by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
The Laurel Awards ceremony at the Florida Theatre was one for the ages, literally. A record-breaking crowd was treated to a Renaissance-themed event replete with sword fights on stage, jugglers, flame-throwers and a Renaissance-era band.
“Everything went great. It was a lot of fun,” said Mark Berman, chairman and host of Friday night’s event and owner and president of Garage Tek. “We tried something really different this year. The sword fight scared the heck out of me. It was very realistic and I had sharp metal six inches from my head. The live band was a first, too. We had a lot of moving parts and a lot of things could have gone wrong, but few did.”
Berman is on the board of the Sales & Marketing Council and this year’s awards were his second and last as chairman. He has selected Amber King, the marketing director for Richmond American Homes, to serve as chair of next year’s awards.
Berman also said over 600 people attended the event, up from barely 500 last year.
“We also had a record number of nominations, awards and sponsorships,” said Berman.
The biggest real estate award of the night went to Susan Kennedy of Vanguard GMAC Realty, who was named the 2004 Realtor of the Year. Kennedy and her 16-person team sold over $87 million worth of real estate last year and the award was her second. She also won in 2002.
“It’s neat,” said Kennedy, who was sick and didn’t actually attend the awards show. Kennedy said the award is certainly a feather in her cap and will help as she and her team look to grow their business.
“We work all over town, but we just moved into a new building in Mandarin South Business Park because we needed the space. I just bought a building on San Jose Boulevard that I will eventually tear down and build something new.”
Despite this year’s success, Berman said one downside was that several people from different facets of the real estate industry didn’t submit nominations because they feel as though the Laurel Awards have become political. Berman explained that feeling is unfounded because the awards are judged by outside, totally independent judges with nothing to gain locally.
“It’s unfortunate that people think politics are involved because winners are chosen on their merits,” said Berman. “There can’t be politics involved but quite a few people didn’t enter the awards this year because of the perceived politics. None of the judges are from this market.”