Coming to Northeast Wisconsin live from the Civic Media Studios and featuring TV and radio broadcast veteran John Minow along with the City of Green Bay's longest-serving mayor Jim Schmidt.
This is Minow and the Mayor.
And here are your hosts, John Minow and Jim Schmidt.
for the first time since I bet October.
Todd has our current temperatures and it's in the 50s.
I know.
Wasn't that great this morning?
October, Todd?
Probably not long ago, I would say.
52.
Beautiful.
Yeah.
Nice Southwest wind out there.
8 to 10.
Close, yeah.
Let me see.
You say.
8 to 10 Southwest.
Come on.
8.
It's not windy at all
from the Southwest.
Thank you.
Right.
Thank you.
Thank you.
It was a good weekend.
Wow, the golf tournament.
Wasn't that fun?
That was fun.
Well, yes or no.
It was fun.
Well, for those of us who just watched it for what golf is supposed to be, as Todd said earlier, when we were talking relaxing and just, you know, the beauty of the beauty of Augusta.
Right.
I thought
Jim Nance was really overdoing it for a while yesterday.
A little bit on that, didn't you?
Yeah, I did.
And the whole Rory thing, so
when Rory's walking up, he's
like, and his father on the head, one token left, but young Rory wanted to hit some more golf balls.
It's like, you know, he wouldn't... So you hadn't won yet, don't blow it for us, Gene.
And sometimes... You know, that's not right, Todd, yes.
And sometimes you just...
Better off just letting it
happen.
Just
let it go.
He used to feel like he had to fill in the time.
I agree.
I thought there was, he overdid it a little bit, but.
Mom and
dad sitting back in Northern Ireland at the little pub where Rory washed dishes and his mom checked down the golf course.
I know.
The most humble beginning ever.
Yeah.
And now on the precipice of winning the green jacket.
We used to let a lot of wind
go.
And what, 11 years?
It was 11 or 12?
Because he was going for the grants.
What was it?
It's good for the lifetime grants.
Yeah, but I mean
When did he had three?
I thought 2015 or 2015 I thought was this
okay, so that he's been chasing that last
I mean I thought somebody said this was the 11th
shot at trying to get the fourth one.
Yeah, okay
I mean, there was a lot of you obviously a lot of emotion built up.
Oh, you know what?
I kind of talked about this a little bit with the Duke game But you just got to give these guys who don't win this unbelievable credit.
No
question, man Just that guy from Ireland and you know
when Justin Rose was right so just Great just awesome like yeah, I was that was something man.
It was you know, you don't remind me of that when we're talking about Rory coming up the
that one fair were there, and now the pride of, you know, and growing up so humble.
His parents had to be saying, oh, he was still in the golf club.
We were still in the country club.
Really?
He's skied.
Come on.
He put soccer.
He's skiing.
We had a boat.
And they make it sound like, you know, these peasant people living hand to begging alongside the fairway as a traveler.
Can you smell what's a bubble?
It's like, come on.
I remember the old Saturday night lives get back to the days of Garrett Morris.
What is the thing?
It was like a throwback on the little kid, Babe Ruth, to hit a home run for him.
You know, his little kid is like.
Kids listening to me.
I'm gonna hit two for your son.
Come on, baby.
I'll tell you what, baby said he was gonna do it for this little sick kid.
Actually, oh boy, he's beyond sick.
Hope the kids still with us.
Why?
Just because
we're dead any minute
now.
I'm
dying.
That's
what that reminds me of.
It's like, shut up.
You really saw that kid in the dusty streets.
They
knew.
Yes.
But anyway.
Yeah.
So, okay, gotta bring this up.
Okay, so about three months ago the biggest story in golf was Rory filing for a divorce against his wife and the big rumors were he and the main yada yada We're yada yada, you know the get the person that does all the interviews afterwards Okay, her yeah, but they had hooked up.
Okay, and we're divorced was divorcing his wife.
Okay,
then all of a sudden backtracked in that And then she was
Tall picturesque blonde with the big hat as beautiful little girl and the whole thing.
And I didn't see that.
Did that woman then interview Rory?
I know she interviewed Dishambo and Justin Rose.
Did she interview Rory?
Because I was going to say, you got mama standing there and you got the other one standing there.
That's got to be a little bit of an awkward.
You know what
that
reminds you
of?
You don't remind me of?
The Chilean minors.
Yeah, but what a day what an amazing go I'll tell you what man
Major gulf is almost like must watch
and what up?
And then you know, they usually a perfect that was perfect perfect weather man It was yeah,
that was great.
I mean
just he just gonna make you
want to go I will say this I can't eat because there was one time where I mean the intestinal toughness fortitude of these athletes and I'm talking about all these high-level athletes not just golfers Rory
Could have Rory was so close.
He was this far away to being considered the biggest choker possibly in the history of the game He could either do one of two things be immortal Or be the biggest choker ever and it came down to the right Isn't that crazy all that work all that whatever and you make this putt or you miss that putt and that's boom That's it.
That's how you're identified for the rest of your life But for him to hit some horrible shots and then
To come back with a couple of the most beautiful shots under pressure I've personally ever seen a man when Justin rose on the playoff hole when he hit that one I don't know six feet seven feet but it's a game over right over
two feet
and then Rory does that Unbelievable yeah, so I made some money made some money at the casino that's never been on golf before I would say this I would recommend it.
It's a lot of fun
I don't wonder if you enjoyed the game as much as I did.
At
the end I did.
Halfway through I was right.
Until that putt went in, I don't know if it's enjoyment.
I'm not sure what it is.
It's like watching your kids perform.
It's like you're enjoying it, but your heart's in your throat.
Yeah.
See that's why I, with football, and I told you that there's some games where I really don't care, but if I bet on them,
I care.
Oh my goodness gracious.
Yeah.
Yeah,
so got some good morning sir.
Good morning says Vicky.
Hi Vicky.
Hi Vicky.
Good morning gentlemen.
Have a great week, Michael.
Michael things are going for you.
Man, this gotta be you're on the clock now, Michael, right
buddy?
Uh, what accent is that John Brian?
That which one?
The Irish one?
Or the Chileans?
What was Chilean?
What was Northern Ireland?
Well, the both of
those guys are from Ireland.
So I think it was the golfers, right?
Well, one was England.
Yeah.
Scott or England one was what now actually one would you know why but he's just doing their grandfather's might have been mortal enemies once Northern Ireland the other ones England
I
mean, you know remember Paul McCartney Give a year to the Irish remember that time.
No, you don't remember
that.
No, sir.
You don't remember that song by Paul McCartney.
No, sir
Maybe don't remember.
It's just your rendition.
I don't know.
Right, right.
Everybody knows that song.
Everybody knows that song.
Got another one here.
Good morning from across town.
Mac.
Good morning, Mac.
Who else is out there on this beautiful Monday morning?
Brewer's Saturday.
Jeez.
Did you see that?
What happened?
No.
Brewer's had a 96% chance to win that game.
Two outs away from the win to win five to nothing.
Two outs, ninth inning.
The last two guys basically in the batting order at bat for the Diamondbacks.
Brewers loose.
Scored seven runs with one out in the night.
Five to nothing the Brewers led and they lost seven to five.
Wow.
Oh that was a gut wrencher.
Gut wrencher just kept walking guys and then a base hit and walking guys and a base hit.
It's like wow.
Well, anyway, happy Monday to you 52 in Green Bay, 52 in Hampton, 52 in Oshkosh.
You're on 97.9 FM WGBW 98.3, 96.5 FM WSS, and of course, the Civic Media app.
Tigers in Milwaukee tonight, which is a great thing.
That's always a fun series to throw back to the old American League teams.
Happy birthday, Sarah Michelle Geller, 48 Michael, excuse me, Anthony Michael Hall, 57, Brad Garrett, 65.
Anthony Michael Hall of course was rusty
in national ampoune.
Yeah, um did all those Teenage Movies to like oh man 16 candles and Johnny be
good.
You remember Johnny be good.
I don't
remember that one
Played the part of high school quarterback being recruited bad movie
Michael Hall did cuz he was kind of the geek kid back
now He also played white Ford in 61 the story on Roger Maris's quest to
to break Babe Ruth's record in 1961.
He played Whitey Ford.
Brad Garrett seems like one of those guys would be a lot older.
Shouldn't he be?
Yeah, he's not.
Everybody hates him.
Everybody loves Raymond.
Yeah.
All
right.
We get a great lineup today.
Brittany Merleau, of course, coming on, Civic Media Meteorologist.
Aaron Popkey from the Green Bay Packers talking draft 2025.
No getting around it now.
No.
Drove out there.
Friday, pick up my taxes.
CLA went by and like you said you look at you were out there and said I thought the stage would be Well, I don't know you whatever you thought the stage was gonna be but it's built right and it's cool
It's growing more.
Yes, it's it's more of a skeleton.
It's right.
It's fun to see
that but you can't really see it now From the front till the draft, right?
Can you get up one party that way towards the snow?
No, no, no, no, I just say close it
yesterday.
Yeah, so but you can walk Yeah, but I mean you can't be driving by
it.
No, look at
that.
Yeah, um, but
So it's it's fun, right?
It's construction every day.
There's something new.
So that's going to be cool to talk to Aaron about it and how things are going.
Yeah, there's it's here.
What it's 11.
Yeah, 11
days.
It's here.
No turning back now.
No.
Um, we got to ask, should we do it?
Got to ask really for the long range or it looks pretty good.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That looks pretty good.
Yeah.
It's funny.
I was talking to you guys this morning about this.
This is just a, you look at the crowds and you look at the last four NFL drafts.
What I really find interesting about this is just this last minute, how it's picking up like yesterday, you know, I was at, I told you I was at nail cart like this weekend and you know, people are like, oh, I think I'm coming up.
It's like.
Talked about this a year ago, and you think you're coming up.
You know, where's the game?
They got their tickets ahead of time.
I'm tailgating here.
I'm staying here.
So I think it's just one of those events that
I do
make
in the
last two weeks.
Which completely is 180 versus the way we thought it was going to be.
Right?
When
it's
sold out, your house is going to be rented.
And now it's like, well, now people are.
And now the rush is up.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So it's going to be great.
I just, I hope it works.
We got a great lineup of guests, folks.
Stay with us.
First day you can honestly say okay.
We got through it.
Oh, I felt yeah, right?
You know, that's true.
You know, it's
now it's over.
It's over.
It's this is it the worst day.
We're declaring it
rain.
It is we're declaring it.
Oh gosh.
No, I think we can
we have that authority really.
I was just afraid.
No, when somebody declare something that's usually when all but with me and Jim right,
right.
Yeah.
I just
I just I do want to say though my
Brother's birthday is May 3rd, and it snowed one time, and it
was... I
believe that.
It did.
Yeah.
Because I remember we were going to get together.
It's like, you know... Well, in the U.P., I've been seeing all these spring sport things.
Oh, did you guys make national news again?
No, I didn't see it.
Yeah, I think there's some bad weather up there in the U.P.
What?
Yeah.
I believe.
I mean, it's... I was watching kids trying to run track, and they had one lane.
They'd like taken a snowball or something around one lane.
Did you see that, Tiaz?
I saw that.
It just, ugh.
Again, I'm
100 years old, but we used to have those old cinder tracks, which is just mud.
It's just black mud when the weather was like this.
So we ran for track.
We ran on the roads up until like the first meet.
That was like the first time we ever lied on the track.
Guys, thank you.
Morning, boys.
Yesterday.
Pro bowling finals were a 20 and 22 year old bowling for $100,000 top prize.
A 20 year old pulled it off.
What were you making at 20 years old?
Mino and Jim.
Tori.
Yeah.
Wow.
You know what that is?
Bowling needs that.
You know, because bowling is great and they need a Tiger Woods.
They need something.
You know what I mean?
They need
But a 20-year-old making 100 grand, they'll get some people on the lanes.
You know, I was talking with somebody about this a couple of weeks ago, whatever, about sports we used to, you know, back in our day.
I think it was Burke.
No.
What did the old sports get?
But anyway, talking about sports, they don't really get covered.
Like, when I was first in this business, you know, the thing, the ongoing thing for sports was if it's dead, it leads in regards to a dead fish, dead deer, dead pheasant.
You know what I mean?
It's like that was so big, like the Al Sampson days.
Outdoor stories were huge.
You don't see those much anymore.
Another story we did numerous stories on.
Bowling.
We did numerous bowling.
Bowling was so big around here.
Well, sure.
Wasn't there a show?
Yeah, Saturday mornings.
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah, live bowling.
It just what happened to bowling of all the sports.
It seems like that one kind of slid the furthest he became a little bit of a like a joke, you know, like
You know, so the
all-time great movies are about bowling big Lebowski Kingpin Todd am I wrong?
No, you're right.
Yeah
But wouldn't you agree even your younger days taught like in your little town with a
bowling
alley would have been like almost a hub of the Rooties and two rivers?
Oh, we did even the community house at bowling and we were in leagues, but we're yeah What happened to bowling?
I used to take my daughter a Lindsay out to bumper bowling.
Yeah on Saturday mornings at Riverside lanes But here's what I'm saying is then you got that was sixth grade, but you think I don't know high school.
Was it not taken as a serious?
track, you know what I mean?
Like you get, then you got into basketball and all these
other
things.
But there
are some high school teams.
There are high school bowling teams in the state.
We didn't, really?
Yeah, there are.
Does Preble have one?
I would say Preble has
what, 81,
right?
We
talked about that one time.
Yeah,
enough kids to fill what I would think.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
I don't know.
What schools out there have high school bowling?
That would help a lot.
No question.
No question.
Yep.
Yep.
William says I still have cinder pieces under my knees skin after falling in a hundred yard dash in 1970 William, I'm right with you my brother Those those cinder tracks were nasty when you went down on him Brian says there are a few teams around here high school bowling teams Okay, but think about how many more lanes there were either even like you know the mid 80s around here There
are a
lot more.
