Hey, Paul, we're on a roll.
We sure are.
Two weeks in a row.
Two weeks in a row.
We've done it again.
Art and Rick have agreed to come back.
They're going to be coming in.
The second part of the East Bay celebration, the celebration of East Bay.
I can't wait.
Episode number 69.
Yeah.
Serving Washington.
This is the Wasa Business Show and now hear your day's Bola Dome Bola and 400 block blockin' Yankee Bookstore Booking Hosts Ryan and Paul!
Y'all, hey there!
The Wasa Business Show!
Hey there, here I am, I'm a man on the scene I can give you what you want, but you got to come home
It's the Wassup Business
Show.
I'm Ryan.
And I'm Paul.
Exciting show ahead this week.
Got a lot going on.
We got Wassup business rumors coming up.
Oh, we're bringing that back.
Bring it back.
Got it.
We've got Jesse Bartnick from the new Faraway Place.
Heard good
things for those who have had a little sneak peek into it.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
He opens.
He's going to tell us all about that.
Cool.
That's coming up.
We're going to be talking to Polly James, who was the doer of things.
at East Bay.
Yeah, the doer of stuff they called her.
Has a lot of nice things to say about Art and Rick from her perspective.
Right.
But we're going to start today with a famous Wausau Business Show correspondent, Shay Reif.
Shay.
What's up, Shay?
Nothing much.
I just got back from DECA international competition in Georgia, and that was really fun.
In hot Atlanta, your Wausau West DECA team won an award and got to go to DECA, right?
Yeah.
Won a competition, and then you went to DECA in Atlanta.
Yeah.
And who else went with you from Wausel West?
There was 13 other students.
13.
Yeah, but I did my project with Hallie Foster and Olivia O'Keefe, and we did it on Rostar.
How did it turn out down there?
I haven't heard it.
It
went well, except towards the end, we had a little shaky part, but we didn't get our score back yet, but we didn't, like, finalize
it.
What do you mean?
What was shaky?
Yeah.
Well, the project went great until the judge started asking all about return on investment.
I was
wondering how we got our numbers.
Oh, what does Deca stand for?
It's something really long.
I honestly don't even know.
It's like
it's like a marketing business competition thing.
Yeah, right.
Okay, so Deca stands for something having to do with marketing and business.
And we're not going to look it up or fact check it.
No.
And then you had to go to it like you competed in a state semi final or something.
And then you got the opportunity to go to Atlanta with this group.
And you got hung up on the return on investment part.
I
think that's what got us.
The judge smiling the whole time as soon as we started talking about return.
on investment,
having
got a weird look on his face.
Yeah, that investment.
Pesky ROI.
It's the return part that always gets me.
The investment part is easy.
It's the back end and get the back.
It's the return that you want to focus on.
Good lesson.
Well, that's good.
Well, good luck to all your partners in that.
When do you find out how you fared?
Well, we know we didn't get a make it to finals, but we'll figure out our score soon and what went wrong.
And then what do they get?
What do you get?
Do you get a prize or anything like that?
No.
Well,
it's
the pride.
Maybe we got to go to Atlanta.
Yeah, she tripped to Atlanta.
Congratulations to Wasall West representing us in Atlanta.
And you're working at the woodchucks this summer.
Yeah, I'm really excited.
I totally know what I'm doing yet because they didn't really say in the email, but.
Any sports reporting?
Not that I know
of.
Necessarily.
Well, you're in.
You're in the organization.
You're going to work your way up like you always do.
Maybe we could get special sports reporting on the woodchucks this summer from Shay.
Yeah.
Great idea, Paul.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And speaking of sports reporting.
Go ahead.
Shay, how did the Packers do with the draft last weekend?
I'd say amazing.
Overall, they focused heavily on defense.
Well, hang on.
Let me start.
Let me start the music.
OK, go ahead.
Let's hear the report.
Here we go.
Well, I think the draft went great.
Obviously because, well, they traded away their first round, picked to get Micah Parsons, and he was the powerhouse for the Packers this year.
No, a little injury there, but a little hiccup.
Except for the little hiccup.
Minor hiccup.
He'll be back.
He'll be back.
He just did
get there at
the
end.
But I would give the draft still an A-plus for that.
A-plus.
A-plus.
A-plus.
All right.
Good to hear.
This is the year.
This is the year.
What's that?
This is going to be the year.
I've heard that before.
This
is finally
going
to be the year.
