Good morning, Wisconsin. Morning, world. It's a new day, and thanks for kicking it off
with us at WFHR.
Have your host, James here. I'm joined by Melissa. Good morning. And the best listeners in
radio. Thanks for joining us, everybody. We appreciate the company. Melissa and I are
going to have some fun a little bit later. Get in some entertainment news. Got a couple
of other topics we'll touch on our schedule. We'll also get in some good stories of the
day. But we kick off the 10 o'clock hour with a long time friend of ours here at WFHR.
Mr. Bob Brickhouser with us from Assumption High School. Bob, it's good to see you good
to have you on the air with us. James, good to be here. Thank you for having me.
Melissa, Bob does have his headphones on, so we can hear you if you have any questions
or anything. Good morning, Melissa. Good morning. Bob, how you been? I've been fine.
Good, that's okay. I cannot imagine how busy you've been. I imagine you've been going
at it since the last time you joined us. Especially with this particular golf scramble.
We have a lot of different golf events throughout the summer. We love golf in this area.
It's very well supported and I appreciate it. But there's certain ones that just stand
out. This is one of those that really stands out. People love to come to this one. Thank
very much. I think that's very true and specifically based upon the retention that we
have of four sons. The other thing that I've noticed over the years has become very family
orientated. A lot of families come up and both as sisters, fathers and sons, it's been
really very revealing. This is a four-person scramble that's going to take place at the
richest golf course. Bob, will let's get into the details of this one and what people
can expect from the event. Yes, we're at the richest and this is our 37th annual golf
scramble and we've been at the richest the entire time for the event. It started out as
a single flight lady and back in the late 90s, we went to two flights one in the morning
and one in the afternoon and they are scheduled now at 7 a.m. in the morning and 12, 30 p.m.
in the afternoon. So we can accommodate about 60 four sons and we definitely end up
between 55 and 64 sons. It really speaks to the popularity of the event having to do that
until years ago and everything and how it stayed that way. You've kept so many very people
coming to it year after year. That's really a very rewarding aspect of it because people
really, you know, they put this event on their calendar very early and like I say, we
get a lot of the same groups back year after year and yeah, it's a lot of work but it is
very rewarding also. As I said, we're at, as you said, we're at the richest and it's
our 37th annual. The first one was back in 1988. Unfortunately, I remember that well.
But it's been a, you know, it's, like I say, I won't lie about it. It's a lot of work
but it's very rewarding. It's a good fundraiser for the athletic association. Yeah. The funds
raised from this event are go right into that and help out and we see the fruits of that
all the time with assumption athletics and I think any, and one of the, one of the things
that I love about this event and it really came across in the early years of you and I
talking together, Bob, is how full circle this event is. You know, these events and event
like this helps fund assumption athletics. Assumption athletics goes on and does great
things and brings in, you know, economy to the city, to the area and everything. Not just
assumptions certainly but to the city of Wisconsin rapids to this area and then you see some
of that money being spent on the golf scramble. Like you just see this wonderful kind of circle
of things where we're looking out for each other, we're helping each other, we're also
supporting each other and having fun while we're doing it.
And it's very well said. As I say, yeah, it is a lot of fun. Now, the, the glue behind the
whole event is my son, Joel, who is the flight director up at assumption high school. Yeah.
And, you know, the other nice thing is that I get to work very closely with him on this
event and on many events. And we're all, we'll all give a big sigh of relief on Saturday, July
19th. But, you know, it's, it's just a very, very rewarding yet, very worthwhile endeavor.
Yeah. But I'm sure it's a lot of work. Let's talk about the cost and then get into the event
itself and what people can expect about. Correct. The cost for the AM session, which starts
at 7 a.m. It's $100 per individual and for a force of them would be $400. The PM session
was starts at 12 30 PM. The individual costs is $110 and a force of cost is $440. These,
we've kept these prices for quite a while. Yeah. The price includes green feeds, golf
cart, skin games, prizes, and an open bar of beer wine and soda. There are mixed drinks available
at the golf arts cost. And the, we feature a beef medallion and chicken officer dinner,
which is, which is excellent. Very good. That sounds good. For many years, we had the
banquet at the award dinner at assumption. And we moved off to the richest side. We was last
year and it really, really went well. It's been just a whole lot less running around. Yeah.