I don't know why bowling for some reason seems to have there were a lot.
I don't know about that You don't think so
No, I think there's a we still have a lot of bowling lanes here.
I don't think compared to the way we used to.
All right, someone knows more than we do about that.
OK, well,
Riverside lanes.
For sure.
But what they built out.
Well, Schwabin has always been awesome.
I'm
a Schwabin on
lanes.
I'm talking about those ones like in Howard Swamaco.
Didn't they build like what is that?
Oh,
OK.
But I mean,
that there's that other little one in in Depeer heading out on PP.
Off to the right hand side.
Is it the starlight or something like that at one time?
But a lot of those little ones just seem to have been closed Yeah, no, no, why I mean we used to man we used to cover those stories a lot But those are the main stories that seem to have dropped off a little bit
I remember having like the weekly bowling report sponsored on the radio, you know, really?
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
No question.
Yeah question
Yeah,
300 game was rolled by yep.
Yeah
And they went a chicken dinner for a montage grocery Yeah, well
absolutely
fact that they're
up to a hundred thousand dollars
that that's
making it that's giving some headway, but You know that's interesting to see why that you make a good point.
It just hasn't right
Con on caught on yeah, but do you think it's like because of social media and stuff like that kids?
Just don't get out maybe that stuff
such a fun thing when you're a teenager What's more fun than going bowling?
That was my favorite thing about coming to Green Bay for the Packer X of Michigan.
Yeah,
we're all at Devroy's bowling alley out on Phelps.
That was awesome.
I was glad to read that the two winners were 22 and 20 versus.
I agree.
I agree.
68.
Hey,
young kid.
What the hell are
they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing
out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell are
they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell
are they doing out there?
What the hell
are they doing
out there?
What the hell are
they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell
are they doing
out
there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell are they doing out there?
What the hell are
I got this one century lanes Kegler's Club red carpet.
Yeah, that's right
That's the one I was trying to
think of
red carpet Manhattan lanes so many went under Todd from deep here But why Todd?
Why did they go under just that generation?
Maybe of I remember my dad when he was working, you know in the mind He'd be like afternoon shift They would have the leagues in them depending what shift you were on you could go out like nine in the morning and bowl
You know for your scores, then the rest of the guys would bowl that night or whatever.
I mean, it was serious bowling was like taking really serious back then.
You know, maybe it's not an easy sport to spectate.
I guess, you know, when
you look
at football basketball wrestling with it, you can.
I always got those kind of fun though.
On Saturday mornings, there's nothing else on you watching that.
And I was
talking
about live, you know.
There's not like there's bleachers or anything to watch bowling.
I don't know if that's it I don't know hard to believe in my first TV job I got into it so bad with the PBA at one of their things we almost got like into it into it
Can you tell us that story when we come back?
They're
But here I was a bad young man here in Green Bay that we have huge bowling tournaments huge phenomenal
So,
I don't know.
We're
gonna resurrect Bully.
Let's put that as one of our
goals.
Here we are.
All right.
Huge line up for you folks.
Stay with us.
For WGBW and WISS News, I'm Lisa Hale.
United Auto Workers Local 291 has been on strike at Cummins Oshkosh for almost four weeks.
Saturday a rally was held across the street from Cummins at the Union headquarters to show solidarity.
One speaker was Joe Priceler representing UAW Region 4.
Nobody wants to strike.
I don't want
to strike.
Nobody does.
Cummins put us here.
Striking is not a career.
Fair is fair.
Right
corporate America taking advantage of people.
We're not going to stand for it.
Are we?
No!
UAW Local 291 President Ryan Compton said the rally is to let striking workers know they're not alone.
It's just not the 291 members that know what's going on.
It's other locals.
It's news outlets.
It's.
people, you know, we got people from Madison, Milwaukee, Jaysville, Racine, Green Bay here.
So that's what it's about is to make sure that the guys that are on strike know that other people are still thinking about them and they didn't forget about them.
Compton said workers are striking because their contract expired January 29th.
Cummins has been slow coming to the table to negotiate.
Talks are scheduled for April 22nd through the 24th.
Air Wisconsin announces even more layoffs.
Back in January, the Appleton based company announced layoffs for more than 500 workers in Appleton and Milwaukee.
Last week, the company added another 128 positions to that list of reductions.
The layoffs will be temporary for unionized employees, but permanent for salaried employees and management.
Temporary furloughs start this month.
Most layoffs will happen on June 1st.
I'm Lisa Hale for WGBW and WISS News.
For news anytime, visit civicmedia.us.
Take Mino and the Mayor with you anywhere.
Download the Civic Media app today from the Apple Store or Google Play Store and text the studio directly all from the Civic Media app.
Download it today.
Now, once again, here's Mino and the Mayor, John Mino and Jim Schmidt.
Hey, thank you very much.
Welcome back.
Beautiful Monday morning out there here at 97.9 FM WGBW downtown Green Bay, where it is 52 degrees.
W or excuse me, 96.5 FM.
W. I. S. S. In Appleton and Oshkosh where it is also 52 degrees, 52 across the board forecast cloudy and windy with some showers high in the mid fifties.
All right, we can take that is Brittany there.
I am.
Good morning, Brittany.
How are you?
Good.
How are you guys?
How was your weekend?
Phenomenal.
I gotta read some things here first.
Can you just give me one second, Brittany?
We've been doing a big thing.
Why bowling isn't in the limelight anymore?
We got this.
But sir, how do you keep scoring bowling?
Nobody knows.
Okay.
Thank you, Scotty.
Tori says they're as expensive as bleep to maintain.
Chris says, good morning, gentlemen.
Got another one here.
Mally's spare time bar in downtown Greenleaf has an association value, an old school four lane bowling alley, paper and pencil scurrying and manual pin setters, a major step back in time.
That sounds like fun.
The
math on doing that?
I don't know how to do that.
Brittany,
you know how to do that?
No.
I could
never figure out
scurrying.
Todd?
A little
bit.
Automated.
But that that was nice when they went to the revolution and that was that was good.
Hey, Brittany, I was up in your neck of the woods.
There's a lot of snow on.
You
saw the snow banks everywhere.
Yeah.
No, I've been on Granite Peak.
I was just surprised how much snow is still on there.
Oh, I know.
Well, they they're able to make it and maintain it.
And they've been trying to keep it there because they were open up until gosh, the first week of April and they had events going on.
They even had like a cardboard sled race.
Oh.
People dressed up crazy trying to ski across the lake.
It was it was pretty cool They do some fun stuff But it is nice to have the snow there because it's always there early in the season and it stays late into the season So if you need that itch of snow, it's here.
All right.
Look good.
I think this is for you.
Let's get this show out of the gutter
No, I think that was that.
That's
Brian.
It's our people.
You have to know our people.
They look at life a
little skewed.
A little
different.
That was funny
though.
So Brittany, I know we've been bothering you about this for about the last month or so.
So like the old say, the cliche says you are now on the clock.
But she, I just want to say Brittany, it was, you're right.
It was about a month ago.
We said, you know, give us a long range and you're going to be very active.
very close to what you said about the draft, which starts a week from Wednesday, really.
I guess a week from Monday is when they're expecting people to start coming in, so.
Okay, so whole week long thing.
Monday through Sunday, that's the whole draft field.
Saturday,
Sunday, yeah.
There's concerts Saturday night, so, yeah.
Really, I guess,
yeah.
So,
what do you want to
talk about this week or next week?
Because we want to hear about both.
Okay, let's start with this week because then I'll just roll into next week.
So kind of what we have going on here is a low pressure system up in towards Lake Superior and it's a strong one.
So those winds are going to be gusting today up to about 40 miles per hour.
Yeah, and it's we're still gonna hit 60 so like in those mid 50s to low 60s today and then the cold falls and after that So what's gonna happen is we're gonna have some little light rain start around midnight and a little bit of light snow overnight So we could be waking up to a trace on the ground tomorrow morning, but it'll melt very very
fast.
She wasn't listening.
What did we jump the gun?
You guys jumped the gun.
She was not listening to us this morning.
We we called it no snow from here on out
OK, it's over.
It's over.
It's over.
Is that count?
That
just that was a kick
in the gut.
I'm sorry.
No, no.
No,
what happened?
Kick him
harder.
Kick him harder.
It's OK.
Wow.
OK.
We're going to look
like
we don't know what
we're talking
about.
Yeah, that
would be a first.
We're
taking to
the bank show
Jim said that my hometown area in the UP was in the national news again for their
horrific weather Yep
Yeah, just yeah, and we're gonna get hit again.
They're gonna get like another six inches tonight overnight tonight.
Good morning.
U.P.
just never ends.
It doesn't end.
Yeah.
So what do you, what do you, you can't even be mad about the flurries tomorrow
morning.
All right.
Flurries doesn't count.
All right.
And then next week, Brittany, what do you think?
All right.
So it looks like a pretty big system wants to hit on Monday.
So what that means is right now all rain on Monday.
Good.
Again, flip to maybe a few flurries Tuesday mornings, kind of a read.
We're talking next
Monday here,
right?
Right.
But
clean streets, you know, make it look good.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Good.
I like that.
All right.
So we're going to be in the upper forties.
It looks like to start the week out.
We fall to the low forties on Tuesday because we're going to get blasted with the colder air behind it Wednesday.
I can't really tell if it's going to be cloudy or sunny just yet, but it looks like we're hanging out in those mid forties Wednesday and Thursday.
Pretty dry.
Then as we go into Friday and Saturday, the sunshine comes back out.
We go to the low fifties on Friday.
It looks like the low sixties on Saturday.
And then Sunday, sunshine 70 degrees.
OK.
Does that sound nice?
I'm more excited about that than I am the draft.
Me too.
I
want
to
walk outside
on Sunday morning.
Wow.
Yes.
Wow.
Awesome.
Yes.
So when,
hopefully it stays this way.
Now you got to understand things can change still, even though it's just too away.
Um, but it really looks good Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
So a really wet kind of cold start to the week and then we warm up and clean up stuff.
All right.
That is great.
I'll take it.
The big event is in the bowl on Saturday, right?
I think so, right?
Yeah.
We'll talk more there
and pop keep the Packers coming up in just a few minutes.
Talk about
that.
But it's
one of those things though, too, Brittany.
I mean, okay, look, I actually think about this at times because every sometimes I'll be at Home Depot or someplace.
Hey, I know what do you think they're going to drive?
You know, things like that, which is I've dealt with that all my life, which is fine, you know.
But for yourself, do you ever get that if you're in like a store and it wasn't supposed to rain?
And it's like, I mean, do you get that if you're recognized?
Oh, man.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, and if there's going to be a big major snowstorm, like, let's just say something happens in April, I cannot go out grocery shopping or anything because they'll be like, what the heck, Brittany, it's your fault.
It does happen, huh?
Or they'll be like, I saw Brittany kind of loathing out.
There's
hammers.
No, no, no, no.
Oh, what?
No, no, no.
No.
Forget
that.
No, that's not what I meant.
No, she's stocking
up.
I'm not sure where
you're
going.
I would
say she's stocking up on
things.
And
if she's, if the weather person's stocking up, you got it.
No.
You
know, so that's my point.
Yeah, just 643 good morning,
but
okay, but I'm sure people Would stop and you know at Gwasker especially to their kids.
Well, there's the weather lady Gwasker so
Yeah, yeah, but I love it.
I don't know everyone's so sweet and so nice right it's never a bother at all
What's gonna be your first outdoor activity after I know I will say this though, you don't
Have to take many weekends off from getting outside, no matter what the weather is.
What's going to be the number one outdoor activity you're looking to personally do?
I cannot wait to kayak again.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
What about you?
Kayak.
Really?
He's never been on a kayak.
I have
to, Jeb.
Remember in Sturgeon Bay, I told you, running the channel, you can do that.
You can rent them from Bayshore.
You told me you could rent them at Bayshore.
Yeah, and I did.
I went, you know, I went up to the Apostle Islands.
Todd.
Okay, there it is.
Okay.
All right.
So what?
I did.
Really?
Yeah.
You didn't.
Got awful
quiet awful Yeah, I had to back off for one six.
I just realized that's like superior.
We're in Lake Michigan.
Yeah, I was just wondering how you got
there
the kayak in the back of my Jeep.
Yeah, okay, never mind.
I totally got that.
What do you put your kayak in?
Oh, anywhere.
But my favorite river in the entire state is the Brewer River.
So that's kind of like
up north off of Lake Superior.
They've got little rapids in there and families go from canoeing to kayaking.
It is just an amazing river.
I
have fished the Brule River.
You have.
Yes.
People love to do that.
And there's some
great tributaries that come off of it, but you got a little bit of everything on that river.
It could be big and wide and slow, and then it can get kind of fast and...
Oh,
yeah.
That's
what they like.
Oh, yeah.
You got to know what you're doing on the Brule.
You do.
You do.
You have to go to the right section for the right, you know, how you, you know, that water because.
Are you up around the town of Poplar or which area did you do the rule?
Yeah, I actually used to live over there into the Poplar area.
So that's where I would go.
Yep.
Highway two.
That is a beautiful, I
love that area.
That is almost a hidden place of the Midwest, I think.
It really is.
Yeah.
Put your kayak in there.
I promise you'll have a great time.
That's cool.
You know, um,
But we were talking this weekend because we kind of saw the state, you know, we'd we're not like for a couple days and we had drive the Minneapolis for Minnesota for a wedding This state is just so on Underdeveloped.
Yeah, I mean just
it's a
beautiful state.
I just haven't driven in a long time and I like to drive but it's just there's just a lot a lot of just Beauty out there that and I'm sure there's places that Brittany's been to and and Christian with the fishing I just I don't know.
