Latest / Crossroad Conversations with the Lewis Brothers / Ep. 78 Community Outreach, Fan Engagement, & Car Shows!!

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Ep. 78 Community Outreach, Fan Engagement, & Car Shows!! · Crossroad Conversations with the Lewis Brothers

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_04: Lewis Automotive does a lot of community outreach events.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_04: I see a lot of things on social media.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_04: Uh I also pass by, see the trucks that are out here.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_04: I I you know, y'all y'all have done a great job of that with supporting the community and showcasing that support, especially I know with your leadership on the chamber.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_04: Immediately I thought, car and truck show, this is something I put together.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_04: I had no idea what a car and truck show was, but somebody said, Hey, you should do this outside the stadium.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_04: And we started it.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: Hey everyone, welcome to Crossroads Conversations with the Lewis brothers, where we aim to share real stories about running a successful family business, working through adversity, and pouring back into the community that keeps our doors open.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: We're your hosts, Taylor Matt, and Shelby, and we'll bring you relevant local business advice and automotive insights that are sure to change the way you look at running a business and maybe throw in a plug for you to do business with us.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome to Crossroads Conversations with the Lewis brothers here.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_03: We're back in the studio.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_03: We've had a few weeks when we were live on the showroom floor during Ultimate Challenge, which was a big deal.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_03: We got a recap coming up on that.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_03: We also have our good friend Elvis here in the studio today.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_03: We've got a lot of fun things to talk about with the university on coming up that kind of integrate with our business too.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_03: So uh we look forward to getting into some great conversation there.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_03: But Shelby, before we get there, we have got to talk.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna spoil it, a record-breaking ultimate challenge.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my goodness.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: Previous record in the month of March, we had sold 617 cars.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: This year set a goal of 600.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: I know that seems backwards, but it was a growth goal from 550 to 600.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we ended up selling 678.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_03: I I want to give them a little context there too, though, because like when you when you think about that in Shelby, you say, well, we just set our goal at 600, even though we had sold 617.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_03: Well, one of the things that you do in business is you look at your track record.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_03: You know, what are you trending on the past 90 days?
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_03: But you also have to look about what's the industry doing, yeah.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_03: And then what's the supply in our business look like?
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_03: Well, we're dealing with fires at multiple different factories and shortage of inventory, and also industry off some percentage points.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_03: So when we looked at all that, we're like, last year's goal was 555.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, they got on heater and went to 617.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_03: We want to raise that goal, but we also have to look at reality.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: And and the most important part of a goal is you want to make it achievable.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: Like it has to be far enough out there that it scares you, that it's that it's tricky and hard to get to, but you don't want to set your team up for failure.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: Like we just say, like, yeah, let's do 650 or 700 right off the rip.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that is one car with one customer at a time, realizing that you have to talk to three to four to five times that amount of customers, and realize that you have to have at least one and a half to two times the amount of those cars in stock to sell.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_01: So that is an astronomical amount.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: And those are all retail customers, no fleet, no dealer trade, no wholesale.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: 678 cars.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: That Elviset, like think if you and I went and looked and cracked 678 doors and said, let's go test drive that many, we'd be whipped by and worn out.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: I'm done.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: You couldn't remember the first one we looked at.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's that's good.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_04: Hey, you know, data-wise, we can look at the way that we we look at things with our season tickets and the sales that we have when we set goals with within our own uh department of season tickets and where we want to be related to attendance.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_03: So you look at that as well.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_03: Like you always want it to grow, but it's like, hey, what does that look like?
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_03: What's the flow look like?
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, what's the noise on the street?
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you can't just mysteriously throw numbers out there.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, you're definitely wanting to take a look at the previous numbers and uh and see how far back you can go.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_04: And and we do that with student attendance.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_04: We do so with their with our overall season ticket holders, but yeah, I I think you hit it right on go ahead.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_04: It was a great goal, and you were able to surpass that, beat it.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_04: And um, that's really exciting for your team.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_03: For all of our automotive friends listening out there, our business uh friends that have been listening long enough that are starting to learn about our business.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_03: I do want to say we don't have all the stats completely finalized because it takes a while for verifying it all.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_03: But our turn, which means LSF means how fast we turn a vehicle once it comes into stock.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_03: Like how many days has it been on the lot or another business would be on the shelf for us.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_03: We looked at our turn on pre-owned inventory, so all of our used vehicles had an average of 28 days.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_03: Now, it took on average 10 days to go through the shop, get cleaned up, get ready to go.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_03: So the actual shelf life was less than 18 days on every used vehicle that sits out there, which uh industry standards, if you can turn them every 45 days, you are top top.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, you're ranked, you're conference champs.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_03: You know what I mean?
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_03: So that uh 18 was that's how we were able to do it when you talk about how'd you hit a goal.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_03: When the industry's, we don't like to admit this, but going down a little bit, supplies down, you turn it faster.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so it was uh definitely one for the books.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so outstanding job uh to our entire team, and thank you to all of our customers for your support, for trusting us and stepping up and get crazy good deals.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: Like at the end, you get to win, right?
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: Because the customer got the absolute best deal.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: Before we roll into completely uh unpack what we got going, why Elvis is here, we got to recap.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: Last week we talked episode 77, and it was leadership under pressure, like that that's normal, right?
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: Leadership under pressure, but making decisions without perfect information.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: So if you don't have all the data to make decisions, like, hey, here's what's going on, there's a fire.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: Well, how do we handle it?
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, okay, let me collect the data, let me break that down.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes you don't always have the data to make the the split second decision.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and so we fully broke that down in episode 77.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: So if you haven't watched that yet, go check that out across all sources for podcasts, crossroad conversations, episode 77, leadership without perfect information.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, quick plug what's in the garage.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: I love this car because it it combines all retro styling, but has new new technology that's the Dodge Charger, the two-door.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: So, like I like to call that one the challenger.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's not but I know it's homage back because the charger people don't realize.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: I think charger is four-door.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: Well, originally charger was a two-door back in the city.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: I was a two-door.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: That was the but I love that it's a new high output twin turbo motor, and a lot of enthusiasts are like, ah, it doesn't have the power, man.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's over 500 horsepower, isn't it?
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_03: This thing is an inline six twin turbo.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_03: So for all the car guys out there, you take an inline motor and it gives you low-end instant torque.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_03: And then we got two turbos that are spooling up.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_03: This thing puts out 550 horsepower, 431 foot pounds of torque.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it does zero to 60 in 3.9 seconds.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_03: And I love this next feature.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_03: It's all wheel drive standard.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_03: And some people out there are like, yeah, yeah, that's great, but I like to smoke my rear tires.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_03: Guess what?
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_03: It's got a mode, rear-wheel drive only.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: You can always count on Mopar.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: If there's a gadget in the aftermarket, they're gonna do it.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I'm gonna need to be able to do a burnout.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: And they're like, Yep, we can do that.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_03: One of the things we hear about, of course, we sell Mustangs and we sell pre-owned Corvettes and we sell all the fun stuff.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_03: But one of the things we always hear about, I'm gonna call it the Charger.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_03: Shelby is referring to as a Challenger because it was before they flipped back over, is you hear people talking about how well they perform, yet of the muscle cars, they're the most comfortable on the road.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_03: So, like if you want to drive it, you know, down to Pensacola or down to Dallas or you know, up to Chicago, but then have some fun, it it drives and it rides great.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_03: For so for it to be as big of a car as it is, and as heavy of a car as it is, and to run 3.90 to 60 and do it in all wheel drive or take out all wheel drive and have fun in a drift mode in it, is just it's fantastic.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: So check that out.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's over in front of our CDGR store and is a really neat new technology car.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_03: You bet.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_03: So uh we already tipped into it, but we have special guest with us here, Elvis.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_03: Elvis, welcome to the show.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_04: Thanks for having me.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_04: Hey, before I leave, I gotta say Elvis has left the building.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_04: I get that all the time.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: I guess we're a beer to sick, though.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: Might as well use it.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, Elvis is in the building.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: Elvis is in the building.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_03: Elvis is in the building today, and as Elvis is with the University of Arkansas, which is obviously right here in our hometown, and we've had a long-lasting relationship with him for a long time.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_03: Elvis is the associate athletics director of community outreach and fan engagement.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_03: I like that.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_03: That's cool.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_03: And you're also the assistant sports administrator on the gymnastics team, right?