There you
go.
It's gonna be the year, finally.
It's gonna be the year.
This is the one.
And your grandpa is winning a big award this Thursday, right?
At the Champions of Business with Junior Achievement.
Yeah.
Bill Reif of Lhasa Coated.
Yeah.
What does that entail?
So from my research, I've learned that to win this award, you have to be working in the community and have a commitment to enriching WASA's cultural landscape in your personal and professional life.
Well, I can say that I think he has accomplished that goal.
Well deserved.
Well deserved.
Real smart guy.
Was he in DECA?
I don't think that was
around when he was four.
Oh, OK.
All right.
And Shay, you're going to be driving pretty soon, right?
Yeah, you might need to watch out on their
odds.
Watch out, everyone.
You got your temps and you're going to be 16.
What's your thoughts on the parking situation in downtown Wassa?
Because it's very controversial, as everybody knows, that there's not enough parking people here.
That's what they say.
That's what people say.
There's not enough parking in downtown Wassa.
Yeah, we can get thousands of people down here for the Christmas
parade, for example, we can get a thousand plus people down here for the grand theater.
But not
thousands of parking
spots.
Well, that's what they say.
Yeah.
So we thought we'd send you out on assignment as our senior Wausau Business Show correspondent to solve this once and for all.
How
are we going to do
that?
Well, Shay, you're very good at math.
I know that.
You're a smart A-plus student, right?
Yes.
Okay.
All we need you to do is some simple arithmetic.
Would you mind as part of Driver's Ed?
We'll call this.
Get you ready to part.
Can you go out in downtown Wausau and simply start counting
the parking spots that are available for people to park in downtown Wausau.
Yeah, and we can either confirm or deny this fear people have about not enough parking in downtown Wausau.
Let's count the spots.
Yeah, let's count the, let's count the spots.
We really want to know definitively how many people can park in downtown Wausau because we hear it over and over and over again.
That parking is a problem.
I got to walk in a parking.
I don't know.
But I think we need to do a study or a report.
Right.
Is
parking an
issue?
This is an unparalleled
Parking in some parts of the world is considered a sport and you're a sports journalist.
That's right.
A skilled sport.
Parallel parking you got your cell phone you got your cell phone there This is part sports journalism parallel parking and part drivers Ed that's right.
So
hey, I'll get right to work on
it Okay, so just call us up here once you get out there and we'll check in with you and just start counting when you when you see the parking spot that that's number one and then the number two number
two Yeah,
this is good.
She even if it's occupied now that counts as a spot,
right?
We're not looking for open spot
not
available spots.
We're looking for
a total number of spots.
Right.
All across downtown Wausau.
It might take a while.
You got time?
I don't know if you could have done the day, actually.
You might.
I think it would be an ongoing project
for
you.
Yeah, this might be a few days.
OK, well, just give us a call when you get out there and start counting, OK?
We'll talk to you in a second, then, OK?
Yes, yes.
Perfect.
All right, so she's on her way out there, Paul.
And while we wait for her to get out into position, let's do Wausau Business Rumors.
Let's go.
Rumor has it.
Rumor has it.
So I think everybody knows the historic 2510 is closing down after decades in business.
It's a bummer.
It's got a lot of staple.
Loves spinning the wheel, the birthday wheel, you know, which is by the way up for sale, I guess.
You can go in there and put a bit on it.
That's going to go for a high bit, I think.
Silent auction sort of gimmick there.
Fun.
And they're putting a barbecue place in there.
Is that right?
Yeah, it's like a porker John's or a porky John's or something like that.
Is that a guy we went to high school with?
Hey guys, one-time listener, first-time caller.
You know where to be a great spot for the red lobster is the old 2510 building.
He said it.
This guy said it.
Oh boy.
I agree with him, though.
It would be the perfect spot.
Yeah, it would make a lot of sense, actually.
I had no idea.
Is it too late?
It's too late, unfortunately.
But, you know, they can build from scratch, I guess.
Yeah.
All right, Shay's out there now.
You there, Shay?
Yep, I'm here reporting live.
from the downtown parking lot.
Okay.
Okay.
Okay.
Which, which parking lot are you currently, uh, uh, counting?
Oh, okay.
As we call that the Jefferson street in parking ramp.
Yes.
The surface lot, we call it.
Is it the ramp or the surface area of the landmark building?
Okay, those are private.
Those are private.
We need public parking spots only.