We just got us
72 counties and my parents always, you know, they went to every county and of course my mother always said I told you this before that, you know, that's 72 times that that's why there's 72 books in the Bible.
I
knew
that too.
Well, it's her analogy that but I mean really you don't really need to go too far to
know you know, Brittany, I could see you doing one of those shows, right?
Just don't exactly you nobody maybe nobody else knows too much about pop work.
Nobody knows, right?
I think you'd be awesome at going around and doing one of those shows.
Don't you Todd?
I would be so fun.
I would have too much fun doing that.
I got an idea.
Why don't you and Brittany do it together?
We'll call it Mino and Berlowe.
And then you guys, yeah, and you guys go out,
you do
a little fishing, she does a
little activity.
You do a little eating, she does a little activity.
But you know, I tell you the, the, the, the, the market
sleeping should do activities.
The market research would show John with a bottle of Merlot.
We definitely have to do some proof.
That would
be
more interesting that John McGivin who but he's really in the city He doesn't really do the nature nature part of it, right?
I mean he does a great great job.
I love watching his show, but um Yeah, there's just so much I'm gonna get that natural resources.
Yes.
I
agree.
I like it and
things that Demi don't do your
too risky skydiving stuff.
Just do stuff like if John can do it, anybody
can do it.
You
know, no, that's what I'm saying.
It could be.
I'd rather take a nail to my eye than like go parasailing or any of those kind of
things.
But that would be the fun part of it.
It's like, wait, I can do this.
I'd be screaming.
All right, Brittany.
I gotta be honest.
Give
us a
forecast, Brittany.
all right.
So sunny today pretty windy though.
Th after midnight, a little b possible in the morni tomorrow.
Highs at about fifties for Wednesday too.
A few more showers push into our friday, but then
And you know that draft is looking gorgeous, too.
It's about 70 on Sunday.
Brittany, the best part about Mondays is talking with you and getting us off on the right foot.
You're always awesome.
Thank you.
You are awesome, too.
Appreciate you guys so much.
Thank you very much.
Brittany Merle, Civic Media Meteorologist with our forecast coming up for the draft in just a little bit.
Aaron Popkin of the Packers will give us more details back after this.
97.9 FM WGPW 96.96.5 98.3 FM WISS of course the civic media your Milwaukee Brewers are beyond the air and WISS at 605 taking on the Detroit Tigers
Okay, somebody's trying to help us with this score.
Yeah, that's why see that's why I go to automatic That's why I love that what when it does it for you get this So this is where you have to bring out, you know the slide rule a spares worth 10 plus your next ball a strike is worth 10 plus your next
two balls.
So if you get, so if you pick up a spare, right, you don't score that one till you play your next ball.
Right.
And then whatever that is, you add that to 10 and that's your score for that frame.
And if you don't get a spare,
well, no, then it's just the regular.
That is
just the regular.
So if
you get, all right, so if you, it's amazing, I've never learned how to score.
It only gets tricky
when you start when you're a kid though, they didn't have automatic somebody would,
you know, there'd
be like that one person that okay.
Yeah, if you
went bowling
with four people,
at least one person had a story.
One person knew how to do it, yeah.
It's true.
He'd just invite him because he could do her.
Okay.
Yeah.
All right.
Anyway.
It
gets tricky when you start piling up spares and...
Right, multiple spares?
Yeah.
Like that's a turkey,
right?
Three strikes is a turkey.
Right.
I knew
that.
I knew that.
I knew
that.
I knew that.
Todd, I knew that.
Okay.
All right.
Feeling challenged here.
You know that?
Yes!
Anyway, all right, we we have to get your order to do we're gonna get Somebody from like the youth bowling league or from the on here to talk about what and maybe bowling's bigger than that's a great idea Maybe you know you guys we could be way off base too.
Maybe bowling's bigger than we think it is Well, it's just not covered in them in a present.
That's a good point and maybe we need to do a better job of Talking about it because maybe it's just not covered.
It could be they could say your bowling is never
been more popular than it is now.
We don't know
that.
But like when I lived in Tucson, the PGA tour would stop in Tucson.
I mean, it was, and they were like big names like Marshall Holman and, I mean, Wayne Webb and, you know, the
Johnny Patraglia.
Those are household names, John.
Yeah, I
know, right?
The only one that I remember is Dick
Burton.
Yeah, I remember him.
Yeah,
really?
Oh, yeah.
Earl Anthony.
Earl Anthony.
Yeah.
Those are
brilliant ones, too.
Yeah.
I mean, there were times they'd be on the cover of like Sports Illustrated.
You think they'll be big up here too because of the I know whether you know me like an indoor
thing Yeah, I got this one.
I kept score bowling.
I won right No, he's gonna do
tell you that right, yeah You won
by 10.
Yeah, okay, whatever.
Yeah, what other bowling movies were there Todd?
I named two of the best ones of course Kingpin and the big Lebowski
Was that it wasn't there another bowling movie somewhere along the lines?
That's the other thing there haven't there haven't been enough bowling we got to get more bowling movies folks, okay Hollywood's got it.
Yeah lean into this We got a lot of work to
got to bring in more characters like big Ernie McCracken remember big Ernie McCracken Todd
not necessarily
no,
okay, um, let's see big Lebowski.
Yeah Strikes and spares
Don't
know
that 1934.
Oh, King paying a dreamer in 1979.
Don't know that one gutter balls in 2008.
Hmm.
Yeah.
I think I saw that one at the drive-in.
Adam, Adam, the amazing zombie killer.
That was about bowling as well.
Okay.
So we've got two good bowling movies
in the
history of the entire sport.
You
know, and he's think of all the other.
Yeah.
Well, anyway, I'm interested to see if I think someone texted in
if this is a high school activity, because I think that would.
It is.
I don't know how many schools,
but you know,
it's kind of cool about it though, because I've watched it.
It's been televised at times.
You know what the kids do?
You know, okay, in like normal, you know, somebody at bowl and everybody else sits quietly or whatever, right?
Then that guy's done and then the next guy gets up.
These kids have to stand in a line, both sides, face with the ball, your ball in your hands.
And as soon as that person on your team is done, boy, you jump right up.
And you go, there's like no waste of time.
You have to stand in line, holding the ball in your hand, waiting for your turn.
So I just looked up the high school bowling club.
Yeah.
There are 200 over 200 teams in high school in Wisconsin.
Wow.
Yep.
That's awesome.
That's great.
Yeah.
And it looks like I'm just guessing by what I'm seeing here.
I could be wrong, but Ash gosh, Nina, just some of them that I'm seeing listed here.
Nice.
All right.
We got it.
I'm going to do a little.
And what did every bowling shirt ever made have buttons?
Besides that, I mean, like snaps.
I mean, besides that big pocket, put your smokes.
Everyone, you know that.
Yeah.
Remember the time, Greg Cook, when he left the Packers, went to Miami Dolphins and they said about whatever he goes, I got to buy a new wardrobe in Green Bay that saw they wear a bowling shirt.
And he was sent.
from Packer people, so many bowling shirts.
It was like incredible.
That's awesome.
Yes.
And he don't have to charity or whatever he did with them, but it was like incredible amounts of bowling shirts people from Wisconsin sent him.
That's cool.
Yeah.
Which are still valuable.
Right.
I think when we had that kid in here who has that, um, what's it called?
The, the, the vintage store.
Yeah.
The store.
And he talked about bowling shirts.
Yeah.
That bowling shirt.
Yes.
Just cool things.
And, um, yeah.
And that's that I'm 200 bowling clubs in the state.
That's that's good.
That's a lot.
I know.
I know.
All right, we're getting there's all old uniforms, old stuff.
We guys know you guys some see some of the stuff I brought in.
I just love collecting that old stuff.
Aaron's here.
Aaron's
bowling.
That was actually good form.
But but.
Can he keep score?
Right.
I mean, that's the bottom line.
And then I don't
know.
Let's just be
honest.
Here.
A lot of work to that.
But I don't know.
Did you?
Have you, you've bold?
What?
Bold?
Sure.
Do you, over 200?
No.
We can break 100 though.
150.
Well, that's not bad.
I think I can do 150.
Okay.
That's not bad.
145.
But they need, when you talked about the- 142.
That they have to follow the next person.
Yeah.
Right in line.
They're talking about maybe having a clock on golf, a shot clock on golf.
Well, they do, they just never use it.
There's one.
Yeah, you can be put on the clock and the whole yeah, but they very very very very very seldom ever
people like to see
there is They were like 20 minutes between shots for a while yesterday down the stretch.
I know we talked about that Yeah, erotop give the Green Bay pack
is
coming in the house right now talking a little draft Kristen Ambo's point mortgage Beth Nash Indian Crossing Casino Tavia Hopson burger old station 31 back after this
Coming to Northeast Wisconsin live from the Civic Media Studios and featuring TV and radio broadcast veteran John Minow along with the City of Green Bay's longest-serving mayor Jim Schmidt.
This is Minow and the Mayor.
And here are your hosts.
John Minow
and Jim Schmidt.
Hey, thank you very much.
Welcome back, hour number two, Minow the Mayor here at 97.9 FM, WGBW 98.3, 96.5 FM, WISS in Appleton and Oshkosh, which is where you'll hear your Milwaukee brewers tonight.
Take it on the Tigers at 6.05 on WISS.
Beautiful threat now, 52 across the board, Oshkosh, Alpton and Green Bay.
Joining us right now, Aaron Popke of the Green Bay Packers.
And I've known Aaron since he was like...
Coming out of Peng's high school and I never know what your titles are Aaron because they change every couple of months or whatever So what's your title right now heading into the draft?
draft
Director of Public Affairs, but you're right.
I've been many things over the years going back to public relations intern.
Exactly.
That was the first one.
Now
we got to talk.
We're talking about something else.
You were outside of our window harassing us with your bowling form, showing how we should do it.
You're listening now.
And I said, yeah, I bet you were one of those kids who, you know,
bold when they were young and learn how to score and everything.
And you took it a step beyond that, didn't you?
As far as when you were in grade school?
Yeah, Notre Dame middle school in Depeere.
Part of our gym class, and Larry DeClean was our teacher.
Oh, Larry.
God bless Larry.
Now I'm past, but what a guy he was.
But part of our gym class is we learned how to score.
Bowling so I can help you guys with that We would we would walk from Notre Dame middle school right over to Century Lane's right on Broadway in Depeer That was our gym class for a period of time.
That's so cool.
All right, so 25 years with the
Packers, right?
This upcoming season will be my 33rd But
thank you for
all right.
Well, he didn't
pay attention to you for the first day
Well, that's another show you look like it's 25.
No, no, this is
It's a big deal.
You've been working at it, but you've been on the show a couple of times.
You've been on my show a couple of times.
How do you feel?
We're what, 11 days away?
Yeah, we're excited.
We were talking off air, but the campus is coming alive.
And we, yeah, I mean, this goes back, I was just looking a couple of weeks ago, the very first survey of interest that the NFL asked.
So in 2015, it was in Chicago that April, that fall,
Peter O'Reilly the executive vice president for the stuff at the NFL sent out a memo to all the clubs like we're taking this on the road so in fall September 30th We had submitted 2015 our first survey of interest for the NFL draft 2015 2015 mark Murphy when they said the memo came around mark said hey
We need to do this.
So it's been literally going back to the wall of 2015 where we've been thinking about it.
Fast forward to April of 2025 to see the campus get built out in the last couple of weeks.
It's been amazing.
The lot shut down at Lambeau so they could stage all the equipment.
I equated as we were looking out the window from our offices just watching this happen when you get that new Lego set.
when you're a kid and you open the box and you take out all the pieces,
you
lay them out, and then you start building it.
And that's what it's looked like.
They raised the roof on the draft theater last week and everything's starting to fill in.
It's really amazing.
The energy and electricity is exciting.
And that's the stage on Onida.
And I think a lot of people have driven by their, if not, they've seen it on YouTube or the things that you've been promoting.
But talk about...
We talked about is it like a Super Bowl, but Super Bowl has so many activities going on But that's akin to what you're doing talk about some of the things besides the actual draft I mean things open up at noon right around your campus or
yeah, the Thursday Friday Opens at noon Saturday open at 9
Actually, on Saturday, some more of the information's been announced, but Saturday morning at 8 a.m., we're gonna do, we probably talked about this, leaning into the unique traditions of Green Bay and the Packers, the bike kids, that tradition that
goes
back to 58, that was part of our bid process, just leaning into
that
tradition.
And there's some things going on around it, but Saturday morning, we're gonna do a bike parade through the draft campus.
And the campus stretches, as you said, the theaters on Onida Street on the east side, that parking lot.
But across the north end of Lambeau Field, over to the west side parking lot, then the title town is the draft experience.
And Lambeau Field is going to be part of the campus.
So I think for people that are going to come and just walk around and soak up the energy, you can watch the draft in the theater, you know, straight on that huge structure.
But then you go into Lambeau Field and you can sit inside Lambeau, sit in the bowl, watch the draft on the screens.
And then you can wander over into the draft experience on the west side over in the title town.
There's going to be big screens up everywhere, food, beverage, activities, autographs.
all sorts of stuff for, for the kids and adults, these galleries that are going to be set up, uh, Cliff crystals doing a history of the draft, which will be new to the draft experience.
I just want to say
that one of the things that you just said was a separator between, you know, if you're hosting something for the city gym, what can you do different than Philly or whatever, whatever.
That whole thing about walking into the bowl in the day of the draft into Lambo, I think that really sets this apart from others.
Wouldn't you?
Yes.
I think just what Lambo Field means to football fans in general, certainly to us near and dear, but football fans, it's often spoken of as a mecca, it's on a bucket list, those types of things, very true.
I think Deanna fell really like the idea of incorporating Lambo into this, because they can lean into the history, the tradition.