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_03: I guess.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_03: You got to play full.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_04: Lots of full uh full play, but a lot of fun.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know if I'm gonna get this right or not, so you can correct me.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, but it seems like fan engagement can have its really big highs.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_03: And then other times they think that maybe you're the person to reach out to if it's not going the way the fans want.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I get that uh a lot.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_04: It depends on uh if we win or if we lose.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_04: Depends on email.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_04: You know, emails might be a little bit uh there there would be more in my inbox than uh than there would be if we were had a great win.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_04: So uh, but also, you know, the the thing about Razorback Nation is it's so special and everybody is so passionate about Razorback athletics.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_04: That's what makes this community special.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_04: That's what makes the state special.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_04: And we hear that a lot about, you know, the state pride for the Razorbacks, but it is true.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_04: And if I didn't get an email about someone being upset, then I knew that there, you know, there's not that community passion and love for our fans.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_04: I mean for our for our teams.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_03: That's a great way to look at it.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_03: I'm thinking I'm gonna relate it over in our business.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_03: When I'm driving to work or or around during the day and I hit a bunch of traffic and it's stop and go, before I get really frustrated, I have to remind myself that that means that more people are driving and more people need to buy cars or service cars.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_03: So I guess it's the same right now, different industry, but it's the same.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_03: But what a great position on making sure that we have fans engaged because we know that the team plays better, any of the sports, when the fans are engaged, when they're routing and they're on their feet, and all the hype's going, our players, they just play better.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_03: They really do.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and it's just, you know, it it's a whole game day experience.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_04: And and our marketing team that we have, as well as with our group, our spirit squads, our band, uh, you know, everyone is really working to try to bring bring the best game day experiences possible.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_04: So we have our weekly meetings uh leading up to each game.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_04: And, you know, as a part of that, as our uh assistant athletic director for marketing really goes through a run of show and everything's lined out to the T.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and you know, those fan promotions that we do, we want them to be exciting, we want them to be engaging, and we want people to take home memorable moments that they would otherwise not experience if they couldn't be in the stadium.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_04: Sure, sure.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_03: And and it it's it's it's funny you say that again because I'm thinking through like the games I've taken my kids to, and I couldn't tell you all the plays that went on, and I couldn't even tell you the actual score at the end of the game.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_03: I can tell you if we won or if we didn't.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_03: But I can vividly tell you when we were sitting in the stadium and the drone show came over the top, and my kids, they talked about that forever, and the Rack was running with the drones and like so those engagement of it's become an experience.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we're we're rooting on the Razorbacks, but it's an experience that you can take your family to, and uh that's really cool.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_04: You know, and just trying to be a cutting edge and what what are the next things that we could do to set ourselves apart from other schools?
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, I know this year, if you had uh gone to uh a basketball game, you know, we added rail lights uh that were on each of the rails.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_04: And that was something that uh we had seen uh through the NBA and some other schools were doing it.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_04: We brought that in and it was really cool to be able to utilize those lights during uh hot timeouts.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_04: And uh the the student athletes also really take notice of that and it it helps excite them as well, too.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: I was gonna point that out.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: I went to a basketball game this year.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, my boys are getting to the point of like they're they're excited, they're playing basketball, and they're like, hey, can we go to Bass Williams?
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: Like, yeah, I think we got tickets, let's see if we can go, right?
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_01: I hadn't been in 20 years.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it just hadn't been on my radar, but uh it was so engaging the entire game.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: Like we won, right?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: The team was great this year, so that was a bonus, right?
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's no fun going to a not winning game, but uh the student section was amazing.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: They had this humongous banner that they that they handed up and it went over the whole student section, and so the engagement there was outstanding.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: The activities during the timeouts, uh you know, the long putt all the way across.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: There was something going, and it was a late game, and I was like, that's my bedtime, but then I didn't really feel like it because there was so much going on.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: So much going on.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's the part.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's the part is you took home those memorable moments.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_04: Um, I think one of the things that our marketing team does.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_04: So, you know, we have somebody who oversees men's basketball marketing, and he's consistently trying to find new ways to engage the crowd, but bringing in those, you know, all the way from the video segments, they're uh what might be given out in the stands or parachutes dropped.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my kids love that.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: They were looking at everyone up on the skywalk and they're dropping the parachutes, and uh they were so jacked up in the intro when the players came out.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: Now, you can see this, but I don't know if you got to see our our uh meeting room.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: But when I noticed when they brought the players on, they railed out these uh or wheeled out these carts that had big flame cannons and it had these CO2 things, and I was taking videos of it sending these two, like we gotta get some of these, all right?
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_01: The uh hype was solid, and I was like, this is so good.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: I saw the rail lights, you know, you could see it on the screen and you could see it going on.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: So all of those things were so good of why fans enjoy it, right?
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it's really important uh because we don't have national sports around here, right?
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: We don't have the pro sports, so hog fans are so even if we don't have the best of seasons, I think somehow they still rally and they're still fired up, and you know, you get some new players or get a new coach, or maybe it's just hey, it's another season for a reset.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I think we'll see that with the spring kicking off with football of just people being rejacked up.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, the the the you hit it right on the head is you know, it would it depending upon the seasons, our fans are always going to be there for us.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_04: They'll maybe upset or they may have decided, they be there.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_04: And it's you know, it's part of it's part of the fandom.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_04: So that's that uh that's something that goes along with being a true fan.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_03: We we see that as much as well uh as well that we bring in, you know, some local radio stations that cover the Razorbacks, and like last month they were here every single week, but they're here at least once a month doing their show live on our shoulders.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_03: Because so, you know, ESPN radio is here, and those guys were live talking about as much as we can sports.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_03: You know, we got to stay in our lane.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but we know that their fans drive vehicles, and it just always adds to the atmosphere in that conjunction with the Razorbacks and us doing business as well.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_03: You know, it's a it's a big deal.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_03: It's such a cool position.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_04: It's a lot of fun.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_04: It's what I mentioned to you is uh, you know, something's something's new every day.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_04: We're you know, we're working on um a really cool tour with Coach Silverfield happening this summer, uh, along with the spring game.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_04: We just wrapped up the the Golden Clash uh international soccer event that took place there, you know.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_04: Another thing that the department's doing is hosting uh the Pitbull concert uh in July.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_04: So a lot of fun things and a lot of uh great extra events that are taking place to continue to help revenue.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_04: And we all know what revenue means.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, and haven't they opened up to have more concerts at the stadium?
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, continuing to build on that.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_04: Just uh uh partnered with a group called the Oakview Group, who is going to be working with some different um um I I think they're different groups that are concert touring um promoters that that go out and help bring in those events to stadiums.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, because the last one I went to obviously and shut it down was Garth Brunson.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: Garth Brut system it was amazing.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that was awesome.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we talk about that all the time.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: Of it'd be great to get more of those in there.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_03: It's just how that's uh evolved because I can remember growing up, we all grew up in this area.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_03: I I think I went to the first concert that the U of A let ever happen in any of their areas, and it was in the old, old uh basketball stadium.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_03: And Barn Hill?
