Tending Faith, Growing Futures

Each week, Jan Brittingham’s parents would walk to their local bank to handle finances and perhaps shop at the nearby stores. It was a simple routine, and one they could have sped up by taking the family car, but they preferred the time spent together, the wind and sun, and chatting with those they knew along the way. But one morning, Brittingham’s parents were surprised to find the bank’s manager pacing outside the building, looking fretful.

“‘I forgot my tie,’ he said. And in those days, you couldn’t go into the office without one,” recalls Brittingham, Atlantic Logistics’ Director of Human Resources. “My mom simply told him, ‘Wait right here,’ and walked all the way home to get a tie for him. That’s who she was.”

Caring for others was woven deeply through the fabric of her family life, Brittingham said, emerging from both faith and an empathy gained from her parents’ struggles.

“My mom and dad grew up during the Depression. They had to put newspapers in their shoes to make them fit,” she said. “They learned hard lessons so they could give back when times were better, so I was raised to help people. Even if you didn’t have a lot of money, I was taught to always do what you can.”

Paid volunteer days for employees at Atlantic Logistics, as well as other forms of charitable giving and outreach, is something Brittingham truly appreciates about her company.

“Rob’s got a very giving heart and I think it’s wonderful that everyone is encouraged to give back,” Brittingham said. “I have a servant’s heart. I’ll do whatever I can do to help somebody, whether that’s a charity or someone along the roadside.”

Brittingham can frequently be found among the fruit and fields at Seamark Ranch, where she volunteers each month to assist the ranch in its mission to provide a traditional home environment for children in crisis. The ranch, a Christian-based organization, provides therapy-based and individualized care in faith, school and the community, and boasts a variety of food crops and farm animals the children grow and tend. The January recipient of the Atlantic Cares charitable giving program, Seamark Ranch will use the corporate gift to acquire and repair essential farming equipment.

“We have 465 acres and about 100 is really developed,” said Greg Voss, Chief Executive Officer at Seamark Ranch.“We have blueberry plants, strawberry fields and orange trees, but if we have poor equipment, we can’t tend to that land. We have a horse pasture that requires clearing… All these things become too challenging when you have equipment failing from too much deferred maintenance, so this is definitely going to help in that regard.”

And in the meantime, you’ll find Jan Brittingham at the ranch the second Saturday of each month – on her knees –pulling weeds amid the blueberries. She believes in Seamark’s mission, which unconditionally accepts children who have struggled with abuse. So that’s where she’ll be – in the rain or sweating beneath a blazing Florida sun. It’s a sense of purpose Voss knows well.

“What really compels me is the mission of Seamark, which is basically to give children and families in crisis a chance to rewrite their stories,” he said. “Getting an opportunity to live that mission out is what gets me moving every day.”

About Atlantic Logistics:

Atlantic Logistics was founded in 2001 as a woman-owned business and experienced record growth in 2021, moving over 30,000 loads and generating $41 million in total revenue. Utilizing the industry’s latest technologies such as load-tracking, digital freight matching and transportation management software, the company is prospering. Professional partners including McLeod Software have maximized Atlantic Logistics' resources to meet logistics and supply chain challenges into 2022 and beyond.

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