We often hear if we're not someone's favorite team,
were their second favorite teams or
bucket list just to see it
you know just to yeah I
mean I'd love to see Fenway I've never seen Fenway Park and I hope to see Fenway Park someday
and yeah and we talked about this many times but that is a bucket list thing for people and um it's it's amazing and Fenway Park Notre Dame I mean those are things that are on on their list yeah
just stay oh well it's been renovated but
I mean yeah those are iconic ones you still want to really cool to see um in the bowl you have um and
We can get this information.
There's a couple things I want to make sure that people who are listening to get that one pass.
I mean, I think a lot of people are getting that, but it's really important.
It's so easy to do, but people have to get that to get in so that the lines run smooth.
But talk a little bit about the bull.
You're going to have activities in there as well.
Don't you kind of honor Wisconsin?
Yeah, the bull on Thursday prior to the draft getting started, excuse me, started is they're going to do the red carpet.
where the prospects come in and kind of a photo-op media session.
It's about celebrating them and giving them a moment, but that's going to be down on the sideline in Lambeau Field.
So we'll be able to see that on TV.
It's not open until... The first
time those guys have been there.
Yeah.
Yeah, you're right.
Absolutely.
Unless someone rolled through.
But we're excited about that.
That'll be neat.
And then there's going to be some activity.
So that's more of a closed event, but it'll be televised and those types of things.
But stay tuned for details on that.
But also during the days of the draft, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, there's going to be activities inside Lambo.
You can watch the draft, but there's also going to be other activities that you can participate in inside Lambo.
So stay tuned for that.
on one pass where you need to download that.
It's got all the info you're gonna need.
You need to register for the draft, but then the schedule's gonna be in there.
So you can really set your days, what you wanna do each day when you come out to the campus.
Got a question here for you real quick here.
The original bid was put in nine and a half years ago.
Green Bay was awarded one and a half years ago.
Were there subsequent bids put in or did the Packers know they were eventually up on the horizon?
Good question.
Yes, to all of that.
But early on, I was just simply saying, hey, we want to be considered.
And then it got to a certain point where the NFL, and, you know, we didn't know if we were going to be seriously considered.
But when they came back to us and said, hey, we'd like to submit a formal bid, that's really cool.
Wow.
So that turned in from a three-page essay, I joke, because one of the questions on an initial survey of interest was, in a thousand words or less.
explain why Green Bay and Lambeau Field would be a great host for the draft.
So I wrote up this essay and sent it in.
Since then, obviously, then it became the one inch binder of information, the three inch binder of information.
And then we actually put in bids for years, like a specific year, like 22 or...
those first years that we're interested in, 18, 19, and then we put in formal bids for say like 19 and then 20, we had COVID so it got pushed.
And then when the Resh Expo was getting built, we actually held off on a specific year while that was getting constructed.
And then we went for the subsequent years.
So then it was 25 and we were thinking maybe 27.
But then we were getting a little indication that 25 could be the year, so we sharpened our pencil and made sure we got more information.
And on that
bid, that included more than just the Packers, right?
Municipalities that were part of that?
Yeah, for this type of event, it's typically like the city's commission that handles big events, like Detroit was Visit Detroit and other cities, it was their local CVB.
And we've got a great one in Discover Green Bay with Brad Toll, Nick Meiser, Beth, and that whole team there.
They've great.
So we partnered with them.
We put together a local organizing committee, which also included the team from PMI, the team that runs the Resh Complex.
They were a very key part of it.
So the three organizations, Packers, Discover Green Bay, PMI, was our local organizing committee.
And PMI did all the work with the Resh Expo, because that's a key.
part of this in terms of the facilities.
The green room, the prospect green room is in the expo center, the media center is there, the resh center.
Arena is part of a contingency backup place that whole space is so key and that that team over there has been fantastic and discover Green Bay was so helpful with locking down hotel rooms So it really was a team effort and the Packers this one's unique because it's typical the the team the NFL team typically hasn't gotten that involved with the bit It's more of the CVB, but because of our unique
community and you know we don't have the size and scope that the larger ones do it had to be a unique team that got put together and we knew we had to lead the effort and we put together our host committee which raised the money the Packers are in for a lot of cash and a lot of in kind so big team effort absolutely worth
Aaron Popkin director of the NFL Draft so you've been at this for a longer
than a year and a half but I just gave you a new title did you hear
that
Oh, yeah.
Aaron Popke, director of the NFL draft.
Director of the draft.
Ceremonial director of the draft.
Hope Rogers died in town.
He would spit up
his coffee.
Well,
we
got a few directors
of the draft.
You're going to need a new title next Sunday, because it's all over.
Eddie, you've been at this for really four years.
You've been the last four drafts, right?
Did you say that?
Yeah, been
a number of
them.
OK.
Eddie, surprises.
And I know you're not.
Gonna tell me the truth, but I think you concerned about I mean this is coming up I mean this is 11 days away and you know there's people like where people gonna park is the traffic gonna be okay Do you think we've ironed out pretty much everything?
I think so we've got the updated maps that just got posted last night in this morning Discover Green Bay has some good maps Packers comm the one pass certainly has information that gets you those maps I think we were we've spent some time figuring out the best way to flow traffic in and out I think that
People just need to do their homework and absorb, and we can talk more about that.
Yeah, let's do it.
Let's do that.
We
gotta set a quick break.
We'll be back with more with Director of Public Affairs for the Green Bay Packers, Aaron Popkey, talking all things draft.
Back right after this.
Beautiful Monday morning.
52 and Green Bay, Alton and Oshkosh cross the board.
Aaron Popkey, Green Bay Packers, Director of Public Affairs.
Aaron?
Hey.
The floor is
yours.
Hey, thanks.
Thanks again for the opportunity to be here and certainly over the past few months and years talking about the event.
It's as we were talking about earlier, it's just exciting to have it be here.
You know, when we did the, we unveiled the countdown clock last May and it was 345 days out.
I remember looking at the clock and like, holy smokes, that's, we got some time.
And now we, you know, going to the office every day, seeing that and it's, you know, down into the double digits and it's on top of us, but.
And speaking of over by the office, over by the campus, we've got some roads that have closed down as we continue to prepare.
And I think it's just neat seeing the energy that that is there.
And for people that I talk to in towns, there's a little bit of concern like, oh my gosh, I don't know if I'm even going to go over there.
There's going to be so many people.
Yes, there's going to be some people.
But I think even if you're local and even casually follow the draft.
you need to go and just experience this.
It's right here, man.
You got to at least the
energy of people just being there, celebrating football.
And these aren't even going to be all Packers fans.
These are going to be fans from all 32 clubs.
And that's what I saw at the other drafts, just people walking around and having fun with each other and the energy.
And hey, it's going to be a beautiful spring few days that weekend.
So we're excited about that.
But I think people are concerned about construction.
Things are set up nicely.
And yet you got to take some different routes and detours, even the businesses that are right there near the draft, they're still going to be open, like Hinterland's still going to be open.
Kroll's West on Ridge over there.
You know, he, Mike and his team, they're still open.
You just got to take a different route to get in there.
So stuff is still open.
Please still go and visit those businesses you always visit but just check in to make sure you're getting there the right way stuff is
still your
route Yeah, and people like I was saying earlier, you know, like I don't want to go over there.
No come on over The information is there as we lead up to it.
Yes, there's road closures, but shoot Wisconsin there's
What are the seasons?
Every
road construction and everything else.
So we are
used to roads being closed and that sort of thing.
Same thing here.
Just, you know, plan your day a little bit and get on over there.
It's going to be so fun.
Your biggest piece of advice is to just go online, Google One Pass and it's...
Very simply, put your email in there and it's all there.
Yeah, download the app.
If you're an app person, it's all right there.
But if you'd like to go online on your desktop or your laptop ahead of time, you can do that through NFL.com, the draft information there and discover Green Bay's webpage, greenbay.com.
It's all right there.
So you just need to do a little homework and then make your way over there.
There's plenty of parking nearby.
Green Bay Patty Keywood's Green Bay Metro.
They've got a shuttle set up from downtown here.
I
talked to her this morning.
She's coming on my show white on Sunday.
So she that's People are hearing bits and pieces.
They just really need to put a ball around it to
Like you said, plan their three or four days out.
And
you'll be great.
So like if you don't want to drive over there, just park downtown, take the bus, and Patty's team will get you over there, drop you off.
Ride share is going to be a big part of it.
So if you like Uber, Lyft, and taxis, there's going to be a really smooth way to get over there that way.
The parking in the neighborhoods, the game day tradition, it's not unlike a game day.
Right,
in that part.
So those types of things.
Let me just shift gears for one second.
Sir, what's an app?
That's what we asked.
Nobody knows.
We always do the Nate Barghetti thing.
We're going to see him in May, so we can't.
Sir, what's the thing?
Nobody knows.
Yeah, we're in love with that guy.
The jobs, you put something in.
I think maybe that's filled now.
I know you were looking for, I know there's a lot of volunteer opportunities, but some people, especially some of the teachers that had
called.
I said something like 18 bucks an hour for some jobs or
something.
Yeah, it's through teammates.
And in fact, we had
I wanna say we had five or 6,000 people sign up when we started promoting that to when the jobs finalized and were available, we were gonna send out an email to all of them and we did and there was a ton of pickup.
And now we put out a call just for some remaining jobs, just last week.
So if you go on package.com or greenbay.com, there are some jobs that are still available, paying 18 bucks an hour, a lot of hosts and helping people way find and those types of things.
So I wanna say they're gonna hire like 1,000 people to fill those jobs.
Overall, we just got this number last week, 2,200 people.
are needed to put on the draft.
So you get these teammates, people that are getting hired, but all the people that have been in town now for a couple weeks, assembling the stage, the campus,
all those
things, 2200.
I mean,
that's great.
It's here, enjoy it, but also, you know, it's okay to make a little.
Side hustle.
Oh, yeah Opportunistic
people that
we've got
we've got local contractors that have been hired the source program the NFL has for diverse businesses is engaged Food vendors locally are gonna be on campus working.
Yeah
a couple more things I want to just touch on how it's so family-friendly this sometimes a game people may think it's a little bit more skewed toward adults, but I mean
Talk about that experience.
You know, the games are such drinking events versus something like this, I would assume.
Correct.
I
think we should talk
about that.
And then the cost of entry.
Free.
No, free.
We
have to remind people
that you guys don't have a
reputation of the NFL doesn't have a reputation of free.
And I just think that's really important to remind people this is free.
And the NFL does
like that about this event.
It's really just
so we
celebration of the game.
And yeah, games and Super Bowl and these other events are ticketed, but this is not, it's free.
I think it's just the opportunity to see this amount of people that are just walking around, that sort of thing.
But family friendly, yeah, go online, see the schedule, bring the kids out there on the field and title town.
There's gonna be clinics that are there.
There's games, interactive, just walking through photo ops.
Kids love photos.
Shoot, we all love photos, but.
helmets and jerseys from every team.
There's going to be locker room, Super Bowl ring display, Lombardi trophy, all those things that people just enjoy taking pictures and sharing that sort of thing.
And you can even find out the players that are going to be there.
I mean, you go to that detail on the app.
You can find out some of the players that are going to be there for the photos.
So it's very cool all the information that you have on that app.
Who do you think should be the number one draft pick?
Oh boy.
Go ahead.
Sit.
Sit.
Best
available player.
Oh, come on.
Give me color out.
Give me color out.
Give me color out.
Give me Heisman Trophy winner.
I'm going to tell you why.
Why?
So my daughter works on his social media thing that we're company in New York.
Very
cool.
Isn't that cool?
Yeah.
And it's stuff like that.
The energy that comes around it, we're going to have, I think they're finalizing the list, but we're going to have like...
I think 16-17 prospects that are awesome to Green Bay, which is a really good number.
Jim was trying to rent out his house.
They can have his house for free.
He did not say that.
Jim cooking meals.
Absolutely.
That he
would
do.
He would do.
Well, let's get a laid out campaign.
Jim Schmid.
I will
see you there,
Aaron.
Aaron Pox, director of poker fairs, Green Bay Packers.
When it's all over, you can have a cold adult beverage, you think?
Perhaps.
Hey, thanks for being here, man.
Thanks guys.
Appreciate it.
Appreciate it.
Eric Popkin, Kristen Ambrose, Point Mortgage coming up next.
For WGBW and WISS News, I'm Lisa Hale.
Governor Tony Evers announced a series of job fairs as the state's Department of Workforce Development attempts to recruit recently fired federal workers.
There are four more virtual events coming up tomorrow and Wednesday.
Evers says he wants to give displaced federal workers a fresh start.
The federal employees in Wisconsin that are getting bumped out of their jobs, they're doing good work.
People wonder why they're being laid off to begin with or fired.
And so we know they're good workers and we have always had vacancies in state government.
We want to make sure that they have a good landing place.
You can find more information on the DWD website.
Without childcare counts, a fourth of childcare programs will have to close.
Joanne Krulatz has more.
A new survey shows a quarter of childcare programs statewide could close if a critical support program isn't funded.
The survey from the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families shows 25% of childcare providers are somewhat
very or extremely likely to close if the state legislature doesn't make investments in the child care counts program.
A release from Governor Tony Evers office says that the program ends, cost for infant care are also expected to rise.
Evers has included $480 million in his 2025-27 executive budget to go towards the child care counts program, which is set to expire at the end of June.
A Green Bay native and former Badger runner won the men's part of the Milwaukee Marathon over the weekend.
Tony Adrianson crossed first with a time of 2 hours 21 minutes and 11 seconds.
The 21-year-old claimed victory in just his second marathon after placing second in his 2024 Madison Marathon debut.
There were over 1,300 runners from across 50 states Saturday.
The women's winner, Krista Staley, is a 32-year-old mother from Baldwin, Missouri.