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Barn Hill.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_03: It was so like before then, no concerts ever happened.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_03: So to see that uh evolve and to go, no, this is you your local university, and and and we are engaging you during the season and during the non-season, and we're gonna talk about that coming up, but that that's just fun and that keeps the excitement.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_03: No, I I'm now I'm going to Bud Walton or I'm going, you know, to to the Reynolds Stadium to watch the concert, just to stay plugged in and part of that razor bag in you.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_04: So and and I think about that too, you know, every year we've hosted uh since I've been here for you know 13 seasons, and I know that they've done it before I got here, but you know, for women's basketball, every year they host uh elementary day for uh kids in Northwest Arkansas to attend the game.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_04: And I think about this, and every year it comes to the part of, you know, those kids that get to come to this game, it may be the only time they ever get to go into that arena.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, you know, even though it's in their backyard.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_04: And I think about that, and then also just having conversations with people out in the community that will say, Yeah, hey, my daughter or son went to a women's basketball game when they're fourth grade or it's fourth grade, third grade, and they've graduated already, you know.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_04: So it's like every one of those kids have had a chance to come in that have gone through Fayetteville Elementary School.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that my our kids go to Farmington and they all got to go and they were so jacked up.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so when I took them the game, I was like, hey boys, and they were like, Well, we've been here.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, Well, I haven't in 20 years, right?
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: But uh, they were so jacked up, and so that I think that's where the fanfare starts, right?
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: They're like, Hey, I've been there.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so then even if it's a while before they get to go, they see them on TV and like, no, I've been there.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that's our team, right?
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_04: And maybe that could be translated into, you know, for us, we look at it as how are you trying to build new fans at that young age?
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_04: Sure.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_04: And and you know, maybe as a takeaway is like when somebody comes in and buys their kid a car.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_04: Sure.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, that step is them moving on.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_04: Yes, they'll be purchasing your home via soon in our future.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_04: So you could look at it that way as well.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I I would say it, it's it's kind of a little funny you bring that up because we talk about that.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_03: And where we would usually not sell higher mileage vehicles, because they could have issues going on, and you know, it's 200,000 miles and 150,000 miles, it hits a price point for somebody to buy their kid a first car because we want to start that relationship early.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_03: So then when it comes, okay, now let me buy a nicer used vehicle, let me buy a new vehicle, it's the same thing.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_03: You guys are getting them in the stadium, getting them part of being a razor back.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_03: And uh and then to some of them too, they'll never get that opportunity, and you're giving them that opportunity.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_03: That's amazing.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_04: Yep, that's a part of it that really is special.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_04: It is.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_04: And you know, we we do have charitable organizations that we uh donate tickets to throughout the course of the year so we can get kids in the stadium that may not get that chance again.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_04: And I mean, they don't care who's autograph, they're asking for autographs from anybody.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_04: Anybody they take it home and that's something they're gonna always remember.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_04: And then to get the emails the following day from the the advisors that took them out of like these pictures of just thank you, thank you.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_04: I wouldn't have been able to do this.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_04: Like, that's the cool part.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, yeah, that's the neat emails to open.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, that's the neat emails to open.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think that you've affected somebody's life.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think that's a cool thing we saw with Coach Cow, and I don't know that he was the brains behind it, but he was the driver, is that he saw that hey, he wanted to bring the hype and he didn't want one empty seat.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: And so Saul pushing this year, it could have been in previous years, that said, hey, if you have a ticket and you're not showing up, you need to transfer it over to this, and so we can give it to students and people that don't have tickets, and that helped fill it up.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_04: Yep, and that was a good move there.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_04: So going back to that, that's where those tickets went.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_04: They went to, you know, charitable children's organizations, they went to some of the nonprofits, where they went to uh a Fayetteville Police Department, uh, some different groups that may not ordinarily get the chance to get to come to a game either to work or because they, you know, may not be able to afford it.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that that's the funny thing.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: Taylor, how long Taylor's been working, we've been seasoned ticket holders for a long time.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: How long was 39 years?
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: 39 years.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and I told you that I hadn't been a basketball game in forever.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so we we have tickets for almost every single raise the back event.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: And the fun thing that we get to do, because we're we're just workers, right?
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so like we're always just here.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: So raise the back games we don't go to, but we get to give them out to all of our employees.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_01: And the fun thing is when they come back, you're like, I've never been able to go to a football game.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: I've never been able to go to a baseball game.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_01: So with 270 employees, we constantly send that email out.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: Said, hey, yeah, put your name in the hat for the wish list.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: And we try to spread that love of people that haven't been able to go.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: And so we get to send, so all the tickets we've been buying for 39 years, our take rate of us is less than 1%.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: We're sending all of our employees for that same idea, those people that don't have tickets or don't have the opportunity to go.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: And it's fun to hear those stories.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's odd.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_03: It really isn't in some of them that have been before because we've been ticket holders for a while and big supporters, we've we've got pretty good seats.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_03: So then they'll come back and be like, Did you know those were on the 40 yard line?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_03: You know, our our seats, we don't have to get into all this, but our seats, you know, moved with the basketball.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_03: But it used to be right next to where Nolan Richardson sat.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_03: So then people would go and they're like, Do you know did you guys know that no one's in there?
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, no.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Big baseball.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's right next to the dugout, like on top of the dugout.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: And they're like, Man, your tickets are so good.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_03: It's like, yeah, and then you can go in.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_03: But it's still, you know, every single time, you know, no different than you guys are doing transferring.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_03: It's like, we want people in those seeds.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_03: We want them to experience it, you know, for their family.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_03: So then on those days, they go home and they've been able to take their family.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_03: So I know we're getting a little off subject there, but I think it's just deeper than just like what's the score of the game?
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_03: It's the community involvement.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_03: It's all that around and some pride to be a part of.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_03: So we we jumped a little bit ahead there.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_03: But let's let's back up because he said 13 years ago, before you got your path here to the Razorbacks, were you doing the same type of work in Amarillo?
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_04: So I uh graduated from Texas Tech, uh, had the opportunity to be uh a member of the cheer team there.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_04: And so as a part of the cheer team, we had to do all these crazy promotions uh that the marketing department gave to us.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_04: And so I uh I was a little vocal a couple of times on you know what they were asking us to do.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_04: And uh the lady that was in charge of the marketing at that time said, Hey, you seem to seem to think you know what you're talking about, so why don't you come in and intern in our office for us?
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_04: We can put you to work.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_04: And yeah, put me to work was I, you know, the first job that I had was sitting by a fax machine, and all the faxes that were coming through was uh approvals for licensing.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_04: So at that time, that's how things came in.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_04: So if you wanted the double T or you wanted something on your shirt or mugs, it was through a fax machine.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_04: So I sat there, did that.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_04: Uh she did that for me.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_04: And then uh she said, You're also gonna go out and deliver bottles of champagnes to uh uh to our uh corporate partners, and I ended up delivering probably a car full of just you know champagne bottles, going out delivering stuff.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_04: And I said, This isn't as much fun as I thought it was going to be.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_04: So anyway, I've I created a good, really good relationship with her and rapport, uh, and she helped propel me uh into uh what I call the love of marketing and the love of what I consider fan engagement.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and so I've stayed with that.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_04: I went on to work at graduated from Texas Tech.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_04: I worked at Purdue for three years.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_04: Uh at Purdue, I had the opportunity to meet uh and work with the women's basketball coach Christy Curry there with her husband.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_04: Christy then uh about a couple months after I got there, Christy uh was uh given the job at Texas Tech and named the head women's basketball coach.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_04: So I had the chance to go back and work for her.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_04: So she called me, she said, Hey, I would love for you to come back out to West Texas.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_04: I don't know this area well.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_04: I've talked to some folks.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_04: They said they knew who you were.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_04: It would be great to have you on staff.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_04: So I worked with with Christy.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_04: She was uh uh then went to Alabama, so I got to see her then, and then she was just announced uh this past week as a new head coach at the University of South Florida.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_04: So those connections really helped me there.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_04: And then um I stayed at uh Texas Tech for seven years, uh, was director of marketing for two, two or three of those years, and then had the chance to come to Arkansas in 2014 and have been here since then uh in this role.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_04: Wow.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_03: That's that that's quite the exposure right there.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_04: It's quite the exposure, a lot of fun things.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_04: You know, the marketing has really changed uh the way it used to be just traditional marketing.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, you know, it's now, you know, it's really digital marketing, social media, all those fun things, email, um, yeah, all those, all those things that go along with it.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_04: And then this part of my job is really just interacting with the community, finding ways to promote the Razorback brand, uh, working with uh our different uh our different uh different groups in the community to try to get them to support Razorback Athletics.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_03: You know, and I would say it definitely same thing in our business, like uh it's changed, but some parts haven't.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_03: You know, so so the way we communicate, the the way we get the hype out there and our specials, it's obviously a whole lot digital, like you are, but they still didn't show up in person, you know, to do the transaction.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_03: They don't put it in their Amazon cart and check it out.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_03: We deliver it.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_03: Same thing with you is like like all that hype happens online and that engagement, but it's really just all building for your in-person events, yep, or in the stadium.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_04: That's part of it.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_04: I think uh the the big piece now is is like the creative design, like what's it gonna look like, what's gonna be appealing for the fans to see, uh, and then trying to get our coaches involved with the marketing of it and and having the opportunity to have them help promote.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, and then social media, of course, is the biggest thing.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_04: And and you know, I'm still at the point where I I appreciate social media, but I also don't know all the ins and outs of it as well as some of our other staff members.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_04: Does that happen with y'all here?