And so everybody should be very pleased with it. So, you know, we, whenever we have a chance to
talk about the ridges, we love to highlight them, compliment them, appreciate them, putting into
the community a lot of those things. One thing I don't do is talk enough about the chefs
and the cooks over there. They just make good food. They make good food over there. This is,
especially with those, the specials that you have there, with the beef medallion and the chicken
officer dinner, those are, that's going to be really good. We have a lot of very nice compliments
on the meal last year. Yes. The fourth person scramble again, the shotgun start begins at seven
or 1230. The open bar banquet will be from five to nine and they're going to have live music
there from eight to midnight, too. I got to make sure to mention that. Yeah. That's just a little
bit of an added feature, which obviously is associated with the golf scramble, but last year,
they had the same thing. They had the music from eight to 12 and it was very popular. A lot of
people stayed around. Thanks. We're excited about this one. Excited to hear how it goes and
want to mention to the audience, too, as a little bit of a tease of preview. Bob will be back with
us in a couple of months. I imagine and talk about the cranberry classic and we'll get people
at, I'm not trying to jump on that. We'll give it, we got time. We got time. I certainly hope so.
But we get a break, Bob. We are looking forward to it. And I can't thank you enough not only for
coming in and talking with us, Bob, you know, talking about the event and letting us know more about
it, but everything you guys put into it and you had something else? Well, I just wanted to point out
that in order to accommodate golfers of all abilities, our four surprises are awarded not only
on the basis of best score, but we'll be also on the basis of four some makeup. For instance,
we have a mixed couple flight. We have a all women flight and then we have three flights
for men BC and D. So, you know, we try to accommodate, as it says, golfers of all abilities.
It's really great. That's great to hear. And I appreciate you including that, Bob.
And thinking about that. How about mini golfers?
Because that's about my ability. Look at that. But we appreciate your Bob. Thanks so much for
joining us. If you'd like to find out more, encourage you to go to the assumptions website and
go to assumptioncathacschools.org. I encourage also to follow them on social media as well.
It's great contact information ways to reach out to the school and find out more if you'd like.
And if you want to sign up for the golf classic, Bob, is that the best way to do it?
Send them to the website. You could do that way. Probably investing at this point would be to
contact my son, Joel Verkhalzer at 422-0915. That would expedite sign up.
Yeah. And be sure to reach out to us if you need that information again or anything
anybody and spread the word about this event. So, we make sure that we got a great group of
people to turn it out for it. And you're going to have a great time, Bob. Thanks again for the time.
Thank you very much. Melissa and I will be back with more show coming up right here on the
morning show at WFHR. Welcome back everybody. Morning show here at WFHR, locally grown radio.
Melissa and James hanging out with you. Thanks so much for hanging out with us. We hope you're
having a good one out there. Big shout out, big thank you to assumptioncathacschools Bob Verkhalzer
for joining us. Talk about the four-person scramble coming up. Thank you Bob.
He's such a great guy to talk to. Love talk with Bob. That 37th annual royal golf scramble
will be coming up Friday, July 18th over at the beautiful ridges golf course. Sign up for that,
get involved everybody and put back into the community like that. I appreciate it. Sounds
like a fun time. That's going to be good. That's going to be a great event. I encourage you to
check that out everybody. Melissa and I are diving into some entertainment news now for you. And of
course we begin being the home of Dally Parton who is with Dally Parton. Dally's inviting
all of us to help tell her story. Everybody out there listen. The country legend is putting
together an audio book for her upcoming memoir, Star of the Show, My Life on Stage, and she wants
fans to be a part of it. In an Instagram post, Dally asks fans to share their favorite concert
memories, special moments, or ways her music has touched their lives. Some of those stories will
be featured in the official audio book. Oh, cool. She says, quote, my story isn't complete without
yours. Fans can leave a voice message through the link in her bio. Dally's audiobook comes out
on November 11th and is available for pre-order now. I think that you can make the argument.
Dally Parton is not make the argument. She is one of the smartest people in the entertainment
in the history of entertainment. The way she is handling her career, the talent she has, etc., etc.
I don't know how else to say this. I don't think even she can wrap her mind around what's going to
happen next. The amount of people that are going to be coming forward with stories. And she's
right. She's going to hear stories about I went to this concert and I had this happen or
etc., etc. But what I'm thinking about is, you know, think about Dally Parton's imagination library
and some kid leaving an audio message about how those books help them. Like she's had such an
impact in so many levels of life that I think where we look at her as a musician, as an artist,
as an actor and those things, there's so many people that are going to be coming out of the
woodworks and talking about how she impacted their life or something that didn't have anything to
do with music or movies or anything like that. Yeah. How cool. Yeah. Yeah. So as smart as she is,
as great as she is, I don't even think she can wrap her mind around what's about to happen here.
In the amount of, and I don't, I especially don't think her editors can.
I imagine everybody was on board. This is a great idea, Dally. This is fantastic. And then
her editors are like, wait a minute. Hold up. We have tens of thousands of entries. You know how
long it's going to take for this audio book to come out. Imagine trying to encamp and capsule
Dally Parton's life in a biography. And then on top of that, oh, and also her fan influence.