She finished in about 2 hours and 51 minutes.
I'm Lisa Hale for WGBW and WISS News.
For news anytime, visit civicmedia.us.
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And text the studio directly, all from the Civic Media app.
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Now, once again, here's Mino and the Mayor, John Mino and Jim
Schmidt.
Welcome back, Mido in the air.
Special thanks, Aaron Pompey, Green Bay Packers, Director of Public Affairs.
Man, do they have a plate full.
We're gonna be talking more about that pretty much all the way through, right through it.
Hot Todd.
in regards to hitting on the draft and all the different things that are coming into play with that.
We're actually going to be talking with some members from the Fox Cities about how it's affecting the Fox Cities as well this week.
So lots going on this week.
Outstanding.
Kristen Abbo's point mortgage corporation in the house.
We always love having her walk through a little breath of sunshine.
Oh, thank you.
And we actually
have sunshine out there.
Good
morning.
Good morning.
How are you?
Yeah, good.
With the sun that we've seen yesterday, that was supposed to be rainy and ended up being pretty sunny.
So I love.
You
know, I was thinking this could be in some we think about this out of the what quarter million people that might be coming around here and let's say a hundred thousand of them I've never been to Green Bay before this is not a bad opportunity to kind of show off Where this is not a bad place, you know, if you've
got a type of
job that you can live anywhere, right?
This ain't a bad place to do that.
I heard a gentleman who, it wasn't Aaron, but it was another gentleman who was talking to us at an event about the draft coming.
And part of the reason why they wanted it here so badly was to expose Green Bay, the Fox Valley and all the areas, two outsiders to come in as well.
So it was, he came to address the housing and, you know, how they wanted to drive more people here.
We did a, 10 was longer than that.
15 years ago, there was a survey done.
on people looking California and East Coast of our Green Bay.
And there was a higher percent than you would think that didn't know we were on the water.
A Green Bay, I mean Bay, right?
And it was like, what are we, Green Meadow?
And I just think people have this image of us.
And I think they think we're a very, very, very small farm town.
And so I think there's an opportunity here.
And I think people may, I hope the university, St.
Norbert and TC,
big advantage of this.
And
not only that though, but when you say Green Bay, okay, like Aaron, we talked about next week, some of the, or you were talking about on your show, you know, the Fox Valley, how they're affected.
When you say Green Bay, now, I mean, 25 years ago, Green Bay would have been Green Bay and the Bounds are ended at Denmark or whatever.
Now, it's, it's much more,
let's be honest.
I was just talking about this weekend, how it's so funny to see even in the last five years, Bellevue.
Oh, yeah,
absolutely.
It's no different than if you go to Milwaukee and see the suburbs of Milwaukee and Chicago, like we're turning to get suburbs, I feel like.
Lawrence, the town of Lawrence.
Yeah.
And I think,
but
even if you look
at, but if you look at like a TV station like WFRV or something like that, I mean, their reach is a million people.
Yeah.
You know, and so you have to look at it like that, but there's so much to see and do here.
So that's why we're hoping people just don't come in and watch the draft for five, six, eight hours and leave.
the next day.
We just really hope they spend three, four days.
And that's why Aaron talked about all the events that are going on.
And of course, cities have a lot of things going on as does the Fox Valley.
And so we're just hoping people see more than just the draft.
And I think if they do, they may, for sure they got to come back and visit VAA or something or, you know, Mylon Music.
But look at the
investment in title town tech, you know with Microsoft.
Yeah, you know, there's just there's a lot
of growing
But if they do they're gonna have to maybe buy some real estate and that's where you come in because the
roundabout way but we're How does it
affect you?
So yes
You know, oh, this topsy-turvy, you know, tariffs now tariffs and I don't know, it's just tough to have consistent stability
and
because things change.
It's negotiating, whatever it is, things change.
What do you feel in terms of people?
And prices continue to rise.
Yeah.
They continue to rise.
We're talking about Sonya as a meeting this weekend, a real estate thing.
It's really still supply and demand.
I mean, the products
aren't getting any
better.
Yeah.
It's totally supply and demand.
And the one thing I try to remind people of is if you look back, and I just posted it last night on one of my social media things, but if you go, if you look, the only time since before 1980 values went down, or the 2007 to 11, I usually say
eight
to 10, but truly 2007 to 11 in that era.
Now if you remember from 2007 to 11, if you will, it was very stagnant and values didn't go up at all.
In fact, they went down.
So now you only have to recover from what was lost and then go up.
So values really didn't start coming back around significantly until
between 16 and 18.
So one of the things people, and I know we talk about it all the time, but people are like, these prices are crazy.
These prices are crazy.
If you would have never had that low or that down spurt where houses were underwater and they continually rose four to six percent year over year, which is the healthy appreciation, we would still be here.
with the same payment and the same prices as housing, it just wouldn't be as much of a shock.
It took a different route.
It took a different route.
And so that's why it's such a shock to the system because it went so fast.
But if it would have gradually gone now, this year, they're anticipating that same 4% to 6%.
I don't know that we're gonna see any huge, I think buyers are done paying it.
I really do.
I think that they're like, okay, time to level off.
But remember a couple of years ago, it was up 20% one year?
That was a huge shock.
And now we're back to 4% to 6%.
Worth Kristen Ambo's Point Mortgage Corporation.
But you
read some of those things and you're right.
I don't think people buy that, that there was a dip.
I mean, people just remember that housing has gone up 53%
and
wages have gone up 19% in that same period of time.
Which is still an issue, by the way.
That's still an issue.
Whether I make it sound easy or not, it's still, we just haven't gone up to the appreciation or the payment, the price, yes.
I was reading an article, I didn't tell you this, but this is a guy who wrote an article, I think it was in The Times or something, but he said the answer to, cause some people still want to live in the downtown.
I know there's a lot
of
opportunities to live out in the sticks, but he said the answer is churches.
Because the churches have been, you gotta admit,
they're not as attended as much as they used to be.
And you can write it off to COVID or you can, there's a whole bunch of reasons.
to level those and build condos.
He just thinks is the answer.
So I don't know.
I just,
I would love to build a condo in a little
church.
I was going to get that many in there.
I would love that.
But he just thinks there's, there's a lot of vacant things.
I would
never turned down a church
or school.
I think
you could convert them.
So cool.
But we
have to
build more.
I
mean, that was
his
premise of this whole article.
I know this is a term, but did you ever go to Ringo, Wisconsin?
Ringo.
Ringo.
Wrinkle by Wasson?
So we went to a rock concert there.
There's actually an old Catholic school that has a church in it, and inside the church area is where the concerts are now.
They turned it into a rock concert facility.
So now that you said that, they brought me to that.
Well, they kind of did that all here at Lady of Charity, or Martyrs, Lady of Martyrs, across from the pearly gates.
Yeah, I'm not sure what they call it, but we've had a lot of guests on the show.
That's a great music
venue now.
But this was use folks that can we do something with housing
and
either
add
on
or
go out
because the locations
are there the foundations are there Yeah, they talk a lot too about taking some of the vacant commercial buildings because there's so many of them converting them The problem is is that there's so much red tape to get the development And then the cost of the development is where they start to go.
Okay, even if we do that.
We can't keep it affordable
because the cost to the builders and the developing side of things.
I
remember there was a group that they wanted to do some really, really cool things with the old downtown mall here, and they weren't allowed to do
it.
I remember that, Jim.
What's he talking about?
I'm just
saying.
Big venue.
But the big venue.
I think that
mall... No, throw it down.
Knock it down.
I remember reading a report where that mall was worth $4 million and was dying, and then they...
leveled it and built a building that was worth 40 million dollars and employed 700 people.
I don't know, that's what I read.
Was that the old
chronicle?
Kind of like the AMS building now.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
They were talking about turning that into apartments or condos and that does not.
Well, I mean, the thing is, and we've talked with construction people, but is it cheaper to knock down and start from scratch or to try to rehab?
Rehab.
Yeah, then that mall was such a beautiful piece of history.
It's just a parking ramp surrounded by
phenomenal.
That's parking ramp in town.
Unbelievable.
Well, Kristen, let's talk a little bit about what's going on in your world, though.
People looking for a mortgage, looking to buy a house.
And it's got to be a little bit nerve wracking, though, with the uncertainty going on out there in the world to make that commitment.
Is it?
How do you reassure
them?
One of the biggest things, and we were gonna talk about it a little bit more from the last time, which is making sure your credit and your pre-approvals are in line.
But just first,
first.
First.
Anything else.
I can't say it.
I can't say it more first, first, first and foremost because everybody has a way they depict their situation in their mind and that doesn't always fit into the box of mortgage.
Right.
It is as clear as mud and starting with having that.
The other thing I want to really stress is so many people and I understand the fear of wanting your credit pulled.
It's a really hot topic right now is credit credit credit.
You
gotta get penalized for it.
Right and then you know, they're like no soft pull no soft pull and there's a lot of lenders out there That'll just do a soft pull which is great
They cost the same.
And here's the problem with the soft pull.
You have people now doing soft pulls.
I've got a gentleman that I'm talking to today.
Halfway through the transaction accepted offer, Lender decided now to do a hard pull and he doesn't qualify.
Because
the soft pulls don't show all the
details.
So a soft pull for those of you are where they do a credit pull and it doesn't hit your credit score.
Right?
So everyone's fearful that if I do a hard pull, it's going to hit my score.
Technically, yes, it will.
However, when it comes to mortgages, they allow you to shop without it hurting your score in the first 30 days.
So you don't have to be fearful.
And now one of the key things is if you pull your credit for a mortgage and then you don't do anything else, you're fine.
But if you pull your mortgage credit report and then you leave and you go,
pull 10, cause like car, car loans are horrible.
The car dealerships will pull your credit 10, 12 times to find financing for you.
And then you turn around and buy, you know, take out a credit card and max it out.
That's going to hurt your score.
If you're just simply getting your credit pulled once for a mortgage, you're okay.
And that's the fear of people that's been put in.
But a hard, a hard pull shows me everything of all three bureaus.
A soft pull might only show me some of one bureau or two bureaus.
So it does not give me the full picture.
Okay.
Couple other things we want to talk about.
as we come back after this break.
Number one, what if somebody young doesn't have a lot of credit?
What can they do?
What can, and on the vice versa, what can they do unknowingly to hurt their credit without
knowing it?
I'm ready for
it.
Okay, outstanding.
Good stuff, Kristen Ambrose Point Mortgage Corporation.
We got Beth Nash coming up, Indian Crossing Casino, some great, great entertainment they've got coming.
Tavia Hobson Burger, Old Station 31, Spirits Food, and
Kill Infusion with Chef Chase Ace Champion.
We got a lot of bleep to cover yet.
Kristen, settle down.
We're gonna have some fun.
Back
up.
Hey welcome back mind on the man here 97.9 FM WGBW 98.3 96.5 of him WSS the civic media app on beautiful Monday morning 52 across the board Green Bay Appleton and us gosh Tigers and Brewers at 605 and WISS coming your way tonight Joining us right now Kristen Ambo's point mortgage corporation for young people out there Or maybe you're not even that young but you haven't made this big huge purchase.
Yeah, where you need these types of loans number one
Give it to her, Jim.
Number one question.
Well,
your credit score, but I think you always want to be cognizant of your credit score, whether you're 25 or 55.
No matter what.
I mean, no matter what, because you may be upgrading or they're going to pull your credit score no matter what.
Absolutely.
And I think there's things that you have to be aware of that are affecting your credit score that maybe you're not aware of.
So what
are some of
the things that you may unconsciously, unconsciously, but not
be aware.
Annoyingly.
Annoyingly.
one of the number one things that people don't realize is super really tough on the credit score is when they dispute something.
So one of the one of the top ones is maybe not anymore but like cable or cell phones and somebody's you know really mad at Verizon Credit Union or
Whatever you're not Verizon Credit Union Spectrum or Verizon phones or whatever the case may be whichever company it is and let's say they they sent you a bill that you didn't agree with and So you call it and you dispute it soon as they hit the word dispute it hits your credit score and it's negatively affecting you come on that then you are not
Yeah.
So I'll get people to be like, I'm not paying that bill.
That's from before.
Can they do that legally?
Yeah.
And even like $40.
Yes.
Like
it's not.
I've seen credit get so hurt over $150 cell phone or cable bill.
Wow.
Like just.
Work it out and pay it over a three or fifty thousand dollar
house.
Yes,
a forty dollar
cable.
It could be a factor.
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
So that's the disputes is one of them The other thing is credit utilization a lot of times people like oh, but I'm not using it all but let's say you have a Ten thousand dollar credit card.
It's a pretty high credit card But you have a ten thousand dollar credit card limit if you're using over thirty percent of that
it's gonna affect your score on the negative.
So that 30% I've learned over all the years is like that magic number where you wanna stay underneath it.
And if you go over 30%, just pay it down to 30% as soon as you possibly can.
So over utilizing that credit is huge.
Okay, I'm gonna jump
in.
Yeah.
Can you check your, are these
scam
type things where it says, check your credit, can you check your own credit score personally without being penalized?
Yes, they give you a free credit report.com.
They give you the opportunity to pull once a year so you can keep an eye on it, but almost every banking or credit card has a utilization.
Now, when you look, let's say credit karma, that's a big one.
That's a great monitoring system to give you an idea of where you're at, but it is not.
It's not written in stone.
That's just a monitoring system.
It's not, it's not, you know, if you, if you have a sense of your score go down a lot, that probably means something to happen, look into it.
And if you see a big bump up, but you're working really hard, that's good.
So it monitors that, but it's not, it's not the same as a hard pull.
Okay.
Looking down the road, build a house or buy a house, whatever, whatever.
Don't have a lot of credit.
Live with mom and dad.
What do they do?
Start a secured credit card.
Go to your bank.