Boy, you got a lot.
We're putting a lot on
her.
You got to decipher if it's public or private.
Hey, that's what people that covered the downtown world have to do.
I mean you're right.
She's never driven a car, you know.
This is part of Driver's Ed.
She knows how to count.
Yeah, fair.
This is part of arithmetic, part journalism.
Right.
Part sports journalism, because in some countries... Sorry, I got a bus.
Passing by.
Oh, dear.
Is everything okay?
Yes.
Watch out for traffic.
Especially buses.
Okay.
Now, do you see the first parking spot?
Yes.
Okay, that'll be number one.
Oh, let's start at the beginning.
Good.
How many do you see, Shay?
I'm still counting one second.
Oh, okay.
Feel free to count all out.
25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 32,
34,
35,
36, 37,
38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44.
This
is just in the ramp.
25, 46.
We're still on the ramp,
right?
50.
We're already up to 51.
52.
53.
She
will not be interrupted either.
57.
58 in the ramp.
But I
can minus like six handicapped spots if you like.
Well, that counts.
Those are public spots.
So I will count those.
Yep.
OK, now we can just, rather than going up that ramp, Shay, this is a little
Multiplication.
Ooh, a little more advanced.
OK.
We can just multiply that number by the number of levels.
All the ramp.
Genius.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
How many levels are there, Shay?
In the parking, like, buildings,
too.
Just as only, I think, we're not sure which parking ramp she's in as it turns out.
Now, do you see any other spots you could count?
Like on the street?
or the public library parking lot.
Well, those are technically public spots.
Yeah.
Okay.
On the street, we have
about... Keep count, keep count.
You got to add it to your old count.
Well, before we have 58 to 59, 66, 1, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67.
He's good.
You
can put this on your resume.
Yeah,
yeah
We
do not need that on
our conscience.
Come back,
Jay.
Come
back.
This is all within walking distance of any place in downtown.
25, 96,
77, 98, 99, 100.
She
won't even let us interrupt her.
Fantastic.
You're up to 100.
102,
103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109.
Very short.
And it took you one minute to get there.
She saw 109 parking spots in one minute.
OK.
So we're going to check back in with you later, but keep counting, OK?
I will.
All
right, ladies and gentlemen, Jesse Bartnick is here.
Jesse, hey.
Hey, Jesse.
Hey, guys.
How's it going?
Good.
Welcome back.
Proprietor of Faraway Place.
Yes, sir.
Congratulations on the evolution of malarkeys.
Can you tell
us how that happened?
Yeah, thank you so much.
It's been kind of a wild ride just over the past year of us owning that malarkey space.
Yeah.
Just felt like it needed a little bit.
a little bit of a refresh, a little bit of a new identity and something a little bit more aligned with who our staff was as a whole and kind of felt like there was a gap downtown.
You were running somebody else's establishment a little bit.
Exactly.
Yeah, good friend Tyler had a great thing going there and we tried to keep it going.
You tried to keep it going and, you know, I think I think you made a good run at it, but now it's time for a little bit of a change, right?
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
Tyler did so much and continues to do so much for the Wausau area.
And it just really felt like it was without him being in the space anymore, really felt like it was our time to kind of make it our own.
Yeah.
And then Mumble Wrap replaced Townies.
We're getting into the whole evolution here.
Yeah, let's hear it.
So Mumble Wrap is
no longer, right?
No longer for now.
Yeah, that's correct.
But what a fun.
year we had.
I mean, really building up a culture within that brand really had some pretty hardcore customers attached to that brand.
And we had a ton of fun.
There
was some good
food there.
Yeah.
And so the idea is to bring that back in the future in some way, shape or form.
Maybe
in a different
location
you were mentioning.
Exactly.
Yeah.
So we'll see sort of how that shapes out.
But for now, we'll be taking some of what we learned and some of what we were passionate about on the Mumbler app side.
And some of that will be kind of sprinkled into what the manual
be at Faraway Place.
What is the menu going to be?
Yeah.
Tell us more.
Faraway Place is Ojibwa.
Wasa is Ojibwa for Faraway Place.
Right.
So
that's where you got the name.
That's cool.
Yeah.
So there's tons of tie-ins there.
Being that that is where the name ties in from really wanted to kind of embody that and really take a step back and see what that meant to us.
So with the food menu, we're going to be really focusing on locally sourced items as much
as we possibly can, including once ESA Bakery opens up, we're partnering with them for a proprietary bun.