We just got done talking about like, not what, three hour movies. This is a 40 hour book.
This is like this. Hey, you know what, though, 40 hour books are awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Let's go.
I have, I have several favorites that are 40 plus hours long, but also the fact that she's
including her fans and her story. It just speaks, like you said, so much to who Dally is as a person.
How she has viewed her career in her life and her art and her contribution to art and the
contribution that her fans have made to her art. It's just, it's a beautiful thing. I recently,
I saw the Alabama shakes and Miley Cyrus doing a song together. And I don't know a whole lot
about Miley Cyrus, but what I do, I do know a bit in pieces, bits in pieces. And certainly she was
a, you know, child star. Then, you know, kind of turned, went off and did her own thing as a pop
artist and went pretty far and extreme with some things. And now has kind of seemed to round out
a little bit. And she's still a bit of a wild child and all that, but she also does it in reserve.
And she seems to be very, um, composed, very aware of her surroundings, of herself and all these
things. And, um, I can't help but think that having Dally Parton as a big influence and having
her being a part of her life is part of why her story is not the way a lot of those stories go.
And, and, um, I, you know, I know that she's given credence to this a little bit,
Miley Cyrus has. And, and I use her as an example just because it's somebody that I don't know
that much about, but one of the things that I do know is this. And that's, that's just one person
we're talking about with the impact she's had and the influence she's had. I'm, I'm really curious
to see over the years how many other artists in other people she is influenced and we hear about
that. I think her legacy is so much deeper than we can even wrap our minds around in that regard.
Yeah, her music is legendary. It's going to be enjoyed for the end, until the end of time.
Her acting, all these things, her imagination library, even, I just mentioned is really big.
But then you think about the influence and her influencing other artists and that's something
people looked up to her as a mentor like Miley Cyrus did. Yeah, that's, it does. Just, it's
just incredible. It really is. That's really cool. It'll be neat to see and listen to that when
it comes out. Another darn good artist Ed Sheeran had something interesting happened. Can you
believe it's officially been 10 years since Apple Music first debuted to celebrate the Milestone
Apple shared their top 500 most stream songs of the decade. They did some fun with this one.
A lot of people have been enjoying it. And Ed Sheeran's Shape of View is the most stream song.
The most Taylor Swift had 14 song streams. She had, she was the second most streamed artist
on the list. But the most stream songs Ed Sheeran's Shape of View number one, blinded lights from
the weekend at number two. Otherwise, had most of you the artists that I think you'd come to
expect on there. And basically songs that have been hits over the last, you know, five, 10 years.
I probably know that song, but I can't recall it. Looking at this list, it's definitely one of those
things where I don't know that song. And then I hear it. I'm like, oh, yeah, I do know that song.
That's usually the case with me. I'm afraid I'm getting closer and closer to that age.
I've been afraid of this for a very long time where I always thought my dad, I had a cool,
I still have a cool dad. And I'm lucky for that. And my dad likes, you know, he's not,
oh, my music's only good music or anything like that. My dad got into Nirvana with me and stuff.
Like he gave things chances. But at a certain age, he'd be hearing something and he's like, well,
that sounds like this. It all sounds the same. It's all just, you know, the same music. I'm afraid of
that happening of being that getting to that age where this new music coming out. I just
sounds like garbage to me. It doesn't. I said, when I look at these lists, I immediately, I'm like,
no, I'm still young and cool. I know these songs. I'm familiar. I didn't know. No.
Well, it's, it's when some of your favorite bands that you listen to as a kid are now titled
Classic Rock. Oh, it's not all just 80s hair bands anymore that you're kind of like, wait a minute.
Yeah. Shout out to Travis over a big cheese doing his thing. We, you know, shout him out when I can.
When him and I were in our old Classic Rock days and we were, you know,
getting new in the business and new in the industry, we were playing Classic Rock music and
essentially music that our fathers enjoyed. And then all of a sudden, we started to be able to,
like, the corporate new music every six to 10 months, things like that. They might do it
differently now, but that's how it was done back in the day. And we get all the sudden introduced
with Nirvana and Alson Chains and Sal Garden. And some of those bands, we were able to play.
And for a good minute, we were excited. We were jacked. We were, so this is going to be amazing.
We get to play the music that we listen to in high school. Wait a minute. Hold up. So that means
we're old now. What, what happened? What happened? When did that happen? When did our music become
Classic Rock? But in order for it, you know, under the definition of what Classic Music is,
it's anything that's 10 years or older. And so, yeah, it's this kind of like wake-up call of,
yeah, you're getting up there. Okay, but you could instead of calling yourself old,
you could call yourself a classic. Yeah, I like that. I like that. I tried seasoned a little bit.