Secured credit card is putting your own money on the line.
So let's say you have a, look at it as a savings account.
Let's say you have $300.
That's all you have.
That's okay.
You put it into that secured credit card, use $100, pay it off.
Use $100, pay it off.
Even leaving just a small balance, like $10 or $15, because if you leave that small balance, that credit's gonna continue to revolve, and it's going to look like you're using your credit very well.
I just did this with my daughter about a year ago, and she is over a 700 credit score right now, just utilizing her own money.
So it's huge.
That secured credit card is big, but remember that 30% factor.
That's an awesome, that's awesome advice.
Yeah, thanks.
And I think the other thing that
We need to tell people you need to use established credit.
You have to use credit.
People like
cash, cash for everything.
And I happen to think, you know, grew up in the school of cash as king, but you can go in there and say, I pay cash for everything.
And they're going to be like, well, that's not a good thing.
It's
not always the best thing.
No, I think it's like, come on.
Cash is king.
I love that you want to use cash for it, but we don't know as a lender when you're using that cash Are you paying your bills on time?
Are you two weeks late because you're just running in whenever you want to to pay that bill?
We don't know and that's the problem in the whole bill and are you paying the home exactly so they will we can do Loans with cash is king no credit, but you're going to be looked at as a 620 credit score Which is the lowest you can go on conventional and then your interest rates gonna hurt you like so just
automatically goes to that.
Yep
Because we don't know so we have to we always are gonna think worst-case scenario.
If you pay
cash for everything, well, here's the price of
the house.
That's a Fannie Mae Freddie Mac guideline.
That's not a Kristen guideline.
That's that's the overall guidelines that are set.
We're blaming
you.
That's right.
It's all my fault.
Poor Kristen.
Hey, why don't you tell us about your podcast because this radio
show
that she's on, she actually does a podcast that's really good too.
Yeah, it's called Always On Point by Kristen Ambo.
So you can find it on Spotify.
You can go to my YouTube channel at Kristen Ambo.
So you can also find it on Apple podcasts.
Anywhere the podcasts are, I think there's one I've never heard of that it's on too.
There's some all around the world you've never heard
of and I
guarantee you're
on them.
It's on them somewhere.
That's pretty cool.
That's awesome.
But yeah, we talk about different things.
We talk about investing.
We talk about credit.
We talk about different loan programs that people don't know about that can help educate you on loan programs if you're looking to invest in and just different things.
So it's been pretty good.
And that you're talking about something that
affects everyone.
Like Dave
Ramsey, like I listen
to
your kids or whomever.
We all
kids that are in that age right now.
But I just think sometimes we think it's all kids, but there's
People
that I tell you what, I work with people of all ages and they're all in it.
And what's nice about it is this is just helping with financial literacy.
We're almost to a thousand downloads.
So I'm really excited about that.
It's growing.
Yeah.
Give yourself a plug.
Thank
you.
You can find me at 920-606-1156 or Ambo's team.com.
www.ambosteam.com.
A-M-B-O-S.
Yes.
Ambo's team.com.
No, R-No-E.
What did I say?
No, people say Ambrose all the time.
Ambrose.
No,
you didn't.
You heard it wrong.
You heard it
wrong.
Hey, Kristen, why don't you pick closer attention?
Kristen Ambrose, you're the best.
Thank you.
Love having you on.
Point Mortgage
Corporation.
Give her a call.
Coming up next, Beth Nash, phenomenal organization.
Coming to Northeast Wisconsin live from the Civic Media Studios and featuring TV and radio broadcast veteran John Minow along with the City of Green Bay's longest-serving mayor Jim Schmidt.
This is Minow and the Mayor.
And here are your hosts.
John Minow
and Jim Smith.
Hey, thank you very much.
Welcome back.
Our number three in a beautiful Monday morning in downtown Green Bay, downtown Appleton and downtown Oshkosh.
Pretty much 52 degrees across the board.
High in the mid fifties today.
Cloudy a little bit.
Windy with showers coming up later on Milwaukee Brewers in action on WISS tonight at 605 taking on the Tigers coming off a couple of really tough losses today as gardening date as Pecan day and it is dolphin day, which is apropos since we're.
with the lady that used to live in Miami.
That's a little bit of a stretch.
That's good.
Okay.
Beth Nash, Indian crossing casino in Wapaka with an amazing entertainment lineup.
But I met you a few months ago.
We were both doing the show on channel five, Malayne and Lisa's show.
And you were talking about the amazing things you had going on there.
And I thought to myself, I came back, I told Todd, I said, I got somebody we got to get on the air because I don't know if people are on here understand the amount of
tremendous entertainment coming to Wapaka these days.
Good morning, Beth.
Good morning.
I'm happy to be here.
Thank you.
Great to
have you.
Love Wapaka, but this is top shelf entertainment.
I know.
I know.
It is.
It really
is.
I mean, it just is.
Look, I don't want to say how do you get that in Malpaca, but like, how do you get that in Malpaca?
Well, we are extremely excited because we are celebrating 100 years of the ICC.
So
Indian Crossing Casino is turning 100 years in July.
I
didn't know they had casinos in Wisconsin 100 years ago.
Tell me about this.
It's got to be one of the oldest.
Well, and casino is a bit deceiving because we're not an actual gambling casino.
Right.
So we are a gathering place.
And that was one of the, if you look up the word casino, gathering place is one of the definitions.
So that's the one that they used back in 1925.
Got it.
Okay.
Beautiful.
Bingo though.
I mean, when you talk about a casino gathering place, what happened when you gathered?
They would gather for music, for fun, for dancing.
And we're all in the chain of lakes.
So that's really great.
So it's a wonderful
venue.
Can people literally take their boats to your place?
and duck.
Yes.
That's so cool.
I've
always wanted to do that.
Yeah.
We have new docks as of last year.
They're beautiful.
We can fit over 20, we have 20 dock slips and people can come, boat up, you can order food, eat it on your boat.
Love it.
Drinks, yeah.
So if I didn't work with a cheap bleep, we would have a boat this summer.
Not me.
Yeah, you.
No, no, no, no.
I
told you
all I needed it was half and I'll take care of everything else.
No,
yeah, that I want to go have sure it would be it would be up at the chin lakes Tell me though.
Let's talk about some of this entertainment.
Yeah, I mean everybody I mean Beach Boys glam band it goes on and on but I think it's awesome the Beach Boys still
bring it strong.
Oh, man
Yeah, we're starting it big.
We're kicking off summer with the Beach Boys, and it's pretty neat.
They were actually back.
They performed at the Indian Crossing Casino in 1963.
Wow.
Yeah, so we're really, really excited to welcome them back and kick off summer.
It's going to be a good time.
That's cool.
Right.
And that's followed by, do you want to go through some of your list?
Go right
ahead.
Yeah.
I have got, I've brought the whole list, actually.
So we've got- We
almost have the same glasses, by the way.
But
Amazon specials?
Dollar
Tree.
Believe me, he just says that.
No, your glasses are much nicer.
They're not $1 glasses
though.
They're $1.25
glasses.
There we go.
But this is coming up.
I mean, May 21st is when this kicks off with the Beach
Boys.
May 21st, yep, kicking off to summer.
It's their Sounds of Summer Tour.
It's going to be a lot of fun.
And if you haven't been to the Indian Crossing Casino to watch a music event, it's incredible.
We limit it.
What's the setting?
Well, it's on the water.
So it's this big, beautiful venue.
It's got the historic charm.
However, we've been doing updates to the casino the past two years.
So just adding new flooring, just giving the Indian Crossing Casino the facelift that it needed to stay current, but keeping that iconic charm that
it's had
since 1925.
So you're stepping into a little piece of history.
but it's really a cool piece of history.
And then when you go into the bar and restaurant area, you're right on the chain of lakes, you're on the channel, there's water and all the boat traffic that you get to see, it's really exciting.
They've added a new part, so you walk out the back area and there's a place called The Green.
It's gorgeous.
You feel like you've just stepped out somewhere else and you're instantly on vacation.
A beautiful green area.
There's Adirondack chairs.
We have live music Wednesday nights outside on the green.
Sounds
like the Cape Cod or the Hamptons or some kind of those resorts people used to go to in the summers.
Yeah, you feel like you're transported somewhere else.
But back to the venue, then we've got a beautiful concert hall and dance floor and the iconic Indian Crossing Casino stage.
and we're really excited to welcome the Beach Boys on Wednesday the 21st.
Tickets are available.
There's
two
tiered ticket prices, because one is standing, one is seated.
Tell me about how that works so we can get a feel for it when we go
there.
Yeah, you got it.
We've got upfront.
It's going to be a little separate area for upfront, and then standing room.
Both areas are standing room.
One's just a little bit closer to this stage, but all of them are...
great tickets.
There's no ticket where there's no balcony that you'll be standing on from afar.
It's just beautiful.
You're right there.
So everybody is up close.
It's
awesome.
Love it.
To see the
Beach Boys.
To see the Beach Boys.
That's great.
To see the Beach Boys.
Then we're going to bring on Warren and Quiet Riot.
So they're going to be here on June 28th.
That would be what Todd listed to in high school.
Not even a question, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right.
So that's why Todd and I are getting along.
You know, we got that going on for us.
Yeah.
I'm really excited about both of those.
And then on July 11th, we're welcoming back the Bodie.
They've been a couple of times, of course, one of Wisconsin's favorites.
One of my favorites.
They were there last year.
It's going to be a little different this year.
It's basically evening with the Bodines, so we've got two sets of Bodines.
That's cool.
Yeah, that's
super cool.
It's gonna be really neat.
You know, I mentioned the water a little bit.
I was at one concert last summer, I think it was, and the Glam Band was playing.
And we were, it was like so packed, we went up to like above the submarine museum.
So he sat right there with that sound coming over the water.
Oh my Lord, that's a whole different element.
Isn't it though?
I mean, what venue is on the water?
Not very many.
It's a pretty unique thing.
That was great.
Yeah.
Now, let me ask you something about this.
When you get people to come up to Wapaka or that, you know, these entertainers, they're like, where's the Wapaka?
Where's the whatever?
And then they bet when they come there, it's like, oh my gosh, is this cool?
I bet that happens.
Oh, all the time.
Yeah.
So it is, it's a very beautiful place.
It's a small town, but we are doing big things.
They've got a beautiful downtown area that was just recently renovated, lots of shops and restaurants there.
They're closer to the chain of lakes is a little area called King.
And they also have shops and restaurants.
I've been to King of Thotwell.
I've been King a hundred times.
for my World War II and Vietnam veterans visiting them at the King home.
Oh, sure.
Great.
Amazing cemetery.
One of the most awe-inspiring things a few years back.
I had to go do the written story.
And I got there really early on Memorial Day when the sun was coming up and it was coming through the mist and everything on the hill with those real, I mean, from World War II, from World War I, from the Civil War, all those amazing tombstones.
I mean, it's like a mini version of Arlington.
It really and truly is the cemetery.
in King, the Veteran's Cemetery.
It's incredible.
Yeah, I'm really glad that you mentioned that because it is.
It's gorgeous.
It is beautiful and we're really fortunate that we've got so many special places in Wapaka.
And it took me an hour and 15 minutes to get here today.
So we're not far from Great Bay at all.
Right.
Piece of
cake.
Yeah.
We were all there.
We went to Crude Salad.
When you forgot your keys, we turned around and went back.
Plainfield.
Yeah.
Plainfield's pretty close,
right?
Not far.
Yeah.
We went to Plainfield and then we were driving back to Green
Bay.
He won't give up on this story.
And he forgot
his keys so we had to turn around in Wapaka.
So I saw your city a little bit and then we went back to Plainfield, got his keys and then we drove back to Green Bay.
That's the last time I was in Wapaka.
It
didn't take long to go back at my keys because then when we were driving, I was like, wow, is that guy going fast?
I go, how fast?
He goes, I don't know, I'm going 95 and he just passed me.
I was late.
True story.
I had to work then.
I had to work.
I had to work.
True story.
I had to work.
So anyway.
But
you do have a great city.
It's a clean city.
It's easy to get around.
And you have a wonderful place there, but you have other restaurants and shops
and things too.
I
just want to say that.
There is.
If you haven't been to
Wapaka, there's a lot to do.
Do you guys
have watching?
at your place?
Uh, not at our place.
Okay.
Yeah, but there is plenty.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But the chain of lakes is beautiful.
And then, you know, if you're a kayak or a paddle boarder, there's 20, I forget, 21 lakes that are all connected.
Um, so it's great for anyone that loves any kind of water.
Ever see Jim Roman there?
I haven't.
because I think he's got a place there in one packet.
Okay.
Somebody
help me on Jim Roll, Jim Roll.
Oh yeah, he has a place.
I didn't know that.
I thought he had a place.
I think he has a place on the chain of lakes.
Oh, possibly.
That's cool.
Yes.
I'll have to Google that.
Okay.
Yeah.
No, I mean, there's a lot of, um, a lot of beautiful homes on the, on the chain there and a lot of people that come up from, from so many places really throughout the whole United States.
So yeah.
And we, um, we do more than music too.
So we, this Saturday, well, when we saw each other, Mike
ago, it was because of the farmer's market.
That's right.
The indoor.
Yeah, the indoor farmer's market is what we were at.
So, John, when we were there, it was the indoor farmer's market, and that was the thing that we started just this year, and that's great.
We've got our last indoor farmer's market this Saturday, so we're really excited to host that.
It's a spring
themed farmers market.
And we've got about 25 vendors that attend.
And where else can you go?
Grab a coffee, grab a Bloody Mary and shop around, support local farmers and growers.
I
love
the
variety.
Does the city do the outdoor farmers market there in the summer?
They do.
And that's downtown.
Right.
Yeah.
Correct.
I thought they
did.
That's cool.
Are you involved with actually lining up these?
entertainers?