Cool.
Bakery, right?
New Bakery next to the... Post Office.
Post Office.
We don't use it much anymore, but it's called a Post Office.
It's called
the email place,
right?
Yeah.
The Post Office in
downtown Wasler, right next to it's a new Bakery.
When does that open?
They're hoping for by the end of May.
Okay.
really impressive facility.
They're doing something like what has never been done in the area before.
Wow, that's
handsome.
It's really impressive.
I think, you know, Karen and the team there are really doing something special and we're happy to be a part of it right off the bat.
Very cool.
So where else are you locally sourcing from then?
On the town line market.
We'll be getting
our beef from them.
John Jagler's dad.
Yeah, that's right.
Dave.
Yeah.
Yeah, lots of local ties and we'll be getting a lot of produce from different farmers, primarily Red Door Family Farm.
Nice.
Just wonderful people and great products.
So we're already working with them on some of those things, kind of going into the the grow season right now with a lot of different products.
And we'll even be featuring them and some other local businesses on our local showcase on the cocktail side of things as well.
Very
cool.
Cool fun.
fun.
And it's like the core of the menu is smash burgers, right?
Yep.
Hello.
Everybody loves a good
burger.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And then on top of that hand breaded, you know, marinated buttermilk fried chicken sandwiches.
kind of reusing that same batter recipe from the mumble wrap side of things.
So just
really killer fried chicken, mac and cheese, salads, chicken
tenders.
Award winning salad, if I'm not mistaken.
Oh, yes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So the goddess will be.
All
that one is
good.
Yeah.
That that'll be carrying over as well.
So you'll definitely get some of those things that people have been missing over the last month without mumble wrap.
And when can we go?
I mean, when's the grand opening?
It's today, right?
If I'm not mistaken.
Tomorrow.
If I'm not mistaken, right?
Today, Saturday, May 2nd, right?
Yeah, yeah, today at 4 p.m.
So if you're listening to this on the podcast, I guess it's during the week.
It's already open if you're listening to it on the podcast.
But if you're on the radio with us right now, it's opening at what time today?
4 p.m.
So
in
that last sprint, getting everything together.
Later tonight, we are going to have two bands.
bands starting at eight o'clock, a band called Rugg, some younger guys in town, really got a great thing going.
They're going to be kind of opening for a band called Iftacar.
They're pretty well known throughout Wisconsin.
They've been around for a long time.
Madison-based kind of jam, funk band.
Fun.
Oh, cool.
Yeah, little electro jam kind of thing going on, and it should just be a really great time.
I'm going to stop by tonight.
Did I hear you move the stage, too?
Yeah, so really...
took a look at the whole set up with the stage and music and we're even kind of leaning into music.
If you can believe that more than even what we were in the past and what was done in the past.
So the area that was the stage is now a lounge area, kind of focal pointing on the fireplace area.
And then we moved the stage over to the restaurant side and expanded that.
A little big change
there.
And you got a
pool table
now and darts.
Yeah,
pool table darts.
We've got a touch
tunes for those little times.
where it happens to not be a thing.
Yeah, still, we'll have Trivian Monday nights, Corn Dog night,
not
Tuesday
nights.
Okay,
nice.
Can't wait to bring the kids by for that.
Yeah, I like that.
And the whole Malarkey's area then is completely refreshed
and rebranded.
Yeah, yeah, so a new bar top.
kind of some additions and changes on the back bar.
We've got a new tap setup for draft beer and a lot of the cocktail program.
I'd say about 50% to start is going to be hybrid as well.
So you'll be able to order as a cocktail non-alcoholic or with THC.
Does that stuff work?
The THC?
Oh,
it
works.
It works.
Is
it the
little R&D?
Is it the same thing as a beer
buzz or what's it
like?
It's a bit different, but I would say about five milligrams or should be our standard pour is sort of the quote-unquote.
equivalent to a single in the cocktail.
Like a drink.
Yeah.
Yeah.
A single shot.
Ryan, we're going to keep you to the max.
Okay.
Yeah.
I'm just, I always get nervous when people have been offered that before, but
I'm
over the place
now.
Yeah.
Some places they're, they're going crazy.
It's like 20 mil, like a hundred milligrams wouldn't recommend.
I wouldn't even know what that would.
Yeah.
You'd want to be home for that.
Are these forward beverages then that you're sure?
Yeah.