That didn't work. That didn't work. Brad Pitt.
Use food terms to describe yourself. No, no, it's not a good idea. It's not a good idea.
James is leathery. It isn't. It's night rider, everyone. Oh, there's didn't work, didn't work.
Brad Pitt says, he was doing an interview recently. And for those that may not realize,
he's actually really one of the more like open and honest interviews. He just doesn't do a ton of
them. Brad Pitt says he's only been left star struck twice by his famous female co-stars over
the years. And when asked, a lot of people were like, they were asking names and we have Susan
Sarandon and Catherine Zeta Jones, Margaret Roby, Julia Roberts, Gina Davis, and Angelina Jolie,
of course. How could he not be star struck by all of them? Well, it was actually too in particular
that he was. All those others, he enjoyed working with them and everything, but he looked at
them a little more as peers and actually people that he could learn from. But he was star struck
by Susan Sarandon and Gina Davis. Of course, he starred with them in 1991, Stelman Louise.
It was really his breakout role, that movie, that role in that movie. And Brad added, quote,
I got over it quickly, though, in part because of the way that those two are, because you're
going to be intimidated by those two very understandable. Also, Susan Sarandon, Gina Davis,
two people did not put on heirs. They are blunt, they are honest, and they are real.
And I can only imagine that that star struck would have gotten over real quick once Susan Sarandon
just said something sarcastic to him or something like that. I love both those actors. I think
they're both great. And I think that we need more of this of actors being honest about these
things and sharing this stuff. Not just being, I don't know, egotistical. Because, I mean, yes,
we all have an ego, but just keeping it in check and being real. Yeah, yeah. It goes, I will say,
as somebody who has been, and this is a little bit wider of a subject and a little bit different
definition of ego, but as somebody who has been doing a lot of research and working very hard at
the idea of killing the ego, I will say that I find that you breathe easier. You find life a
lot more enjoyable when you're able to quiet that voice in the back of our heads that is where
doubt lives and where so many of those negative thoughts live. That's the ego I'm referring to
and destroying that and getting rid of that. But a cousin of that is much the ego that you're
talking about there, Melissa. And we're so much better off as people, not only in the way we treat
each other, but the way we're received. And I think the way that we enjoy life when we're just
able to get rid of a lot of that noise. And 99% of the time that voice in the back of your head is
not looking out for you. It's the flight or flight flight voice that's trying to help you even
though you might not need its help. Or it's trying to sabotage you because that's what our brains do.
Yeah. Yeah. It's this odd thing that we deal with, but it's there. One of the touch on some
local things going on, including some great local events over at our wonderful McMillan Library,
we send a shout out to them. They have some not only great things going on today, but in the next
couple of days. Today, I encourage you to check out some of the stuff that they have going on.
Baby Storytime is beginning in a couple minutes over in their children's area.
I got their Sima reading program at their all-purpose room. You can check that out. Family Storytime
will be tomorrow at 9.30 a.m. in the children's area. They'll have that going on. Cowboy Union Jam
going to be performing tomorrow at 1 o'clock at the Fine Arts Center. Nice. A big fans of theirs.
Be sure to check that out. And then on July 10th, they're going to have a concert featuring
your such-was-concil songwriter genius L.J. Booth in the Amazing Chris Cauch. College?
Or Kokish. And on July 24th, Ron McCabe is going to be there presenting a mix of his original
and traditional songs. And this series will include with National Star John Gorka on August 28th.
Nice. And there is a special presentation there tonight from the effects of foreign aid on
international relations. And that is from, where's the time?
That is 630. Yeah, 630 to 8.
630 to 730. Okay, perfect. Thank you. That'll be in the all-purpose room. And this is a really,
like not only an important one and one that I think is worth checking out everybody. I will also say
it's being done by somebody really knows what they're talking about and it's a chance to really,
you know, hear this in person face to face. Yeah, speaker Greg St. Arnold.
Yeah, Greg's good. That's a great one. I encourage you to check that out. Everybody.
We also want to encourage you to check out, we had some of the cast joining us yesterday for
the team production of West Side Story. Yes. You can check out the interview at WFHR.com and
with the Rapids Report, great cast, great fun, great interview, and a great show. And one of the
things I got talking about with the kids and boy, did their eyes light up when I talked about
this. It was great. You've seen West Side Story probably. You know the story probably. You've
seen the movies or maybe you've seen the play or something like that. I don't know how many of us
have seen it done, in my opinion, the way that it's supposed to be done with actual teenagers.