We have got an events manager and she, her name is Brianna Yeska and she handles our events.
She does a great job of planning a lot of fun things throughout the year.
We've got, we'll be doing Christmas in July again.
We have something that's called Casino Kids, so we do fun programs for kids 12 and under.
Parents can come sit out on the green, have some food, and let the kids kind of run around and play games and meet other kids.
And just making memories there, it's pretty special.
Do you rent out your venue for other things, weddings or conventions?
Yeah, quick
texture
to me
to wrap.
Eagle River is where Jim Romo is.
Okay, thank
you.
You know what?
Yes, I was just in Eagle River with some friends and I think they mentioned that he was maybe there.
If I had a
place up at the chain, do you think people would say, God, Mino has a place up
here?
They'd all drive by and try to get a glimpse.
I
know,
right?
Or they might say who?
There's
Mino cutting grass
in a tank top and biker shorts.
We got to get a picture.
Stick around, Beth.
Indian Cross Casino Entertainment lineup.
They got great things happening on the chain of lakes.
Back
after this.
Remember John Stamos
played drums in this?
Oh yeah.
1987.
I'll have to look it up.
Remember that?
Remember that old video?
John Stamos played drums?
I don't remember that video, but I do hear that sometimes he makes guest appearances.
John Stamos does?
Yes.
Oh, wow.
You know, I'm kind of keeping my fingers crossed.
Well, that would be cool, wouldn't it?
Or maybe not John Stamos, but maybe John Minow shows up to play some drums.
There you go.
And again, Jim, people are like, who?
1988, by the way.
1988.
All right.
So Beth Nash, Indian.
Crossing Casino, which is not a casino, but it's got very It's where the Indians used to come in kind of hang out and that's
Right.
They were all they were there around the lake.
So there's lots of Indian mounds a lot of like Indian heritage, but
any arrowheads
I haven't.
I'm
big into arrowheads and stuff.
You know, I think my mom thinks that she has.
Really?
I don't know if they're official, but she's really... Really?
Yeah, she's really into rocks and stuff.
Me too.
Oh, okay, cool.
Is your
mom gonna be there?
I'll come out hanging with your
mom.
She might
be.
All right.
I would just, for people like him, I would just go drop pennies just to give him a thrill, you know what I mean?
Hey, tell me about your facility.
I mean, it's been upgraded.
It's a beautiful place.
Right.
Besides things that you put on as the director of marketing, you also run this out for corporate...
Weddings,
tell me about that.
We do, yeah, yes.
It's a beautiful venue for weddings.
Actually, we've been doing on our social media some flashback Fridays, showcasing some of the people that have been married there in the past, and yeah.
So
have they been doing that for 100 years?
I don't know how long, but I will tell you a story that when I, gosh, it was back in probably 2012, I did crash a wedding.
and it was at the casino, I don't know who's wedding it was.
Were you working?
No, I was visiting as a guest to Wapaka and I, yeah, with some friends.
Wow.
So,
yeah.
You intentionally crashed a wedding.
Yeah, we wanted to dance.
Wow.
Yeah, so we didn't really know there was
something.
Did you bring in a box with like a phone book in it that was wrapped
as you walked in?
Yeah.
Who
is that?
That's the only time I've done it and it was at the IACC.
Did
you get busted?
almost right away.
Yeah.
Really?
Yeah, I don't even think we could dance the full song.
We actually just got a phone call in the bride from the weddings on the line.
She'd like to talk to you.
I've been looking for you for a lot of years.
Do
you
have a, for someone who's going to, they cater to the food, do you have a restaurant facility there?
How does that work?
You hooked up with my
brother-in-law.
So we really, we are a waterfront restaurant and bar.
We have
delicious food and we do our own catering.
So for weddings, it's full service, bar, food, lots of options to choose from.
And so yeah, our event manager handles all of the weddings.
Our big wedding season is in the fall, but yeah, we can book the ICC for those private weddings.
It's beautiful.
We do outdoor ceremonies right on the chain of lakes.
Gorgeous place.
Do you have
like a pontoon or anything?
Do you
personally?
I don't personally have a pontoon.
I have a lot of friends that have pontoon.
And speaking of pontoons, but it wasn't actually a pontoon.
It was a boat.
Last July we did Christmas in July and we had Santa and Mrs. Claus on boat.
Yeah.
It was really cool.
They got a lot of attention from all the other boaters coming by in July.
No one expected.
So we're doing that again.
It'll be fun in July.
It's gotta be a point.
I mean, you know, you can live in
different places and have a great job or live in a great place and have a job.
You seem like you got a little of both.
You live in a phenomenal place and have a pre-phenomenal job.
Yeah, I'm very, very lucky.
Yeah, congratulations.
I mean, I'm
sure it's well, well, well learned, but I'm just saying, wow.
Yeah, it's a lot of fun.
It's a great group to work with.
The guests of the Indian Crossing Casino are amazing.
You meet people that come from everywhere.
You know, the music is fabulous.
We've got a lot of
cover bands that will be coming as well.
Let's
talk about some of those real quick.
Sure.
Yeah.
And you mentioned the Glam Band.
And they are, they're coming back as well.
So Glam Band, let me get the date.
24th.
Make
24th.
So that's coming up.
We will be having an Easter brunch.
That's next Sunday.
So that'll be fun.
We will have an appearance from the Easter Bunny.
All right.
And some fun cocktails that are Easter themed.
Glam Band.
Ask your mother coming
up.
Ask your mother.
Good friends of ours.
Yeah, they're great.
They were with us last summer.
They'll be back.
Music on the green, like I said, it's 5.30 to 8.30 on Wednesdays.
Why do I know the name
Cody James?
Um, I think he's a local artist.
Yeah.
So he's, but he's played other places as well.
Code James.
Yeah.
And the
Baudin's
the evening with the Baudin's
warrant.
Quiet.
Right.
I know.
Yeah.
And all, you can find this calendar that we're looking at right now.
That's all online on our website, indiancrossing casino.com.
Uh, so the lineup is there.
Links to any tickets are all there as well.
Um, I'm
just going to, I'm just going to read this just real quick.
Music on the green with just one of the people, Jake.
Okay.
Join us every Wednesday evening from 5.30 to 8.30 for Music on the Green at the Indian Cross Casino.
Enjoy live performances from talented local musicians on the green with a stunning chain of lakes setting the scene.
Grab dinner, sip on your favorite drink, and soak in the music, the views, and the laid back summer vibes.
It's the perfect midweek escape.
Great tunes, good company, and unforgettable moments under the open sky.
How cool does that sound for a Wednesday?
I know.
It does.
It is an amazing place.
You go out there, sit on the Adirondack chair, have some dinner, all fresco, while music's playing in the background.
It doesn't get much better than that.
What does
all fresco mean?
I always wondered about that when I see all fresco.
Outside, I believe, right?
Yes.
In the open air, something like that.
Yeah, all fresco.
Can I ask another really dumb question?
Probably.
What does all the cart mean?
Individual.
Individual?
Yeah.
How
about
some more?
Any other questions this morning?
Is that an appetizer?
No, appetizer would be appetizer.
Entree would be your main course.
And
then dessert, John, is what comes
after.
We need to get you out a little bit more.
Just a little.
Just
a little.
The drive-thru hasn't been doing it for me.
Yeah.
Yeah.
A number five.
All right.
Well, this is going to be gross.
Had to embarrass me in front of a company, didn't you, dad?
Well, one thing I just want to say too is that I weren't 15 minutes.
If you don't want to spend the night, that is nothing.
And from Appleton, it's even
less.
Right.
And with Appleton, Oshkosh are where big listeners are.
But that's just, it's right there.
Oh, this is this.
Look quite right.
OK, this is going to be fun.
We're going to see you this summer for sure.
Yeah.
This entertainment is great.
And just Indian Casino, Indian Crossing.
IndianCrossincasino.com.
Correct.
OK.
All right.
I
got it.
I got it.
All the events, menus will be on there.
Yeah.
We're excited.
1989.
Thank
you, Beth.
1989.
Oh, no.
It's earlier than that.
No.
Oh, yeah.
You sure?
1983.
Thank you.
Wow.
Well, thank you
guys.
Good to see
you.
All
right.
Tavia Hopson burger old station 31 spirits coming up next
Ready!
While the teams get ready to choose their top draft pick, you can help Mino and the Mayor choose their top craft pick.
Northeast Wisconsin is home to amazing breweries, wineries, cideries, and distilleries, and we need your help picking the best.
We've drafted 10 of our favorites, but which local craft beverage creator will go to number one?
That's up to you.
Mino and the Mayor's top craft pick, drafting Northeast Wisconsin's finest one sip at a time.
Now, back to Mino and the Mayor.
Here's John Mino and Jim Schmidt.
Hey, thank you very much.
Welcome back.
Mino
and the Mayor and a beautiful Monday morning special thanks to Beth Nash, Indian Cross and Casino.
They got an entertainment lineup for the summer that just sounds spectacular.
Pulling up on our boat.
I'm buying this boat, Tavia, 1947.
Like Chris Kraft, all wood with the portholes and everything.
Where did you find that?
He like marketplace.
I'm a buddy.
Yes.
Oh, but
I'm
thinking about
it.
Yeah.
It's gorgeous.
I'm
going to get a cool little cap.
We're
going to start, John.
What?
Hold on.
I got a guy.
He's going to help me out with that.
Do you have to refurbish it or is it ready to go?
Yeah, I'm
looking at what doesn't matter on
the back.
Huh?
What kind of motors on the back?
Big one.
Wow.
Again, he has to embarrass me in front of company.
That's what happens.
Tavia, Hoffman Burger, Old Station 31 spirits.
We had such a good time with you in Oshkosh a few weeks back.
We just enjoyed the heck out of it.
We love everything about your place.
We love your family's incredible service and sacrifice to our communities and our country.
I mean, we hold you in the highest esteem.
Even if you didn't put out a great product of adult beverages and the whole thing just what you guys your whole How you created this it wasn't just let's open a bar, you know You guys went upon this an entirely different factor But one of your high priorities was making sure you embrace your community embrace the legacy of where you guys were and how you brought all these moving parts Together history and yes, they hit in a short time
I just want to say hello.
It's great to have you here.
Thank you so much.
And we're
just so impressed with you telling your story when we were down in Oshkosh at our studio.
Thank you.
We've had so many awesome unexpected experiences with the distillery.
I wish when we were just talking earlier, I was telling you that we've had a whole bunch of fire departments from around where we are.
bringing in things because those antiques or that memorabilia has been sitting in their fire stations and they don't feel like it's getting in the exposure to the public that they want.
So they've been bringing it into the fire down to the distillery.
So we could put it in our little museum space.
That's fantastic.
It's been pretty cool.
And everything comes with a story.
I know
that was the cool part about it when we first met you.
And my wife and I were at the Ostoff Resort in Elkhart Lake and they were talking about
you know, being more, better for the environment.
And one of the things they can do is buy more local.
We talked about your place.
And I just think that's a good thing to do.
And you have such a great product line and you're just so community driven.
I just think we have to move.
And it all comes together.
Great.
There's a reason for everything that intertwines company out
there.
So anyway, I just, uh, we're very, very
Paul station 31 spirits in a nice town of
Dale, which is cool.
And I, um, I, have you gone to your summer hours yet or you must be getting close.
We'll start in May on May.
Yes.
Yes.
The fishermen will start coming out and all the campers and all of the vacationers that will go through our little tiny town.
Well, tell our listeners your story quickly.
I just think it's a.
They
didn't listen when we were at our studios in Oshkosh.
Or they missed that great article that was just in the business times a couple weeks ago.
The business news
did a great job for us.
Such a great paper to lots of local community information.
And that's 19 counties they cover.
It's impressive.
It's a pretty
good size
distribution.
So the distillery is in the old fire station in Dale and that building was built in 1938.
So it has a fantastic history.
We've had so many people just pop over and tell us about memories that they have in that building, about events that have happened.
And in those days, the fire department really was kind of like the central hub.
It's right in the middle of town.
Everything happened there.
You went there for all different parties or not only serving your community as fire service, but it was kind of the central hub of our community at that time.
So when we took over the building,
And it was kind of a hoity-toity job to be on that volunteer fire department, too, wasn't it?
I mean, you see that in those pictures.
They're awfully proud sitting there.
Proud, and it's impressive
how
well run those stations are.
They aren't heavily funded.
So a lot of the money that comes to a volunteer department comes either from the community itself or from doing some fundraising.
So it's definitely a labor of love and people are very proud.
And
pride.
That's what I mean.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
The number one thing that we talked about too is you came up with just some incredible drinks
that you
had on your menu.
And it's like you literally.
sat around and came up with many of these, correct?
Most of them, yes.
Are your family and everything?
My friends.
Explain
that, yeah.
So we have an R&D team.
R&D.
Research and development.
Oh, I'm sorry, okay.
Appetizer.
You have to test everything and you have coming up with these ideas.
Well, you're doing
it for the people.
You're doing it for the...
customers.
Absolutely.
That's why you're
sitting there and sampling those things over and over.
All day.
Yeah.
And it's kind of like making.
We would sign up for that.
That's what we could sign up for.
Everybody wants to be on the R&D team.
Are you taking other volunteers?
We have so many volunteers.
It's a really long
list.
The process is closed.
It
is.
Right now we're good.
Probably for the next 10
years.
Take it to the anniversary to 38.
So
there
you go.
All right.
But tell us again a little bit about your heritage and how this all came about and where this is a personal family type thing.
So my family's been involved in the fire service since my memory of a child.
My dad started it off.
And then when we lived in Seymour, my uncle was right across the street and he was on the fire department.
So once dad joined the fire service in Seymour, then it just it becomes part of your family.
Right.
the brotherhood, the hospitality, the honor that you get and you described even the pride that you have.