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_03: That's the difference between me and both my brothers.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I understand, I understand the the pieces of it, but uh they're they're much better at it.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_04: So, you know, I wanted to go back to, we talked a little bit about uh Lewis, and uh I had the opportunity uh to not only represent athletics at different chamber events in the Northwest Arkansas Tourism Association and the uh experienced Fayetteville uh board, but also with the Fayetteville Chamber.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_04: And I know um, you know, Lewis Automotive does a lot of community outreach events.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_04: I see a lot of things on social media.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, I also pass by, see the trucks that are out here.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_04: I, you know, y'all, y'all have done a great job of that with supporting the community and showcasing that support, especially I know with your leadership on the chamber.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_04: And so for that, uh, and then just having Natalie as a contact, you know, contact, she was excited and I she said, Hey, if there's ever anything you think we could get involved with, let me know.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_04: And so this immediately I thought, car and truck show, this is something I put together.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_04: I had no idea what a car and truck show was, but somebody said, Hey, you should do this outside the stadium.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_04: And we started it, done really well without me knowing all the ins and outs of it.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_04: But we really wanted to get somebody, uh a group in that could really help us take it to the next level and showcase support.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_03: So well, we're we'll we're really excited about that, and we're gonna dive straight into what all is going on with the uh hardtown classic car show.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_03: But Taylor, before that, I think it's time for a little fun fact there.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: How many car shows take place in the US each year?
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you gotta think about this.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_00: There's there's way more than you would think.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: Your options uh are 10,000, 20,000, 5,000, or 7,000.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: That was what you thought.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_04: I would say ten.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: 10,000, you're right on it.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: You're right on the won't.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure what the price is.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_02: You have that you'll just think of it as or marketing apartment to find you something.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: Let's go.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: Let's go.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_01: 10,000.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_03: But 10,000, that's a lot.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_03: And I would now I'm speculating here, but I would say the reason there are 10,000 is because when I see people at a car show, I can see a grandfather and a grandson both get excited going through and talking about cars, and whether it's the grandfather talking about the memories and this and that, or the grandson that is wishing and you know, and just dreaming on what his first car will look like.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_03: It's a it's a great time when you can take multiple generations together and have fun.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_03: You know, and a lot of times it's supporting a great cause, you know, um, and we'll get into that.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_03: But I think that is the the power of a car show is you can get multiple generations together to have something to do, to go ooh and ah, or to just have conversation about or to see things that they may not have seen before, which which is really neat.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_03: So we're really here today to talk about the Hogtown Classic car show.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_03: And let's let's tee it up here is you guys do a whole lot, especially during football games, which is fall, you know, during those games, but hog fans are hog fans 365 days a year.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_03: So it's like, how do we keep that going on?
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_03: And you know, there's always a spring game.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_03: So then walk us through because the car show happens before the spring trains, is that right?
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_04: So uh it's gonna happen on Saturday, April the 25th.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, in our event time.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_04: So we've got a couple of things leading up to it.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_04: So we're gonna start that morning with sunrise yoga on the uh on the outside of the stadium.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_04: Uh so we'll do that for an hour, nine to ten.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_04: And then at 10 a.m., we will begin Hogtown, which is going to be right outside the stadium.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_04: And that will include uh our classic car and truck show.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_04: We'll have a petting zoo for kids out there, uh, a lot of fun stuff for that.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_04: We've got a mechanical bull, uh, inflatable.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_04: I'm sure y'all have had those before here.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_04: I don't know who the winner is.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: This isn't chartbone.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: Shelby's buttons.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: Did you take my context of everything we did there and also challenge?
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_01: So Mattley, not this kid.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_04: We uh we've got we've got inflatables, uh food trucks, and uh a beer garden.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I know y'all will really enjoy that beer garden.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_01: We tried the buttons they frown upon driving cars and beer.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_01: So it's drive.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't the hex that far, but you guys can have it.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_04: And then uh we're really excited to announce that uh Justin Moore is going to be performing in concert outside the stadium.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_04: Outside the stadium, uh he is doing that at work.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and all these dollars, uh, this is uh presented by the Razorbike Foundation, uh, empowered by the Link U, uh, which is you know, these funds are really to help support our student athletes and and the NIL as well.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_04: So uh the big thing about this event, it's free.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_04: It's a free community event, so there's no charge.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and you know, in the past, we've yeah, I don't know how much how good this is, but we've had at least 85 cars and trucks in the event.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_04: And uh we knew that having uh y'all as a partner in this would be uh an opportunity for us to continue to grow that and see some of your uh avid customers come out as part of that.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_04: Uh but but all told this is just a free community wide family event.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's free.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_03: So what time is so you got yoga, get everybody stretched.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_03: Yoga is a show.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_03: And then what time we get into the car show?
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_04: Car show 10 a.m.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_04: and it goes till uh it's gonna go till 1 30.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, and then we'll make the awards.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_04: Uh the award show will happen at that time on the stage.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_04: Uh so we're going for best interior.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_04: Now again, these were these were what I was told at that point in time when I took it over.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_04: Uh Best Razorback Spirit.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_04: You should see some of these vehicles, man.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_04: They will go all out when you go Razor Backs.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_04: You know what I mean?
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and then we have the best in the show.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_04: We are excited.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_04: Who's going to be the judge from your team?
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_04: Who's the judge?
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_04: This year.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we might have fun with it.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_00: Who knows?
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: We uh the ones we've had here, we've had to appoint other people, but it might be an opportunity to like charged.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, then we could do some.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_04: I heard that you'll have some fun suits.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_04: I think I saw you in a fun suit somewhere, maybe at a chamber event.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_04: So a lot of suits.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, so you got a lot of suits.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_04: We may need a razorback suit, but we was okay.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_04: Uh huh.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_04: Well, we're gonna have we're gonna we might need to add that to the lecture.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, so let's talk about if I've got a car.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_03: Yep, does it matter?
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_03: Do you have makes, models, year?
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_03: Are you trying to only have classics or you got moderns too?
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_03: What are you looking at?