Most of the time you're seeing somebody if you're lucky, they're 25. And like it or not,
you can have the greatest 25-year-old actor of all time playing that and they're not going to be
able to do what these kids are going to be able to do. Because these kids are able to relate to
these roles better than anybody. And the older we get, the more we forget how it's like to be a
teenager, it was like to be young. These kids don't need to, you know, do any deep acting on that
one. Their experience getting real time. And the play is the school edition, so it is written for
that. I don't know if you want to say a lighter version of West Side Story, but Susan,
their director was in yesterday and kind of touched on that a little bit. It's got all of the
everything you've loved about West Side Story since you were a young probably. And it's a fun one
and it's a great opportunity to buy local support local and support these kids. And there's only four
shows. Yeah. The production dates are this July 10th and 11th and 12th at seven o'clock and then
they'll wrap up on the 13th with a two o'clock matinee. You can get your tickets, check out the cast
and find out more at wrctheater.org. Head on over there, wrctheater.org. Yeah, and if you go to
the Facebook page for the Wisconsin Rapids Community Theater, they've got some pictures posted,
so you can get a little bit of a sneak peek. Encourage you to do that, everybody. They're great
pictures. They're awesome. And while you're online, why not head out over to the wfhr.com and
sign up for our newsletter? Yeah, there'll be another edition coming out on Thursday at noon.
Looking forward to it. It's going to be a good one. I enjoy them every time. It's one of my
Thursday things I do. I make time every Thursday and I put it like a half an hour, 45 minutes
aside so I can read some articles and check out some of the great reporting done by not only our
staff here, but civic media and I encourage you to check that out. All across the state.
Have a new edition for you this Thursday. Go ahead and sign up and be ready for it at wfhr.com.
Sign up for that newsletter. Thank you to everybody who already has.
Melissa and I are going to take a quick time out. We'll come back and have some more fun.
We're going to get into one in five workers. How many times we check our email every day?
I got that one coming up for you. And a morning show at wfhr.
Welcome back, everybody. Morning show at wfhr. Locally grown radio. Melissa and James hanging out
with you. Thanks so much for joining us, everybody. Got an interesting one here, Melissa.
A new poll of working adults found 93% of us, 93% of us check our email every day,
including 88% of us who even check it on vacation. Only 6% don't check it every day.
Okay. So not too, I don't know that that's too surprising necessarily, but it is always interesting
to what you think and to see the numbers kind of back it up. Yeah, I mean, I think it makes sense
because we don't, it'd be like checking your mailbox every day. Exactly. Yeah.
You know, like your snail mailbox, I mean, you know, I don't know what the percentage of people
that check their mailbox every day and, you know, in the, you know, going up until the 80s or 90s
even, but you know, it's a good comp. Here are a few more stats on Americans email habits.
Only checking it once a day isn't very common. 42% said 3 to 5 times a day. 28% said 10 to 20.
And 19% checked their email more than 20 times a day or 8% check it just once.
So all over. But more, I think they're a little bit like potato chips. You're not going to have
just one. You're going to probably check your email more than once. Well, I mean, for those of us
who are, use it for work constantly. I mean, what other choice do you have? I'm always on my email.
Yeah. I would like to see the percentage of people that are doing this because they want to.
I think that might be a little more interesting stat right there or checking their personal email
because most of us have a work email and a personal email. So I mean, I have to check my personal
email a lot because I've reached my max capacity. Yeah, I'm telling me that I'm going to,
I'm not going to be able to receive emails unless I purchase storage. You know, not.
I hear you say, say, and I'm, I'm rebelling.
I'm realizing, too, as we're talking about this, I, my work email, I'm updating that.
I'm refreshing that checking that hourly maybe. At least especially during working,
I am, well, we, it's, we're 24, seven here in radio. We were always working, but, you know,
more of the daytime hours and some of that, I'm really checking it out. Not all of us are 24,
seven J. Yeah. But my personal email, I feel like I only go to that to get rid of all the junk
just to clear it out. Like, I feel like I spend more time doing that than I do anything else.
All the time in your email box adds up on weekend, weekdays, 35% said that they spend less than
an hour reading or responding to emails. 30% said about an hour, 17% said about two hours,
and 18% spent up to five hours on email each day. Wow. Yeah, that's. No, I, I spend at least that.
I'm, I'm what's dawning on me is you're not alone. Yeah. Well, because at least for us,
email is not just email messages. It's also chats. It's also meetings. It's, I mean,
we use it for a lot of things. It's all tied to the same, you know, email page.
And I don't know, you know, sometimes when you're so close to something, it's a little hard to see
the forest through the trees kind of thing. But I feel like I, I spend, you know, more time on
there with work-related things, sure. But, you know, we have chats here at Civic, you know,
and like a lot of companies do. And I spend time on those and that are fun. And, you know,
not just work-related stuff. So I don't know, going back to earlier in that work-life balance,
I think that we're trying to do the best we can with that around here and with an industry
that is time-sensitive, maybe the most time-sensitive. So you can't necessarily always have grace
with things when you've got to get stuff done. You know, I think we do that as best as we can.