So then when my husband and I moved out to Dale, we both wanted to be involved in the community.
It's pretty important to us to have community service.
So he joined the fire department and then our two sons ultimately joined the fire department, but we started the explorers program, which is a program that allows
teenagers to get involved in the fire department and they can go through the training, they can attend meetings, it at least gives them some perspective on what's happening in the fire service.
So with that program, then our two sons were in the explorers program and they now are both firefighters as well.
Both of our daughter-in-laws are involved in the fire service.
EMS, my brother.
So it's a long heritage collectively.
It's about 114 years that our family has in the service.
It's incredible.
Yes.
And I don't see it stopping anytime soon.
So just to take that a step further, the one building that became available, you wanted, was the former firehouse.
Right.
So that firehouse, when it became available, my husband said to me, I think we have to have it.
Okay.
What would you like to do with that?
And that's where the distillery idea came from was the building, I think in
I might be out of order a little bit, but the building came first, and I think the idea came second for the discussion.
You guys
have had some weird things in space somehow come together.
We have had a lot of strange things.
Wow.
Another one.
In a great way.
In the best way.
We have had such good luck and so many different blessings.
Yeah.
Can't even count them all.
Cool.
The distillery came after, so you just wanted the building.
I think my husband wanted the building.
It was, there's so many people that would come in and talk about it and reminisce about it.
It was hard to leave there and not reflect on all those conversations
you
had.
And it would have been so sad to see anything else ever happen to it, to see the doors close and maybe people never being able to go back in there again.
People in that area must just be so happy you guys have kept that alive.
I think so.
We definitely have gotten a lot of positive feedback from the community.
There's two schools.
or like two camps.
There's the camp that comes in and says, oh, I remember when my dad was a fireman.
And then the other camp is I remember when this was a different business and
it's
so nice to see the door still open.
And we have some pictures in there of some of the old firemen.
And then we also have a board where previous firemen like a plaque and they would have their names engraved
in the
plaque and people will come in and they
find someone, a relative maybe, like on the board.
And then they'll grab a little piece of paper and a pencil that we have sitting over there and they'll.
Skit art.
Yeah.
What's that called?
Yeah.
Skit.
Yeah.
They do
that.
I can't
remember.
The wall in Washington DC.
Right.
Yes.
Yeah.
So you got into the distillery business and that's.
Chirkel sketch.
Chirkel
sketch.
Chirkel edge.
No.
Okay.
Appetizer.
But this has become very, very popular since what, 2000?
When did the laws change where you could make your own hard liquor in Wisconsin?
Seven, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11?
But
whatever.
But anyway, you guys are doing this
now.
It used to be a lot harder than it is now.
No doubt.
But
you brought your menu in when we talked last time.
It's just unbelievable.
And I think you're there.
the author of a lot of those drinks.
The creator.
The creator.
The mixologist.
Well,
I think... I'm gonna get a shirt.
Right.
And how was that all working for you?
It just... It's going really good.
I
can see that, yes.
We're introducing some new spirits, so I actually brought some cocktails for you guys to try.
All
right.
So this one... By
the way, I just... Do you know what this is, Jim?
A glass.
But, you know, what kind of glass this is?
specific person.
And I saw that, I said, I want to buy that glass.
The
tasting glass.
It's shaped just for tasting.
Correct.
Yes.
It's a Glen Caron glass.
Oh,
Glen
Caron.
Yes.
So they use most often to sample different liquors.
So I brought you some to sample.
Okay, sample here.
So that one that you have is the smoky lemonade.
So we grill lemons because we're in the fire station.
You have to have some.
You grill them.
Mm-hmm.
Have you ever had grilled pineapple?
Yes.
Same concept.
Grilled lemon, it brings out a little bit of like a caramely smoky flavor.
Nice.
And then our citrus vodka is in there as well.
And that's a key lime lemon combination.
Really
smooth.
And it's supposed to be really refreshing.
That's what I mean.
Really smooth and refreshing.
So you should get a little taste of the charred and grilled lemon.
I haven't yet.
Give me a couple more.
Keep tasting.
Keep testing.
Give me a couple of minutes.
Me half an
hour
and then the other cocktail I brought for you features our berry vodka And this is a combination of blueberry blackberry vodka.
Mmm.
So I'm sorry.
It's blueberry Jim's not a trigger
Todd.
You want to sample that one?
I will I will try really
nice That's a good
idea to get that smoke.
That's a really good idea.
It's a
fun idea right to smoke
the lemon, and that goes in first, and then ice, and then the vodka,
I'm assuming,
yeah.
Yes.
And is that lavender in there?
The whole thing about fruits.
Is that lavender?
This is blueberry blackberry.
Okay.
But is there lavender in your drink?
Oh, no, no,
there's a, what
is that?
Thyme.
Thyme.
Okay.
Gotcha, gotcha.
I knew that.
And if you rub it, you can smell it.
Oh
yeah.
Really?
Mm-hmm.
But the blueberry blackberry vodka is mixed with lemonade that's infused with blueberries.
So you guys don't
just toss things together.
You create.
That's the mission.
That's you create.
You don't just mix.
Right.
We don't want these.
We call these two minute cocktails because it can, in some instances, our cocktails can take up to two minutes to put together
to
make.
OK.
We usually do everything from scratch.
We have a few things that are premixed.
But the lemons, for example, those come right out of a.
We get them off the grill, we put them in a bag, and we wait for you to come in and order it, and then we squeeze it.
Wow!
So...
Taco take that extra step, huh?
Yeah, it needs to be fresh.
There's definitely a different flavor when you eat something fresh versus if it's been sitting for a while.
But there are other things too, like the blueberry-infused lemonade.
I don't wait for you to come in before we make that.
That has to happen before time, because then the flavors can mingle together a little better.
We have to ask her if you make an old-fashioned, do you muddle?
So we are just starting old-fashions.
We have a vodka old-fashioned But that one is with orange bitters and Demerara sugar so that we don't do any muddling with Yeah, it's just the sugar dissolving in the orange bitters and it is delightful It sounds good.
It makes my mouth water
made mine
just now That's a very refreshing that first drink you
have
I mean that's a summer summer drink I bet you are gonna go through and to put time in there adds just a little bit of that
That's the word I'm looking
for.
That's something different.
Savory.
Yeah, that's
a good idea.
You know what this is?
It's funny you talk about things, connection like, talk with Beth there at Indian Cross Casino, sitting on the water, hearing the great, hearing the Beach Boys or something and having this drink right
here
would make for like a perfect night.
Perfect.
That's exactly how we describe them.
Sitting on the end of the dock, watching the sunset, your feet up, having a cocktail.
Just be
perfect.
And then
the word is perfect.
It is
yeah
awesome
nicely done.
Tell me the we're gonna have to set a quick break when we come back We got I want to make sure I always pronounce it right Tavia correct not to via Tavia to me
because
otherwise it'd be Russian, right?
Actually, it is Russian.
I'm Polish, but my name is right.
I think we talked about
that once before and I think I said you need to check out your heritage We think you're Russian Okay, so work on that.
Okay old station 31 spirits in the town of Dale
It is such a great day trip to come there to see your facility and see what you guys do with this.
It's beyond a normal decision.
I don't mean there's, you know what I'm saying?
It's
just
like so many other elements that come into it.
We're gonna set a quick break back with more
Renefus.
Sittin' on that dark little bay.
Look like nothing's gonna change Everything still remains the same I can't do what ten people tell me to do So I guess I'll remain the same Sitting here resting my bones And this loneliness won't leave me alone
All right,
welcome back, everybody.
We are here with Tavia Huffinsburger from Old Station 31 Spirits.
In Dale.
In Dale, Wisconsin, which is, I think you know where Dale is, but maybe you haven't been there.
Just right down the road, 41 to 96.
That's it.
What is it?
40, 45 minutes?
From where?
Green Bay?
Yeah.
How many from
Appleton?
Yeah, it's about 40 minutes from Green Bay and we're about 12 minutes from Appleton.
Okay.
It's a pretty quick drive from Apple.
You got food and cocktail infusion, and you get somebody that's a very, very close friend of ours coming up.
And you will love this.
The people who love this, who you've never seen before, the chef, ace champion.
And we say chef, that's just one of his things that he brings to the party.
He is very dynamic, multi-talented man.
We're a pretty big fan of his.
And he's been on here, and he's done a lot of things in this community.
I actually heard him on your show.
So I was driving into work.
heard him talking about what he does and thought, I have to call it.
Your place to be perfect.
I'm so excited.
I'm so excited.
So what's the
chef doing out there?
Well, I called him right away and said, hey, this is what we're about at the distillery.
Here is what we do.
Community service is a huge thing for us.
So we really like you to come to the distillery.
And he did not hesitate.
Absolutely.
And one of the greatest
guys you'll ever meet, just a good human being.
And super creative
too.
So one of the things that I like to do is the cocktail pairing.
So that's kind of where, you know, doing my recipes for the food and pairing up what he's making and try to create a good cocktail that complements it.
And then he came up with this fantastic idea and actually he's been doing it for a long time is actually using the spirits in the recipes.
So we're releasing a bourbon and the bourbon he's going to use in his bourbon pecan chicken.
that he's making at the distillery.
And then he did the banana fosters with you guys on that segment that I heard him.
He's gonna use our vodka to make the white sauce for the banana's foster.
And that's
ace, that's how
he does this.
Exactly,
exactly.
When is this?
April 29th.
Oh,
that's coming up then.
Can we get a promote
this?
Our tickets are all sold out.
Oh, they are, okay.
Forget about that.
We're still gonna promote it.
After three days, once we posted it, in three days the tickets were gone.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, we'll just have to do it again.
And I don't know if you've ever had anything like like ace or race.
I mean, he'll pull in an instrument.
This is a 12,000 year old.
You know what I mean?
He talked about
this.
It's just like
it's incredible.
One of the interesting things and where he and I really connected was the the topic of the community.
He loves to teach.
So his.
His visit to the distillery isn't just about making food.
He's actually going to demonstrate how he's doing it
Oh, yeah
So that people that are there can walk away with some ideas of how to use not only our spirits But also his talents and being a chef so he can do it all
Well, good.
Well, April 29th, even though it's sold out, I mean, it's still, it's great that you guys are working together because you both, your heart's in the right spot.
I'll tell you that community and charity and yeah, that's going to be a fun event.
Okay, can I try
one thing?
Yes.
What's this?
So I brought you some four and a half year old bourbon.
Okay.
So this is our new release.
It'll come out at the end of this month at the beginning of May.
In fact, we're gonna do the big reveal when Ace is at the distillery when the chef is with us.
We'll do the big reveal, but this is like a soft reveal, if you will.
So we brought you a four and a half year old bourbon that we're selling.
And the name of it is?
It's Old Station 31 Bourbon.
It's a straight bourbon.
and it is delicious.
And
this would be an actual tasting glass of which I've never seen before.
It is an honest-to-goodness tasting glass.
Probably something for
how the air goes
or something.
You got it.
It's a tulip shape is how it's referred to.
So what happens is you just pour a smidge in there and then the tulip shape of it holds the scent or the smell.
near the bottom of the glass, and then as you tip it to sip from it, the smell escapes out of the glass because of the shape.
So not only you get to taste it, but you can smell it all at the same time.
Is it wrong if your nose is too big to fit my glass?
Is that an issue?
Because it is.
That's not a problem.
You don't necessarily have to put your nose in the glass.
You can just sip it.
Get one
nostril.
It's a really cool concept, and it actually works.
So we've experimented just for fun.
Like if you were to drink just out of a regular rocks glass versus a tasting glass.
Like you could smell
it really good.
Yes.
That's
the exact design.
Is
that different than drinking straight out of a bottle, John?
I don't
know, Jim.
I've never
done
that.
Well, I have a bottle here if you want to give it a try.
Well, I'll try it.
First
time for ever.
Sage, pay no attention
to what's going on here.
Todd has
lost
control.
Sorry, Todd.
So that bourbon is in a barrel right now, I take it.
Yes, is that ages in a barrel?
It's delicious.
I hate to say it.
It's deliciously delicious.
It is delicious.
You should have smelled the distillery when we were bottling it.
It was like heaven in there.
So they do age in barrels and then there were four barrels that we had and then we poured them all into one container so they could mix together.
Oh, wow.
Cool.
Bottled them so right now they are all in bottles ready ready to go
and
their first
sale on that night
with a
second be the first time Wow, what
a big night.
Yes.
Oh
my gosh folks.
I gotta take give you give this a plug one more time I know bourbon aficionados are going after like fifteen hundred twenty five hundred dollar bottles It's impressive, but if you're looking for some amazing taste go ahead and give this a plug, please
Yeah, old station 31 straight bourbon whiskey four and a half year old
bourbon whiskey that we have at the distillery.
And roughly, I would tell you, it's a higher rye profile for those of the connoisseurs that are more interested in what type.
It's got a little
something, something working with it.
Let's talk about the raw materials, I guess, for lack of better words.
That's all local, right?
Pretty
much.
The ingredients that go into this, isn't this pretty much?
So we grow a lot of our own stuff.
I think that's awesome.
But the corn was
our vodka's white organic corn, and we can't grow that here.
We don't have it a long enough growing season, so we actually have to source that from a Midwestern grainery down in Illinois.
Whatever it is, wherever it comes from.
Turns out great.
Give yourself a quick plug, please.
Yeah, come visit us at Old Station 31 Spirits in Dale, Wisconsin, right on Highway 96, about eight miles off of 41.
Can't beat it.
Thank you for everything, you guys.
And congratulations.
What a
good success story.
It's been a good journey, and thank you for your support.
Thanks for being a part
of our show.
Yeah.
Wow, what a phenomenal show with phenomenal guests.
Thank you, everybody.
Back in the morning, mind of the mare.
See ya.
