Greetings WBV North team,

I want to take a few moments to reconnect with you after our kickoff meetings last month. You were my first kickoffs in the South East Market and I was truly blown away. Your energy is infectious and you fired me up about what we WILL do together in 2017.

As we talked about, the kickoff is just the starting line. The real work begins now that you are back in your stores. I hope we did a good job of making it clear that our 2017 priorities have to be laser focused if we are going to have a successful year together. We need to: Get 'Em, Grow 'Em and Keep 'Em!

We all have an important role to play and we each have to understand our role and be committed to making a difference.

Here are my top 5 takeaways for all of you:

1. Believe in yourself as much as we believe in you!

2.Create the opportunity. We have to listen to customers and then find the right opportunity for them and their families. Don't forget to find the 'want’...the products and accessories that make your customer smile and feel great about our business.

3. If we don't talk about it, they can't buy it. We need to talk to every customer about the basic accessories and the fun ones, about the connected devices and all the ways we can connect their lives. Remember 80% of customer accounts do not have an active tablet—that amounts to nothing but opportunity if we are relentless and committed.

4. Our network is better than anything anyone has to offer in the marketplace – Period! TMO has 2x more voice failures and 3x more data failures. #factsmatter

5. Be clear with your customers. Be honest with them. All the time. Every time.

Thank you for your energy, your commitment and your passion. Remember, we don't control what they do, but we do control how we respond.

January is now behind us. We made some progress. We are getting our selling swagger back and it shows in our KPI's. You are making the new pricing work for your customers and it's showing in our prepaid results. We had some wins and some losses. We still have work to do on pulling through the incrementals. But, that's okay because I know that we haven't delivered our best yet. I’m excited to continue to take it one day and one customer at a time with you. Forward and upward...as one team; that's the only way we win.

Thank you for being part of this team and for all that you will do this year. I am more fired up than ever before. I hope you are too. Let's get to work! #semagic

-Wendy