Well, and it's also a nice way for us as a company because we are spread out across the entire
state. It's a way that we get to share with the other people that don't, you know, see our,
necessarily our Facebook posts or social media posts all the time. We get to share what we're
doing. Yeah. And share our wins and, you know, that have celebrate other people's wins.
Yes. Yeah. Only one in five people open all their emails. Only one in five.
21% said they'll open an email no matter what. Even if they think it might be spam.
What? That's not 21%. I delete emails that I think might be spam. Because if it's somebody that,
um, that really wants to get in touch with me, they will, they'll still email again.
That Nigerian prince is just, he's got to have to try, he's going to have to try something else
because it's just not working, whatever they're doing. It's not working. Um, if your email gets,
you know, that they, just by the law of averages, there actually is somebody out there who really
could use help. And it's coming from a very jidwood place and nobody's believing them. Nobody,
nobody thinks it's bad. If your email gets sent to spam, they might not never see it.
24% of people said that they never check their spam folder.
Well, you know, that's a thing that happened between you and I, James. I almost didn't get
this job because your email went into my spam. And I never looked at it. That's a horrifying
world I don't want to think about. Um, but, well, thank goodness for the Habegers because they came
to the rescue and we're like, Hey, did you get an email from James? He's trying to get in touch with
you. That's awesome. Um, that's really cool to hear actually. Uh, I, I, I'm really bad at checking
my spam folder. And, um, I'm, I'm really bad about it. My personal one, when we got, when we first
started working with Civic and, you know, opening up new emails and all these, a new, a new email
address isn't everything. I didn't even think about my spam folder. So I was a couple of months
into the job before I even thought about it. I look at it, sure enough, there's an email from
our owner Sage in there. Oh, dear. I had missed. Uh, and thankfully Sage is a very cool and nice guy.
Because I, I, we, we, we looked into it and stuff and we figured out that it was because it was,
uh, and early, it was a new email. Um, and that was part of the reason. But yeah, that's, uh,
that was a horrifying five minutes right there of, of just waiting intensely for the owner of
the company to get back to you and stuff and everything was fine. Obviously, I'm still here.
It was a long time ago, but it's something now I, I try to keep up on it. I try to make myself at
least once every couple of days look at that spam folder because usually not in there, but spam.
But, uh, you never know, there might be somebody important trying to reach out to you and that's,
well, and every once in a while, it, it Google flag things as spam when they're not. I mean,
obviously as we're talking about, it does happen. And even some of the ones that you usually get in
your inbox from the same email address, they'll just bounce into, yeah, but no, when I found out
that you had replied and it had been days before I got back to you, man, I also, I, I was sweating
bullets. It's like, dang it. It does, uh, it's my opportunity. It's one of those nerve-wracking things.
Definitely is. Uh, here's an interesting, uh, store, an interesting thing in, in modern times,
returning items that you buy online and, and how different companies handle that. Uh, so,
have you ever tried to return something from Amazon and they said, just keep it. It can be one of
the greater joys or one of the funny, special perks because you get to keep this item than you
didn't have to pay for it. That's, you know, consumer 101. Walmart, Target, and a lot of other
companies are doing this now mainly because it's just not worth it to pay for the return shipping.
But it turns every stocking fee and, right, and it turns out there's something that there's
another reason they, they should, they should keep doing it. It makes us buy more stuff. Yeah.
Researchers at University of Notre Dame found that when they, when we get, when we get a return
to item like that, like this, it makes us see the brand as friendlier, more generous, and more
trustworthy. And that latter part, more, more trustworthy is a little worrisome, but okay, um,
it's something industry insiders call brand warmth, brand warmth. And I don't know that I've
ever heard that. Yeah, I want to make sure that I said it twice just to make sure it hits home.
It makes us more likely to shop with a brand in the future. So that $5 pair of socks you don't
really want, uh, can end up making you a consumer, a customer for life. It even works when the first
product you got was defective. But if they ask you to prove it didn't work, then that cancels out
all the other positive vibes. Um, the, the, the study found that if the product isn't defective,
they can win you over even more if they say, uh, keeping it is, uh, the most economically friendly
solution or suggest you to donate it to goodwill. Cause that is another thing companies are doing,
which I really do actually like that last part there. I like that they're recommending that or
suggesting it or even just giving it as an option. Yeah. And it's not adding to the shipping
cost and adding to the, then what, like the, like I said, the restocking fees or what do they do
with it then? Um, what happens to that item when it comes back? Does it just go in the garbage?
What happens to it? Um, and you know, I don't, I don't know 100% of what I'm talking about here.