So we will have a forward beverage.
We're going to be working with
I'm quite a bit.
Cool.
And then we'll have kind of a spread from throughout the state from we'll have a THC drink on tap in our cocktail program and then in package as well.
Okay.
Thumbs great.
I got to get over there.
And what's the website?
It's just farawaywasa.com.
Simple as that.
Yeah.
Cool.
Okay.
Do you ever worry about parking downtown?
Not at all.
There's actually parking everywhere.
There's parking ramps.
There's free parking all over the place.
And the city of Wasa does a great job of listing that on their website.
We got Shay Rife out there right now.
Shay, what number are you up to?
468.
You're
under 468.
Oh, my kids are gonna be impressed that she's counting that high.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Okay, Shae, we'll check back in with you later.
Okay, sounds good.
Gene, a bit.
It's growing.
There's a lot of parking spots.
Okay, the point is there's a lot of parking.
Right.
Okay, good to hear.
Jesse, we look forward to stopping by.
Yeah, thank you guys so much.
You brought by a sample the other day, and it was the best smash burger I've ever tasted my entire life.
Couldn't agree more.
Love to hear it.
Mushroom in Swiss.
It was the mushroom in Swiss.
Yeah, local wild mushrooms on that as well.
They were good, and they were wild.
Congratulations,
Jesse.
Look forward to swinging by.
Thank you so much.
Far away place, everybody.
Check it out.
And it's opening fishing weekend, Paul.
The fishing season has begun.
Yes, let's go out.
What what are you gonna do what your whistle what the line I meant what the line where the whistle came out What are you gonna do those one in the same those are one of the same for many guys?
Hunt some musky
yeah,
we'll be right back with art and Rick from East Bay the second part of the East Bay celebration Opening fishing weekend.
It's the wassup business show We're
all in the same boat Fishing in the same hole One where same time goes We're all in
We can all believe what we believe.
Peacefully agree or disagree.
But you can't judge a man until you walk a country mile in his shoes.
Doo doo doo doo.
We're all insane.
Hey, hey, hey, this is Gray Stanky, former Miss America nuclear engineer, and you're listening to the Wausau Business Show.
All right, here's a little-known fact.
The first mayor of Wausau was August Kickbush.
Here's a little-known fact.
He was mayor twice.
Little is known fact, Kickpush traveled back to Germany in 1867 to enlist 700 German immigrants to Marathon County.
So if anyone ever asks you how you'd get more people to move to Warsaw, just ask yourself, what would Kickpush do?
Because he'd go to Germany and bring back 700 people.
That's what he'd do.
So I don't know what you're waiting for.
Get to Germany, roestar.com.
And root or where, we challenge the notion that sophisticated legal practices only exist in major metropolitan areas.
Our team chooses to live and work in communities where many people only vacation or pass through.
We enjoy a quality of life and have an excellent work-life balance, while still practicing exciting, challenging law in Wausau, Eau Claire, Green Bay, and Wisconsin Rapids.
Since 1920, we've been doing what we want and where we want to do it.
Find us at
routerware.com.
Welcome to the heartbeat of Wausau.
The Wausau Business Show.
Center of the Universe in Wausau, Wisconsin, USA.
This is the Wausau Business Show.
And Art and Rick are back.
We got him back.
Here we go.
So let's continue, boys.
Now, what about the
customers?
Well, yeah.
If you're listening to this, you probably felt a nostalgia.
Like when we wrote the book, you feel pretty nostalgic about it.
Yeah.
I think for people.
your age, 90s, you know, high school in the 90s and early 2000s.
We're not in our 90s, but I mean, I went to school in the 1990s.
Your age, you know, 90s.
I mean, I think they remember going to the mailbox and that was pretty much their unboxing.
Yeah.
And getting that catalog and seeing all the new product all the time.
It wasn't a drop that you have online today every week, but that's what they saw and they look forward.
to and everyone we talked to, they were so...
thankful for.
And we obviously are thankful for them.
Really, it was an amazing ride.
We were so blessed.
One of the things that we were able to do is sit in on phone calls.
You could sit and listen to people on the phone and they were so good about passing on information, what they liked, what they didn't like, what they thought would be cool.
Great
kind of research.
So we had a lot of in-house research coming to us 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
And we can't thank them enough.
We just appreciate them trusting us.
Yeah, well said.
As we wrap up here, guys, you know, the other piece of the puzzle and you've mentioned it a couple times is your wives.