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_04: We got uh majority of them will be classics, and then we had the Northwest Arkansas Corvette Club.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_04: Uh they have reached out, and I think they're at like 20 cars right now.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, so we're going to uh map out an area for the for the Corvettes.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_04: Uh I'm excited to see.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_03: It's really important.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not trying to advise you here, but I'll just help me.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_03: It's really important.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_03: The the group, so you got two different types of people that put cars in a car show.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_03: You know, one that just want to be a part of it, and that's great.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_03: That's your general area.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_03: But then you have groups.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_03: They love to travel together.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_03: It's a whole outing.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_03: So you gotta, it's like going to a restaurant and getting a big table everybody can sit at.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_03: So you gotta have the areas for the Corvettes and the Mopars and the Mustangs or the overlanding people and like all that.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, some of them need a little help with that.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_04: Uh so I'm not sure who's gonna be able to help me with that.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm looking at Craig on there, but uh Natalie can.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, uh you're welcome.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_04: We're we're still working through chat, but you know, we it's gotten better every year.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_04: And the the ones that that come and participate, they have a blast.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_04: We give two free tickets out to the first home game just for participating.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_04: Our first home football game.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_04: And so that's been pretty enticing.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_04: And because some of those folks, hey, we love car and truck shows, but we've never been to a football game.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_04: Sure.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_04: So that's given them the opportunity to attend as well.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_04: So yeah, they'll get two free tickets just for participating.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_03: If it doubles in size this year, can you handle that capacity?
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_04: We can, yeah, we can definitely handle that capacity.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_03: And I mean, just think about we think we got some cool stuff, but you got a Justin Moore concert going on.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_03: I think the trucks out.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_02: Now you're gonna need a truck section.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_02: Well, so wait, what time's the concert?
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_04: Concert is going to happen, I believe, at 1245 to 145.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, 1245 to 145.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, five.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_04: And then there'll be someone that goes on stage prior to him that will open for him.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_04: We'll also have a pep rally uh featuring the Spirit Squads, a band, and then Coach Silverfield will be out there as well to speak to the fans and greet them and welcome them to the stadium.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_04: Again, everything's free.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, folks can visit uh Razorback Foundation website to claim their free tickets on there, or you guys visit ArkansasRazorbacks.com and we have information there too.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_03: I was gonna ask you that.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_03: Even though it's free, do they need to register before they go?
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_03: Can they register the day of?
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_03: What's that?
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, we would really like for them to pre-register.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and I believe your team is helping.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, they'll they'll be putting out a social media post uh that's gonna help uh or that's gonna give information on how to register as well.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_04: But it's pretty simple uh form that you'll just fill out and then we'll contact you based on that, and then that's that's the back end for us to know uh where you'll be staged.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_04: And when you check in, yeah, it's a pretty easy process.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_03: And if you'll check out the show notes too in the in the comments below, we'll put a link there for registration and a link for all the information as well to make sure that so we're talking about that that's not this Saturday, it's the next Saturday coming up, right on the 25th.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_04: On the 25th.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, and then that is going to be again from 10 to 2, and then the spring game starts.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_04: Spring kickoff will start at 2 o'clock, should last uh probably about an hour and a half, and then there will be an autograph session with the team following that uh on the uh inside the stadium somewhere.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_03: And all that's happening the same day.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_04: All that's happening the same day.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_03: So if I want the full inch a lot, get up, come do some yoga, okay?
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_03: Get up, drain a car out, polish it, talk to some people, go into the game, get an autograph.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_01: So the I I've got it all, I've got a random question for you because sometimes it's sort of parking becomes an issue.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yep, you know, you get 60, 70,000 people.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_01: Now, at Spring Graham, we won't have quite that many.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but if you come to the car show, can you keep your parking spot through the entire game?
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_01: You do.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_01: Now you're just telling you how you get the VIP part.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, this is right on the north ends of it.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_04: Each of you have your cars that you'll be putting in.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_04: Uh I don't know which one from the the really cool tower y'all be right out of tower.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_04: The tower is amazing.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_04: Love the tower.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_04: We got a couple of red ones in there.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_04: We have to bring there one or two of the red ones out.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_04: I think it'd be fun.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, we need to have the right colors, don't we?
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah, don't bring uh the SEC color scores.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_00: Don't bring orange, yeah, blue, yeah, or a clocks.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_04: But I think I think that would be uh totally cool.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_04: That that tower is awesome.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_04: Kudos to you all on getting that up.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_04: It's uh it's definitely a sight on the side, which is great.
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, good side.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_01: That was uh you talk about your uh your raillights.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_01: That was our rail lights plus plus, right?
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_01: It was just a way to bring a little extra flair.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's you know, and if I can, sure.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_04: The very first time I came to the campus here, this is like its own little city.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_04: It's pretty good-like, I was like, man, this is like people are walking around with Lays and Hawaiian things, and somebody's wearing an inner tube, and I felt like I was in Cancun for there for a little bit.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_04: Uh but yeah, yeah, this is a this is an amazing location.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, your customer service, your everybody that I ran into was just super helpful, customer, uh, customer friendly.
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_04: And so kudos to you and your team for all the great things that y'all are doing in our community.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_03: Well, thank you for that.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_03: I and I know you get that, that it's about the atmosphere that somebody walks into.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_03: You know, with people walking around like that, it's like, okay, there's there's something happening here.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_03: It kind of looks like a fun place to do business, you know, not just the stigma of it's quiet, like what do I do?
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like they want to have fun in the experience.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_01: You totally get that as you know, being a tar in charge of entertainment and you know, kind of all those things.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh finishing up March when we had our crazy numbers, there was a guy that was one away from making it to our employee auction, right?
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_01: We set these goals and these standards for each one of our team, and we had this big auction where they are in auction dollars and they get to buy.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_01: We spend, you know,$60 plus thousand dollars to buy all this stuff, everything you can imagine, the latest and greatest.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_01: He was one away from being able to get to the auction.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_01: It was in the last day, and um, so how do you portray that to a customer?
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_01: Because there's not really any reason why a customer would buy or not buy because the guy's missing a goal.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_01: Like that's his problem, not their problem.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_01: But we had bought uh, you said suits, we'd bought a crazy amount of suits and just ridiculous outfits.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_01: We had George Day, uh, but we had bought these uh disco ball helmets.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh think of like I had seen those before.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they're pretty outstanding.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_01: We saw them in Vegas of all places, right?
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_01: So I got on Amazon and ordered a good bundle for I said, Hey guys, I got you some light up shoes and some disco helmets.
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_01: Order your suits at leisure.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but so we said, All right.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_01: Right at least here.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, just like that, right?
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna need to integrate that in, or yes.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you definitely need to have some people as part of your team.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that's how you could know that they're part just had those helmets on, right?
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like you've never felt just give us a shout out when you integrate the there they are right there.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh we said, dude, put the helmet on.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_01: And we also bought cowboy hats that were the same disco ball.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I said take this out to your customer and say, hey, it's part of our ultimate challenge.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_01: We want to make sure that this is not an average experience by any means.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_01: That's why I have this helmet on, and that's why I'd like to ask you to put this hat on.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_01: So we take your photo on the red carpet.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's part of our process.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_01: Every customer that buys a car, we roll out the red carpet, take their photo.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, so they have a great photo of when they bought their car, maybe their first car, their 20th car, or whatever maybe their retirement car or celebration celebration car.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: So he put this helmet on, and I could see from across the showroom, he was grinning ear from ear, so it was infectious of the fun.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_01: And then she put the cowboy hat on.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_01: Like, there was no way that they were saying no.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: We had to make the deal make sense for everybody.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_01: And the excitement of him just victory, now I'm in the auction, victory of the customer.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: Like, now I got the deal I wanted.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_01: She had the cowboy hat on.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_01: We had another guy that said, Hey, I can't leave here without give me one of those hats or give me one of those helmets and drug matin out there and said, Hey, you gotta get me on the red carpet with this.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, I'm deal number 600.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: I know I am, right?