But I, I will say in my life experience and with just in general, whether we're talking about
business or relationships or anything else, I don't feel like most things end well when you come
into them with a scheme, with an ulterior motive, with a purpose. Like I feel like if you really
want your company to do well, treat your customers well and, you know, the, and your employees well
and things usually work out pretty well. We've got a lot of evidence of that being the case.
The idea that well, we're going to let them keep the items because that means that they're
going to buy more items and, and this and that and everything. We're going to trick them into loyal,
you know, thinking we're trustworthy. You don't have to trick them. Like just be trustworthy.
Just just be a good company. You don't have to overthink this one. This definitely has the
potential to backfire on them because I mean, now that I enjoy this one, the last consumers,
because pretty soon that people are going to take advantage of this and then companies are going
to be like, okay, well, that scheme didn't work. And now we're going to go back to making them
ship it back. Pets.com. Pets.com is forever going to be this example to people of what not to do and
how you can over, you can over stretch your business. They were, they, they were doing so well.
They were overnight sensation and then they started to see a little bit of a trickle in their work
as Amazon got built bigger and some other companies did. So they had this idea. We're going to offer
what nobody else is offering. Literally nobody in the, in the tech world or on, on, on online,
in the.com industry were doing this at the time. They offered free shipping and it was revolutionary.
It was game changing and it was a really, really good idea and it helped them for about a day.
And then they realized, oh, we don't have the manpower to back something like this up.
To give you a modern example of this, obviously, Amazon and a lot of companies offer free shipping
nowadays. Amazon's barely able to handle that. Like as big as Amazon is and they can barely
find enough employees to do this. They think about a small company like Pets.com trying to do that.
Of course they went bankrupt. Of course it didn't work. To Melissa, what she's saying,
don't be surprised if this, you know, comes back around and they take this back and actually
charge you even more or something to return items or something like that. And we see this too
with the checkout industry, the self-checkout industry and, you know, some people not paying for
items and they're being insurance on that and companies now starting to get, you're like, hey,
wait a minute, you know, we're getting rid of this self-checkout thing. We're actually losing
more than we thought we would or when self-checkouts become more time consuming because it asks you to,
oh, no, you got to call the attendant because we've sensed an error or you didn't place it in the
the bagging area correctly or, you know, and then it takes like three times as long to check out
because there's one attendant and there's what, ten checkout lanes that they have to keep
making the circle to do that. I've decided I'm not going through self-checkout anymore. I'm just
not doing it. I've done, done. You know, I don't care if I got three items or 50. I'm going through
the lines for now on. I personally, I've done some homework on this, especially over the past weekend
and it just seems like the smarter way to do it. If we want to keep employees paid well,
that's just me. I'm not telling anybody what to do or anything.
My grandma agreed with you before her passing. She said, don't don't ever go to a self-checkout
because it's taken jobs. It's just what we're seeing right now. This may change and it may change
from company to company, but I'm thinking of the big conglomerate, you know, here in this area
that does that and in that case in particular, I find it important to do. For me, personally,
not at all telling anybody what to do or anything like that. Don't listen to me. Well, to each,
everybody has to decide what they do and do not want to, you know, do in this life and in our
society, but all of those add up. We are going to take a time out and we come back, get into our
schedule, get into some good things going on in our area and plenty more. It's Melissa and James,
take it you through your morning here at 975 FMWFHR. Welcome back, everybody. Morning show at 975 FMWFHR.
Melissa and James hanging out with you, taking into the top of the hour, wrapping up the show.
Music
Looking at our schedule for today, real quick, do want to thank all of you for listening.
Everybody joined us and gave a speed back. And of course, Bob Brickhouser from Assumption High School
of joining us to talk about their great Royal Golf Scramble coming up Friday, July 18th.
Sign up for that one. Get your team ready. Everybody and meet you over at the Ridge's Golf Course for
a great event. That's going to be a lot of fun. It's just 10 days away. We're going to have a
lot of fun with the Rapids Report today. Be sure to join us for that. It is online available for
you at WFHR.com. We'll have new episodes for you over there. Be sure to check them out.
Today, we're going to talk with the Heart of Wisconsin Chamber of Commerce. Promise is going to
join us. Nice. Always fun talking with her. And in part two, Reality Radio with David Farmbrough
will be talking real estate with David and cousin interesting topics that he'll have for us.
Talk about the houses that are flying off the market. Yeah, yeah. All of the above.
Looking forward to getting into it. Well, of course, have Raptor Baseball on your radio
dial tonight at 620. The boys are somewhere in Warsaw to take on the wood trucks. Hopefully,
get back in the wind column. Roll rats. Get your tickets and find out more northwoodsleg.com.