And you said, you know, if there was one piece of advice you'd give to entrepreneurs, it's to have a great support system.
And what roles do you feel your wives played in the support
behind the scenes?
Well,
As Rick says in the book, he was surprised when I showed up, showed up for the first meeting.
In Milwaukee?
In Milwaukee.
That looks
like
Art's car, I think
you
said.
My wife was the one that pushed us to do that.
And she was the one that was all for, let's do this, let's give her a shot.
Let's move back to Wasa.
Wasa's a great place.
We were living down by Racine.
Her support, you know, has been amazing.
And then as you started it out, we weren't making any money for the first three years.
I didn't
I remember after four years, I told Rick, if I was a student teacher, I'd been making a lot of money.
So I've been doing really well.
And so up until that time, they were pretty much supporting us.
And we've been very fortunate.
$20 a week doesn't go very far.
They have their support.
And not only that, but the emotional support of all the things you went through.
Losing Nike and things like that.
Rick's wife was just talking about, I remember the day you came home,
when you lost Nike and what you look like.
And we forget that, but they don't.
And they were rocks.
I mean, they were so good about listening when we needed that and so good about saying, baby, go back and fix it.
When they wanted to give it advice.
But yeah, having rocks like that is just... My
wife's name
was Barb.
Yours is Susie.
Susie, just make sure we get that in there.
Absolutely.
Hi,
Barb and Susie.
Yeah.
Start the car, dear.
I'll be there in just a minute.
Well, speaking of the car, you know, you kind of sold shoes out of the back of your car famously.
If you guys could go back and give any words of wisdom or pieces of advice to yourselves in that car, what would you say?
Go fuel injection.
Make sure you have fresh shocks.
Yeah.
We have a trailer car that the police can pull over first so we could get away with
the shoes.
That's a good idea.
Get to the schools a little quicker.
I don't know.
It was always just one step at a time.
See what the journey is going to take you.
We loved what we did because we were those kids growing up.
And we were those coaches for a few years, a couple more years than I was.
So we knew how important and valuable coaches are in kids' lives.
And
to see that every day, to see them how they...
how they heard sheep and bring, just kidding, but bring the kids into the clinics and how they take care of them and how they look after them.
And I can't believe the schools will even let us in because I had a beard.
Our van was
all rusted and
corroded.
The
paint
was chipping off.
Today, you'd never, they would never let you even with a hundred miles of a school.
I thought that as I was
reading through that, you
know, in the beginning, we're riding around in a bus and a beard.
Keep that guy away from the school.
I wasn't kind of wondering that.
Like, how did you?
You can get into these schools with
these practices, but
yeah, different
time,
different time.
But
seriously, guys, I mean, you know, there were a lot of stresses along the way.
Obviously, what advice would you give your younger selves in that car in that moment?
Keep going.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
If you have a bit, if you have an idea of buying new pair of shoes, because it's going to make you feel better and take that step.
If
you don't take that step, you're never going to get anywhere.
And what's your favorite pair of shoes these days?
Oh, these days.
Wow.
Penny loafers.
No.
On prospects.
Okay.
For me.
I got some ons on as we speak.
Oh, do you?
Nice.
What do I have on now?
Oh, I do have some ons.
Yeah.
They're not prospects.
Amazing what the on brand has done over the past number of years, isn't it?
Well, it goes back to how the industry matured.
Yeah.
And they matured to a point where they got a little, hey, we're doing really good here.
Yeah.
And kind of took their eye off the ball and allowed a couple of companies to come in and gain some market share.
Yeah.
And it's interesting how Nike pulled back from you guys back in the day
in the catalog, and then they kind of pulled back from a lot of their brick and mortar distribution, which tanked their stock for a number of years, and they went through a number of CEOs because of that.
So it's interesting how that came full circle and bit them in the ass again.
They wanted to go direct themselves.
I
think their goal, did that always feel like a looming threat?
Well, you guys asked a good question about why did we sell?
What was the situation?
And that was one of the big things that was just some ghost
creeping up behind you saying, we're coming at you.
You know, we're going direct.
You saw e-commerce coming down the pipe, I would imagine, at the time a little bit or not.
And then you saw Nike, you know, breathing down.
Well, they
opened Nike Town and even New Balance had opened a New Balance store in
Boston.
And you're thinking they're going direct, they're going direct, they're going direct.
Well, we made Nike's Cadlocks.