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_01: And that's just the hype.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_01: People kept asking me why I was wearing something ridiculous.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I was just like, Oh, I don't know what to wear today, most ridiculous thing ever.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I called myself the CO CFO of this and self-appointed, but it was a chief self-appointed chief fun officer.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so it was my job every single day to make sure that there was just a ridiculous amount of excitement and fun going on every single day.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's I think you can integrate that into you know Hogtown Classic for the spring game and just bringing the excitement of just ridiculous things.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_03: Uh uh now we this is our mythbuster section, okay?
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_03: So you could jump in here if you want to.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_03: All right, so so here, is this a myth or not?
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_03: If your product is good enough, you do not need marketing.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: In today's world, I would say wrong.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: Because people still need to know about it.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think more often than not, this is my opinion, it's worth what it's worth, is that uh even if you have an outstanding product but people don't know about it, or you have an average product, but everyone's pushing it, social, and they see the why is this line longer, right?
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_01: So let's say you got six food trucks and this one's got a really long line.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_01: Are people gonna go get in the one with no line or long line?
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_01: They're gonna get in the long line.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_01: So even if the food truck has really good tacos, but no one's in their line, they haven't marketed well enough, they don't have graphics on the side of the truck, they don't have a menu, they don't have music.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_01: They don't know.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_01: People don't know.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I I'm that's my opinion.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_03: I I'm gonna give you an opinion here, too, is that I feel like if you had an amazing product that nobody else had, would it organically grow by itself?
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_03: But if you marketed it well, how much faster could it grow?
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_03: And if you don't gain enough market share by it fast enough, there could be somebody that tries to take that product and rip it off and does a better job marketing and then could steal from what you actually have.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_03: So I think you have to have a good product, but the magic happens when you have a good product and great marketing.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_03: What are your thoughts?
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_04: You know, one of the greatest things that I look at is like the candy lines, and I think about uh, you know, the Hershey's bar and how that, you know, how they made the Hershey's bar.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_04: And back then, man, it was like you're you're making the original packaging, you're drawing it, you know, and you're just sharing it with people.
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_04: And I, you know, I think about that, and they probably didn't have the dollars to market, you know, back the other day, but it just continued to be a word of mouth and it to spread.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_04: Uh so I would I would tend to agree with you as well.
• 43:49
  SPEAKER_04: Um I think I think you gotta it it's gotta be something that definitely has gotta be great, or people aren't going to buy it.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_03: Or there has to be an experience, and I gotta Talk just a little bit of sports here, okay?
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_03: Um, you can just have an average or some people to debate below average, whoever's listening to this, okay?
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_03: Sports team, but really good marketing and still fill the stadium.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_03: And the Cowboys have done that for years, if you think about that.
• 44:20
  SPEAKER_03: You know, because Jerry Jones always has events going on there, he always has people following that.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, you probably have way more insight on that than I tried to fumble through.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_03: But uh, you know, I I think we live in a world that you gotta do well, you know.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_03: Um and there there's some products out there that people talk about, they don't spend any money on marketing, yet they have ambassadors that talk about it all the time.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_03: So it's like you might not have paid marketing, but you still have marketing.
• 44:45
  SPEAKER_01: Some level of telling the people about the product or the experience.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_03: Just to let you know, usually our Mythbuster doesn't get that deep, but today No, that one did.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_00: That one did.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_00: So I think I think you definitely have to work through and share the value of whatever your product is bringing to the table for it to be amplified to the level that it needs to be.
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_00: So diving into we've answered quite a few of these, but uh Elvis, what are your thoughts on, and I'm gonna skip to you know, a lot of people think engagement is just getting people to show up.
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_00: What are most organizations getting wrong when it comes to actually building a real fan loyalty base out there?
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_04: I think it's just consistent communication with them, yeah, letting them know, you know, great things that are going on uh within your program, keeping them informed of, you know, offers, discounts that you might have, uh, but finding ways to engage with them, whether that's uh phone calls like y'all do, I'm sure, uh phone calls thanking them for their support, uh, door-to-door visits, you know, what times we try to get go and you know, we may pluck five to ten season ticket holders out and actually go to their homes with the coaches or the student athletes, knock on their door and say, Thank you for being a season ticket holder.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_04: We just want to stop by and surprise them.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_04: That's all.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_04: So think about, you know, kind of the surprise and delights.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_04: We did that one year by taking our mascots door to door uh and just making some cool thank you for being a Razorback fan uh interactions.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and I think about, you know, I continue to think about like building a new fan base with the young generation because as the older ones continue, you know, you're phasing out, people get old, retire, not able to come, you know, as like they used to, you've got to continue to build your new fans.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_04: And that's the most important part is that communication with them and getting them in at a young age.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_04: So our junior Rager Back program is something that we do, and we send out uh a packet of membership information.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_04: We send them a lanyard, a card, uh, some some different things that they get in the mail, they get to open it up, and they might have a flag in there, they can hang in their room.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_04: Um, but you know, if they can see that load that brand uh hit their mailbox and they get to open it and they're seeing it in their room, the idea is that we're trying to ingrain into their minds the loyalty to the Razorback.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_04: So I think if I I think just c constant communication and and finding ways to to make personal connections with them.
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_03: Other one of the things you hit on there is that like you know, your job of fan engagement starts from maybe social and starts before they even get to the game, but then must continue during the game.
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_03: You know, just because you got everybody there, you guys aren't done.
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_03: The show's just starting, you know.
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_04: I think one of the things too is like uh I use gymnastics as an example.
• 47:37
  SPEAKER_04: Coach Jordan Weber, she does an incredible job on making sure that we're finding ways to say thank you to our season ticket holders, thank you to our fans.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_04: So some of the things that we do, you know, might be a slide on the video board that says thank you to our loyal season ticket holders, or we may do a segment where, hey, we want to recognize four loyal season ticket holders.
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_04: We want them to stand, we'll have the mascots with them, give them an opportunity to be recognized.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_04: And then the other thing that Coach Jordan does uh is she'll take the mic after the game and actually talk to our fans and give them an actual welcome.
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_04: She will also go from uh desk to desk of people that are working at the event and say, thank you.
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_04: I just want to let you know how much you meant to our meet tonight.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_04: And I find that personal connection to be so incredibly uh uh I find it to be incredibly grateful for having somebody like that as a colleague because she appreciates the work that I do uh marketing her program.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_04: And I I I I say you take that into the workplace.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, you you may have somebody going above and beyond and you just think that they do that, but they may want to be able to hear that recognition or that thank you that they have uh gone above and beyond and you've recognized that.
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's so important.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_00: I love to hear that, and that's why you've continued to be successful that you're not taking just because things have worked for so long this way, like a business, we're gonna continue to do it this way because this is how we've always done it.
• 49:03
  SPEAKER_00: You're taking that younger generation coming into and figuring out how you can do camps and how you can include them on Kids Day or anything else.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_00: I remember whenever I was younger, I had done a and uh this was twenty years ago or longer, twenty-five years ago, that we did a summer football camp there, and you actually got to stay on campus and go and practice through the indoor facility and be a part of all that.
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_00: So as I see any of those things come up, it's so important for that younger generation, I think, to see what you have going on.
• 49:36
  SPEAKER_03: That's good, that's fun.
• 49:37
  SPEAKER_03: That's a lot of fun.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_03: That engagement, you know, just you you create those memories and that's what you remember, and then that's how you create that hog fan for life.
• 49:45
  SPEAKER_00: What are a couple of things you've done that surprise you with a good outcome?
• 49:49
  SPEAKER_00: You didn't think necessarily they're gonna work as good as what you thought they were going to.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_04: Let me think.
• 49:54
  SPEAKER_04: Something that might have surprised me.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_04: Um it's a good one.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_04: Um surprised me, but might have had a good outcome.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_00: Or something that just kind of evolved bigger than what you thought it was going to.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_00: You started as something small.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, I I go back to Hogtown.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_04: You know, when you first started Hogtown, we started out with one, we took one side of the street rather than the whole entire road.