And of course, if you are not in the Warsaw area and you want to catch the game, we got it right here
for you at WFHR 620. Our pregame will start. Right, tune in. You can listen to the Raptors always
on our station. You probably heard this during Melissa's news break and everything. I always
appreciate the work she does there. We have a great opportunity for you heroes out there to donate
blood. Yeah. From 1 to 530, you can head on over to Grace Lutheran Church at 1531 Whittrock Avenue
today and donate if you can. We greatly appreciate all of you that are able to do that. We'll have
another opportunity coming up on the 18th at McMillan and then at the end of the month over at
the Rapids Fire Department. We'll tell you more about those as we get closer to them.
And if you're in the Stevens Point area, they usually always have openings during these days.
Yeah, they really do. It feels like they're open 24-7 over there. That Stevens Point Blood
Donation Center is at 321 C Main Street. You can't miss it if you're on Main Street and find it
right away. And again, thank you everybody out there who's donated or are planning to donate.
Yes. Our Wisconsin Rapid City Band has entertained this area for over 160 years.
They are going to keep things moving. They got a concert going on tonight over at my old stomping
grounds in Robinson Park 730. They're going to be over there at the Banshell Performing.
If you've never seen one of these shows, I cannot stress enough how great it is, how much fun it is.
The great atmosphere. It's going to be a nice night for it. It looks like the acoustics at the
Banshell are great as well. They are wonderful place. Head on over there. Check that out.
In the every Tuesday up until August 5th, they're going to have shows over there. Robinson Park,
we encourage you to check these out. Everybody, again, the show will begin at 730 over Robinson Park.
The City Band, go check it out. Nice. Our friends at the chamber have their gathered by the Banshell
happening today. That'll be going on at 530 to 7 over at a Rome Town Center at 274 Geneva Trail
in beautiful Lucusa. It's going to be sponsored by Ho Chiang Mid-State. They're going to have the
pig pen down there for food and duology going to be playing. That's going to be good. That's
going to be a good one right there. Check that out. Promise and I'll be talking more about that
during our interview today a little bit later. Nice. Yeah, they have a couple more coming up.
And just a quick heads up, everybody. Spread the word about this one. Tomorrow morning,
American Heroes Cafe of Central Wisconsin will be opening. 730 to 930 over across your church
right here in Rapids. All you veterans, military, police, and firefighters are welcome.
Make sure that if you have anybody that falls into those categories in your life, they know about
this event and can attend. Big thank you to our friends across view church for hosting this
and all the great volunteers and everybody involved. Again, American Heroes Cafe happening tomorrow
from 730 to 930 over at Crossview Church. It's a good time for fellowship and just a great
environment. Check that out, everybody. Looking at world good stories, 1,500 bikers in England showed
up to escort a 16 year old kid to prom. Wow. That's a lot of bikers. That is amazing. His name is
Josh Duff. He's on the spectrum and he's been dealing with bullies. His dad was a his dad has a
motorcycle and was hoping to get like maybe a handful of bikers to show up. Josh told a reporter,
I used to say I felt alone, but I don't feel that way anymore. That was all that's an awesome
story. That feels like a movie scene. That feels like a scene from a movie or something like that.
That's pretty cool. That is awesome. A Chihuahua saved its owner's life in Switzerland last week.
A guy was out hiking across a glacier with his long hair Chihuahua when he fell 25 feet down a hole
in the ice. He had a walkie-talkie with him, but rescuers were only able to find him because his
dog stayed right next to where he fell. They spotted the dog, rappel down into the hole, got him out.
He and the dog are both okay. They're both doing well. Oh, good. Who takes a Chihuahua on a hiking
trip in the in the Swiss Alps? Only a long hair Chihuahua. I had to look them up because they
actually have a little fluff on them. It's okay. I guess I'm not familiar with that. That's a
one story. Oh, they're cute dogs. Oh, my goodness. What a cutie. That's a good dog. That's a good
dog right there. Good dog. And if you need to relax, check out a site called purel.com. That's P-U-R-R-I-L.com.
It only does one thing. Plays the sound of a cat purring. You can dial it in. People say they
dial it in. The change the change the sound. Add me owls and even adjust the purrs per minute. You
can tinker with it a little bit. But people find this to be incredibly calming.
Well, you know, sometimes we all just need some white noise. Some background noise that to help us
get out of whatever minds that we're in. I mean, if cats are your thing and you can't have one.
They do encourage you to have headphones on when you do this. They say that to get the best
the most out of it. Yeah. But it does sound kind of cool, man. Check that out. It does.
Great show today. Have a good day, Melissa. You do James. Have a good one out there, everybody.
This is locally grown radio. WFHR 1320 AM. W24 A.D.E. Wisconsin Rapids.
And always streaming on the Civic Media app.