Yeah.
So we
knew they were going direct.
Right.
And it's funny how that came full circle because they tried to pull the same thing on you guys back in the day and then they just tried it with their
distribution channels and again a few years ago and the same thing happened and it bit them in the ass again.
Well, the point is, is that they clearly haven't learned, film night hasn't learned his damn lesson.
Oh, he filled out a great job.
Who am
I to say?
Back in then,
I mean, they had actually inquired a little bit about possibly buying us back in that day.
And then he realized that, you know, no one else would sell to us a Nike on this.
Right.
Don't bite
the hand that feeds you.
Well,
and this year, the Nike air structure, which is, which wasn't always one of their best shoes, but one of the best shoes for me.
Okay.
So I liked running in the air structure.
That's the best colorway they've ever had on.
And it's what, 20 some years old.
So
they're
back.
So there, I mean, they have said that they're, they're back with technology and they're back focusing on the athletes again.
And
I mean, that
was always, even when we were, when we started off, it was all
Always, the companies kept telling everybody we're there for the athletes, but the athletes were only, what, 25, 30% of the market.
They were hoping to get that 70% that weren't athletes to buy athletic shoes.
Right.
And they just never said it out loud.
And now for the last bunch of years, they've kind of said it out loud.
And now they realize the athletes really drive what goes on in the athletic industry.
What's your favorite thing about Wausau, guys?
So when we started.
It was just Rick and I, and then Don.
And that's a neat story.
Don Trebotusky's story is a neat story.
Well, and Tommy Gehring and Jimmy Gehring, one of the best things about that we didn't have to think outside of the box because none of us were ever in a box.
And we, you know, we basically developed every, their mail order didn't hardly exist.
There were no lists out there for us to buy.
Everybody, Don, developed a lot of the systems.
Jimmy did all the list management stuff.
Tommy did a lot of the buying.
And they developed it as we went along organically.
And there were no books to read said, here's how you're going to do this because it didn't exist.
And so every system we came around because we weren't in a box saying like, oh, you can't do that way.
This is the way you should say it.
You should do it.
They just developed it.
And he developed it the best way for our business.
So I think being in Wausau, we had just smart people and hard workers, and they did a great job.
Everybody, you know, the people on the phones and that, they would come to say, you know, we're doing it this way.
I think we should try this.
I think it'd be a little bit easier.
I think our customers like it more.
We just do it.
Oh, I guess we have to ask Sam Thurangelo.
Tough.
Well, what day of the week?
It really was.
I worked at Sam's.
I was fired from Sam's.
Only three times.
Tony Sam was amazing.
They were on my, I had a Milwaukee Sentinel morning paper and Perelas were one of my customers.
And I thought I'd get some discounts at Sam's, but they were better at tipping.
So why
did you get fired?
Oh, just who knows?
Not showing up.
I think.
Barb made me late once.
Played on Barb.
You know, as much of a rock as she was, she's got that streak in her.
You know that?
The rebel?
Yeah, my 15-minute break wasn't, you
know.
Oh, okay.
No, say no more.
I'm reading between the lines.
I got it.
No, no, no, no,
no.
Don't read that.
In fact, we just ate at a fairly new pizza bar in Naples, and it's taken its name from a place in Chicago.
And one of the
One of our friends who's from wassa said this is a best pizza He said better than saying better than monocles
blast for me.
You
have to go blast and we went and and not even close
Not even close.
I bought Sam's a lot, but I bought Angelo's too.
They're still like both.
They're both good.
When
Susie and I met, oh geez, what was the name of it?
Mickey's.
It was
a place in Stevens Point called Mickey's.
It was an Italian family run, and they had a chicken catchatory pizza.
And Angelo was good enough to start making chicken catchatory pizzas up here on 6th Street.
And they were spectacular chicken catchatory pizza.
I don't know if they're still doing it or not.
I don't know if they have a chicken catchatory.
Guys, since you wrote the book, congratulations again.
Shout out to bookstores throughout the world.
You can buy it.
Soon.
Book of East Bay.
And it started selling at Yankees first.
So congratulations to Yankees on that.
And I'm sure you wouldn't have it any other way.
Nope.
Wassa deserves that.
And like you guys, I know you give...
Whatever you make on this the charity.
Yes.
Anything that comes in for the book goes to charity to the little warriors foundation for childhood cancer.
Beautiful.
Beautiful.
And we have a website called book of East Bay.
