car for every car we get. That’s almost 3,200 photos a day! Our photographers Roy and Oscar make sure our customers can view complete and transparent pictures of every single vehicle.

Meet Roy

Roy has been a part of the Easterns team for almost six years, but he wasn’t a stranger to the automotive industry before joining the Easterns family. He once ran an automotive photography blog, so he has always been in love with taking photos of cars. He loves that at Easterns, he can do what he loves for a living and stay in the creative mindset.

Meet Oscar

Oscar has been snapping photos with Easterns for almost a year now. Not only is he a great photographer, but he is also an artistic painter. His favorite part about being a photographer at Easterns is the constant surprises and change of pace. “One minute a honda civic, and the next a Ferrari.”

World photography day allows us to celebrate the art, craft, and science of photography. We are incredibly grateful for our photographers for their creative vision and dedication.

Having amazing photographers and the work they do is very much appreciated.

Helping Hands – Helen Zurita

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The community has been overwhelmed with the work of a woman in the Manassas community. Helen Zurita has been a lifesaver for the East End mobile Home Trailer Park.

The trailer park would close four years ago, but Zurita assembled a team to make sure that did not happen. If the Manassas-based nonprofit, Catholics for Housing, had not rescued the property with 58 homes, many people would have been homeless.

Zurita shared that she has experienced homelessness and had to go without food before, and she did not want to see them go through what she once went through. Her work in the community goes far beyond saving homes. She also feeds, clothes, and prepares children for school. She also hosts back-to-school and toy drives for children in the community. On most Fridays, she gives away almost 300 to 400 boxes of food to those in need.

Inspired by the selfless acts of Helen, we had something special for her.

“Hey, I am Joel Bassam from Easterns Automotive,” Bassam explained to Zurita. “We were touched by the story 7News shared about you saving this community and feeding others without any consideration for yourself but only for others. We want to donate $2,000, so you can continue to help others.”

In shock, Zurita expressed how honored she was for this contribution. Zurita said the money would help her buy gas cards, provide backpacks for children, and start her free pantry.

Pay It Forward – Glen Mourning

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Glen Mourning is paying it forward by creating literary diversity for children all over. Glen Mourning, a former teacher, created the Crunchy Life book series so that kids could see themselves in stories and want to read more.

Glen can remember being bullied as a child for not being the best reader, and he is now a 5th-grade language teacher whose goal is to make literacy and reading fun for kids that are reluctant to read.

His book series is called Crunchy Life. The name was created as a way to encourage kids to keep going even when life gets hard or, as he likes to describe it, “crunchy.”

Lamont Geddis, the director of the Freedom School, expressed that having the books like Glen Mourning’s Crunchy Life helps the students to see an African American teacher and author with relatable books and brings the school alive. Students find it empowering to see other children in books that look like them.

Glen was completely shocked when Joel Bassam joined virtually to surprise him with a check for $1,500. Glen was so excited he announced, “Pizza for EVERYBODY!” as the Freedom School students jumped for joy.

Helping Hands – Be The Good Project

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Last year, the Marchand family from Northern Virginia started the Be the Good Project to feed people during the pandemic. In the process, they inspired a caring community, from friends and neighbors to church groups, sports teams, and girls scouts, to donate over 40,000 pounds of food and prepare over 63,000 sandwiches for the homeless.

Recently, they began building little food pantries in underserved communities, with nine already created and five more on the way. Amber Marchand and her family joined ABC 7 News for what they thought was an interview to update others on the Be Good Project, but there was really a surprise in store!

Finally able to return in person, Joel Bassam from Easterns joined in surprising the Marchand family, “We’ve been blown away by what you’ve been able to achieve and the way that you’ve been able to support these communities. We wanted to donate $2000 to you all so you can keep spreading the good and keep feeding these families.” 

Completely shocked by this donation, Amber Marchand was fighting back the tears as she expressed her gratitude. 

Click here for details on how you can support Be the Good Project.

Helping Hands, powered by ABC 7, is always looking to help people or organizations in need worthy of assistance. If you know someone that fits this description, please click here to nominate them.

Helping Hands – Nurturing Families

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Throughout the last 11 years, a woman in Fairfax County has built a non-profit that helps children in need in the community, and she is now taking it to Annadale, VA. Sherry Noud, founder of “Nurturing Families,” collects things like baby shoes, socks, underwear, and outfits for children in the area, and more than 230 children received brand new clothes as part of her May summer clothing drive. All items donated to the children in need are brand new and have specifically been requested by them. After families tell us what they need for their children, complete strangers pitch in to help buy them.

Joel Bassam joined to surprised Sherry with $2,000 towards her mission to clothe and feed others in need. The donation will help cover her shopping list for other children in need.