• 50:22
  SPEAKER_04: We had one side, it was two lanes.
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_04: We had to utilize that so we could keep traffic open.
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_04: And where's Hogtown out so we can we can it's literally on uh between Stadium Drive and Razorback Road, and it's Maple Street, right in front of the stadium on the north side.
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_04: And so they had uh given us two lanes out of four lanes to set up our hog toad.
• 50:42
  SPEAKER_04: So we literally had barricades in the middle of the road trying to set up 10 by 10s on this side so traffic could still flow in this other side.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_04: And after that, you know, I go back in and say, okay, we almost we've we've had people nearly get hit.
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it wasn't safe.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_04: We've got to figure out how we can open this up.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_04: So we we all went back to the table, met, and that at that point in time we were able to figure out a way to open uh to give that whole entire road to us to use.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_04: And then um the bus traffic and the traffic getting into the that lot, we would just take them up Razorback and Stadium.
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_04: They'd have to go around and come in on the sides of the parking lot versus through the middle part of that road.
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_04: Uh so I would say that was one.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_04: I think uh, you know, another another thing is is just being able to uh change your your mindset once a new coach comes in because the coaches have new ideas and they want new ways to promote their programs, to market.
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, they each bring their own ideas in from their own, you know, from their previous stops.
• 51:45
  SPEAKER_04: And so you want to be able to adapt to what uh and change with what they're wanting to do and find a way to work with them on implementing the ideas that they have.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_04: Because even though I might have been here, you know, four 13 seasons, sure, you know, this is that person's first season and they don't know any different.
• 52:03
  SPEAKER_04: So if they say, hey, we want to do this, this, and this, I'm not gonna go back and push back on it.
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_04: I may say, Hey, we have tried that before, here's what's come out of it.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_04: But we always want to give that person the opportunity to try.
• 52:15
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, that's good.
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_01: What have you seen in coaches?
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_01: Of some coaches come in and are just solely locked in on winning, and they say, Hey, you figure out how to promote, versus a coach comes in and says, Hey, I want to try to win, but I also want fans heavily engaged.
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_01: Have you seen both of those?
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_01: You see both of those.
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_04: And, you know, I think both of them are that it's great to have you got the the coaches that want to be involved at the very front end, and they're gonna help you build out uh their thoughts.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_04: They'll give you a list of what they feel, hey, here's the most important things.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_04: Here are our games that we want to really highlight, here's our marquee, uh marquee games, and they allow you the opportunity to go and with your team and work that out.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, and then you present the plan to them.
• 53:00
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, and then you also have the coaches who want to have uh an opportunity to be involved in the process of planning.
• 53:07
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and so you know, one of the things that we've always done is is try to find those three to five really good ideas that can help their program and share showcase those to them and give them kind of that as kind of the lead into what uh they may want to do.
• 53:23
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and so that we we help help drive the conversation with them.
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_04: But you know, they have seen different things in their other stops that have we feel have worked well here.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, you know, one of the things that uh uh coach uh Calipari does is, you know, he has his post-game um post-game talk with the fans and they can bring basketballs and do some other things and get his autograph.
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_04: And, you know, that that was something that he he brought with him.
• 53:50
  SPEAKER_04: So uh that's something that's worked really well as a part of that.
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's Grant, that's really big.
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_00: Well, let's dive into here.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_00: I've got a couple of questions here.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_00: What's the most frequently asked question you think you get asked in your job role?
• 54:06
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, most frequently asked question that I get asked in my job role.
• 54:11
  SPEAKER_04: Um that you have to answer.
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_04: That I have to answer.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, how do you think next football season's gonna?
• 54:19
  SPEAKER_04: How do you think next football season's gonna go?
• 54:22
  SPEAKER_04: Or um what uh what do you think?
• 54:25
  SPEAKER_04: Uh what do you think as far as uh you know, basketball season?
• 54:31
  SPEAKER_04: Where do you where do you think we'll end up going?
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_04: Do you think we're gonna get to the final four?
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_04: Will we go to the national championship?
• 54:35
  SPEAKER_04: I got a lot of that recently.
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 54:37
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, but I think the biggest one is uh how's our football team looking?
• 54:41
  SPEAKER_04: Or uh what you know, what would you say the outlook of the football program is gonna be next year?
• 54:46
  SPEAKER_04: I've gotten a lot of questions just in general about you know, like, are there gonna be any new promotions that y'all are gonna be doing?
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_04: What bands are gonna be in Hogtown?
• 54:56
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, some of that fun stuff.
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_00: I got you.
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 54:59
  SPEAKER_00: Just keeping our toes there.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_00: And besides, because I think Hogtown is kind of your your baby.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's really yeah, you've really grown up.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_00: Any other fan events that kind of come to top of mind awareness that you think have really been successful?
• 55:14
  SPEAKER_04: Let's see.
• 55:14
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, we started doing uh a fan event for women's basketball, and it's a season ticket holder meet and greet.
• 55:21
  SPEAKER_04: It was a special event where we bring in uh their season ticket holders or anyone that's generally interested in women's basketball, and they had the opportunity to uh have a one-on-one conversation with Coach UC and also get to meet the team as a part of that preseason event.
• 55:37
  SPEAKER_04: And that's always good because they're a very close-knit season ticket holder family.
• 55:42
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, so that's been really good.
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_04: Uh I I also enjoy putting on the chamber after hours events.
• 55:49
  SPEAKER_04: We've had the opportunities to host a uh professional develop or the professional night out event or the uh the morning breakfast event.
• 55:56
  SPEAKER_04: So we had those opportunities in the past that we've done.
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_04: Um, you know, that we're always able to be creative and find the finding ways.
• 56:05
  SPEAKER_04: Uh Budweiser Clydesdales bringing them to campus was a lot of fun.
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, I do remember having them.
• 56:11
  SPEAKER_04: We actually had the the Christmas tree that was heading to Washington to be put up in the White House, made a stop at the stadium outside.
• 56:19
  SPEAKER_04: It was huge.
• 56:21
  SPEAKER_04: And uh they had it all decorated on the inside along the stops, and uh that was part of the fun.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_04: I got to set that up and coordinate that as a community event.
• 56:29
  SPEAKER_04: Um, hopefully that answered a little bit.
• 56:32
  SPEAKER_04: It's great.
• 56:33
  SPEAKER_04: Some of the fun things that I've gotten to be a part of.
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I've really started to notice that more and more that there's been more community, especially over the last several years, of just outreach, more of you know, they probably were set in their ways, and you probably saw this a whole lot whenever you first came on with the university, that they were set in their certain ways if we do things this way, and we're gonna call the hogs at this quarter, this quarter, this quarter, whatever it would be.
• 57:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I think you've done a really good job just looking at it from outside of incorporating just fun community events like hey, we may be the big university, but we're still your hometown team here.
• 57:12
  SPEAKER_00: And like Chelby said, there's no national team here.
• 57:15
  SPEAKER_00: So we're University of Arkansas is college, professional, everything else for Arkansas residents.
• 57:22
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and and the other part about my job is being able to just be creative.
• 57:27
  SPEAKER_04: And, you know, one of the things that comes to mind is on creativity is you know, being able to say we have five mascots, which is the largest mascot, costume mascots in the country, an alive mascot, which is Tusk.
• 57:37
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, yeah.
• 57:38
  SPEAKER_04: And I I do need to mention that is you know, we're retiring Tusk six uh and next month in May, and we have a new uh new razor back baby that we're introducing, Tusk number seven, who is probably that big whenever I saw him.
• 57:52
  SPEAKER_04: He's probably about as big as this table, and I'm just kidding.
• 57:55
  SPEAKER_04: He's he's gonna be a lot bigger real quick.
• 57:58
  SPEAKER_04: We'll have him to introduce.
• 57:59
  SPEAKER_04: So that's something new.
