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Group Mackenzie, Celebrating 50 Years
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Decade Five: 2000 - 2009

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009
Click the links above for highlights from each year

Well, it wasn’t an easy decade. It wasn’t even an easily named decade; call it the Aughts, the Noughties, the Double Ohs, or just call it the 2000s.

 

Call it a decade of conflict, of war and terror and devastation, of red vs. blue, faith vs. science, and nature vs. man. Researchers sought to recreate the start of it all even as, to others, the end seemed nigh. Nature’s fury exposed man’s limitations; man’s fury exposed his heroism. We watched towers fall, levees crumble, and great waves wipe away entire communities, and we responded. In tragedy, we found unity.

 

Or call it a time when dollars ruled sense. The housing bubble formed, expanded, and imploded; banks filed for Chapter 11; and the stock market tumbled. The Great Recession sent spirits spiraling into a national depression. But we adapted; we tightened our belts, reduced our consumption, and learned to “staycation.”

 

Or define it by its politics. Call it controversial. Talk about hanging chads, WMDs, and “gotcha journalism.” Call it inspirational. Recall how nothing could jade us beyond a belief in change.

 

Go ahead and call it confusing, a time when reality became scripted and communities virtual. We made friends we’d never met and learned to talk 140 characters at a time. The Internet brought the world to our fingertips while we grew further divided from our neighbor.

 

Be sure to call it sustainable. Carbon footprints, smart growth, living buildings, and perilous VOCs, we learned a new vocabulary and then how to read between the lines of the greenwashing.

 

Here, we called it our fifth decade. We rode the highs and persevered through the lows. We traded one former warehouse and riverbank for another. Amid the challenges, we found ways to grow and success in new markets. We made the smart choices and the tough decisions; we trimmed the fat and then fought to protect muscle and bone. A changing of the guard fueled a reinvestment in the idea of “group”, a reinforcing of the collaborative process.

 

And now, after 50 years, we stand poised, ready to embrace and conquer the next challenge.