The past year has been an outstanding demonstration of the quality of our current shareholder community. Through their very clear actions, they showed all of us at AFC and the rest of the world that they believe in us. They asked us a lot of tough questions. They supported us during a difficult time. They encouraged us.

This experience has brought us even closer together with our current shareholders. I have to wonder how many public companies can honestly say that they have had as much communication and dialogue with their shareholder base as we have.

Yet, I hasten to point out that this added communication was not a strain on us. It was not something that we did reluctantly. We did it enthusiastically. And, they were an equally engaged audience. They called. They wrote. They asked the hard questions.

And we responded. We responded to every one of them. We responded with fair and open communications to all of our shareholders.

In 2003, we began to discover what a best-of-class relationship with our shareholders is really all about. It's not something that has to be legislated. It's not something that the SEC or Sarbanes-Oxley has taught us.

What we have discovered is simply this: the more we communicate, the stronger our relationships become. So, even though our frequent communications were dictated by extreme circumstances, we are going to continue this style of communications going forward.

You won't have to wait for a shareholder letter or an annual report to hear from us. We will keep you informed about our progress in all of the areas I have discussed in this letter. And, as always, we would like to continue to hear from you.