• 58:00
  SPEAKER_04: But I think about too is you know, conversations with our mascots.
• 58:04
  SPEAKER_04: Like I had this idea, and I'm like, hey, I want the mascot team to go to, I want to take them to a random neighborhood on Halloween night, and I want them to go door to door and knock, uh, knock and have their buckets and they kind of dress up and do their so much fun.
• 58:17
  SPEAKER_04: Get some footage of them, you know, and um just being able to be creative like that.
• 58:24
  SPEAKER_04: Like, okay, let's try it, let's see what we can do.
• 58:26
  SPEAKER_04: So I I have I enjoy those those parts of the jobs or you know, here lately we've been getting, I'll get five to ten letters a week from kids in school that write and they're like, Razorbacks are our favorite team.
• 58:42
  SPEAKER_04: We'd love to have a poster.
• 58:43
  SPEAKER_04: Can you send us something?
• 58:44
  SPEAKER_04: We'll get those.
• 58:45
  SPEAKER_04: And then something has happened over the last couple of months on social media now where we're getting wedding invitations.
• 58:52
  SPEAKER_04: And people are inviting.
• 58:53
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, they're sending their wedding invitations to us and basically asking if there's anything that we have that we could send to their uh significant other in celebration of the wedding.
• 59:04
  SPEAKER_04: So I'll work with Hunter, and Hunter will put together a letter, and it was being congratulations uh on their marriage, and we will send a really cool letter from Hunter along with a challenge coin that Hunter has, and we'll mail that off to him as a commemorative gift for their weddings.
• 59:20
  SPEAKER_01: That is so good because that is a trend.
• 59:21
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, it was a little bit of an older trend, but those trends like come up and down.
• 59:25
  SPEAKER_01: But there was a thing, I think it was around COVID, where and it got legs, someone did it jokingly, was like, hey, I sent to Coles and to Target and to Olive Garden and all these people.
• 59:37
  SPEAKER_01: I just happened to get their address, and a couple of them sent them to the right creative people, and they were like, instead of somebody just asking for money, like all the marketing requests you get, like, hey, we sponsor this and just throwing it away, they're like, What if we actually sent something back to them?
• 59:51
  SPEAKER_01: So then, because they're social media, they're like, Hey, I sent this letter out to 150 people, only 10 responded, and look what they sent me.
• 59:59
  SPEAKER_01: So you guys definitely stepped up to it.
• 1:00:01
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, Hunter, can you do something?
• 1:00:03
  SPEAKER_01: And he's like, Oh, yeah, let me write up this letter.
• 1:00:05
  SPEAKER_01: Let's gonna challenge coin.
• 1:00:06
  SPEAKER_01: And so then by you guys doing that, it will continue to trend higher and higher people, like, how silly is that?
• 1:00:12
  SPEAKER_04: But you guys get to step up, but yeah, I think I want to say two weeks ago, I had five in the mill, and of course I laid them out, and you know, I had to plan and I knew I was gonna go in and talk to Hunter and give him, you know, kind of here's what we have, this is for this stuff.
• 1:00:25
  SPEAKER_04: And a couple of people came off, they're like, dude, we knew you knew people, but like you've got five weddings to go to in like the next couple minutes.
• 1:00:32
  SPEAKER_04: No, like none of these that we're both ends.
• 1:00:35
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and then the other thing to tie back in, you know.
• 1:00:38
  SPEAKER_04: One of the great things about working in Razorback Athletics is the stories that fans share with us.
• 1:00:43
  SPEAKER_04: So we receive a lot of uh, which go usually go to me, is there are a lot of fans who are at the uh, you know, may maybe at the stage of uh passing away, avid fans that might have cancer, they're in their final days, uh, or they know they're only going to have six to eight months to live.
• 1:01:01
  SPEAKER_04: We will do everything we can, either A, uh, to work with their family to get them to a game before that happens, or we will work with our mascot family to send a really cool picture uh with the card that says thinking of you, get well.
• 1:01:18
  SPEAKER_04: And then we'll always work with Hunter to Hunter will always write some type of letter to send to the to the fan, letting them know appreciation of their lifetime support of the hogs.
• 1:01:29
  SPEAKER_04: But the stories are incredible and people have vivid memories of when they were uh young and able to come to games.
• 1:01:37
  SPEAKER_04: But we we've got some really peoples whose homes have been lost in fires where maybe their only thing they had in there was memorabilia, and they just want something that to keep with them.
• 1:01:48
  SPEAKER_04: So sure, those are some special moments that I get to.
• 1:01:51
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, yeah.
• 1:01:52
  SPEAKER_04: That's kind of the the file, you know.
• 1:01:54
  SPEAKER_04: You got your bad file that you throw everything in, you know, and then you've got I had to had a person tell me one time before, like keep a file that says bad and good.
• 1:02:04
  SPEAKER_04: And every card that you get over the course of the year, put them in the good file and all the crappy stuff you get, put them in there.
• 1:02:10
  SPEAKER_04: And at the end of the year, open it up and see which one outdoes the other.
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_04: And the goods are all way around boom, boom, boom.
• 1:02:17
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 1:02:17
  SPEAKER_04: So it gives you something to feel good about.
• 1:02:20
  SPEAKER_03: It really does.
• 1:02:20
  SPEAKER_03: I just gotta say, and I know uh both Taylor and Shelby have said this, but you guys have done an amazing job making it not just a game to go watch, but an actual experience.
• 1:02:29
  SPEAKER_04: Thank y'all, thank y'all.
• 1:02:30
  SPEAKER_04: So it's a big, a big team behind it, lots of people behind the scenes making that happen and and a lot of a lot of hard work that goes into it and planning already for for next year as well.
• 1:02:40
  SPEAKER_03: Is there one area where if I'm a fan or if I'm listening to this, and besides the car show, that I can see the events going on and I can know where to go or to take my family if you guys have events like this?
• 1:02:52
  SPEAKER_04: The best the best thing that we do is we put everything out on Arkansasorbacks.com.
• 1:02:56
  SPEAKER_04: That's where everything lives, and then we put it all out on social media at Arkansas Razorbacks on social media.
• 1:03:03
  SPEAKER_04: That's where we put all of our stuff.
• 1:03:04
  SPEAKER_04: We we do a really good job of creating our events as well.
• 1:03:07
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 1:03:07
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, but that's where we put it out.
• 1:03:09
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, we do have uh some of our radio um parkers that we promote with as well.
• 1:03:14
  SPEAKER_04: But uh majority of it's going to be um through email, uh through radio and through uh website.
• 1:03:22
  SPEAKER_03: Well, we're excited about this event coming up.
• 1:03:24
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, you know, with the car show, the classic, it's gonna be on the 25th, which will be next Saturday coming up.
• 1:03:30
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, and if you want to get there early and do the yoga, you can show up at eight o'clock or bring your ride.
• 1:03:34
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm gonna tell you this too.
• 1:03:35
  SPEAKER_03: If you say to show up at 10, they're rolling in about 8:45, 9 o'clock, in your position.
• 1:03:40
  SPEAKER_03: So that car show will go between 10 and 1.30.
• 1:03:44
  SPEAKER_03: Don't forget about the Justin Moore concert that's gonna be in there and then roll straight into the football game.
• 1:03:50
  SPEAKER_03: Yep, and then they'll be able to get autographs after that.
• 1:03:53
  SPEAKER_04: That's right.
• 1:03:53
  SPEAKER_04: Yep, you'll be able to get autographs, and uh, you know, the one thing about it is it's free for everybody.
• 1:03:57
  SPEAKER_04: You bet.
• 1:03:58
  SPEAKER_03: What's a great event.
• 1:03:59
  SPEAKER_03: Elvis, thanks for coming to take a little time and talk with us this morning.
• 1:04:02
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• 1:04:10
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• 1:04:21
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• 1:04:25
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