Yes.
And in the website we started off going direct to the kids.
We put our prologue so you can read the prologue before you buy the book to see.
How cool.
You know if you ever want to go about lowering your literary standards and buy the book.
He's kidding because it's very well written guys.
Well done.
Yeah, thanks, Brandon.
That's for
sure.
Yeah, Brandon Snead under Harvard Business Review.
Great book.
The Book of East Bay, also thebookofeastbay.com.
Guys, since you wrote the book, anything you forgot to put in?
Oh, tons of things.
Yeah?
Oh, is it like, oh, we forgot that
thing?
Yeah?
Everyone we've talked to who's written a book said, minute you get done, you're going to know we should have done that.
OK, well, we're looking forward to the sequel.
But you were mentioning a funny story before.
Maybe you could like enlighten us about that one that you mentioned before, if you could.
Well, yeah, one of the stories.
So my back in the day, yeah, before the basketball teams, Wisconsin and all that in Michigan would play, you know, Eau Claire State or something that for the first game, they would play international teams.
So one day, I'm at my neighbor's house, Don heading up, and my daughter was my youngest daughter, Jenna would always go there and call her nanny Don, she may be sad for him that.
And I had met her son-in-law, but really didn't remember him.
And she said, you know, my son-in-law is, you know, kind of works in the ministry and stuff like that.
And they have some people from Russia that needs shoes.
He's coaching Russian team, Russia and that.
And I says,
Yeah, we can send them some shoes, you know, we have some extra shoes that we, you know, and they were all, I thought were just some youth team, but I noticed they were all like size 13 to 18 and stuff like that.
They're rather large, okay.
And so didn't think much of it, so I sent out a few, you know, a bunch of boxes of them and stuff like that.
And suddenly one day,
Our Reebok rep because they were Reebok shoes calls us.
Hey, it's really neat.
You guys got Reebok shoes on the Russian.
I believe it was one of the one of the Russian army teams, the Russian national team.
Okay.
Because they were on TV playing.
the Big Ten schools.
And they had East Bay uniforms
on.
And this
was back in the day when the
wall was up and the wall went down.
And they
couldn't find anything.
They couldn't get them.
And here I found out, I finally got ahold of Joe Orgovich.
It's a story about him.
He's a basketball player and coach.
That was the teams he was coaching.
And they had these people coming over from Russia.
those teams and he got them those products added to the list of people who you've saved the day for
over the years.
So that was and I found out Joe Herkovich.
was actually living with Dick Bennett.
Oh, sure.
Coach Bennett.
Coach Bennett, yeah.
So that was very interesting.
Very cool.
Great
Soviet connection there.
One of the things I had to mention too, we had so many great people that went on to many good things, but great
things.
It must be hard to know who to credit in the book and when to credit them and when to give
you know, shout outs to people.
And I mean, and then you forget people.
And but if there's a couple of people that stand at the top of the list of people that you guys like to credit most, obviously, Harry was, Harry Colcard was very involved and the list goes on and on.
Yeah.
Who comes to mind a lot?
Well,
maybe somebody that
people don't think of.
I'd say one of the most successful people.
obviously Dick Johnson.
But then probably our other vice president was John Schaefer.
He was probably the only one who knew how to count two plus two to make.
We thought four, but John always could make things six.
He was simply, simply amazing when it came to being creative and looking at the numbers.
Kind of a data wizard.
This is what
you could do.
This is what you should do.
This is how you can make that better.
And he kind of pushed
you guys to make two plus two equals six.
No, absolutely.
No
pushing about it.
Don't tell me.
I don't
think we would be here.
I don't think East Bay would have gotten to be what it was with without John.
He had a number of companies, many large companies, after leaving East Bay.
So he was extremely successful.
Where was he before East Bay?
He was at Watson Metals with Harry.
Oh, and then Chudis.
Ah, that's right.
And then Harry.
Not Chudis, but.
If you read the book, he killed Harry when Harry left for East Bay.
Don't forget me.
I might be looking for a job someday.
You make a good run over
them with them.
Okay.
Yeah.
So, Harry knew his magic powers too.
Yeah.
And he was very good, but he very successful.
And where did he
go after that?
He assimilated so fast.
Yeah.
I mean, he... And to the culture and... Everything.
Yeah.
But even to the flow of the business.
You know, as you... When you grow at the rate that we were growing, sometimes you grow so fast that you can't manage it.
Right.
And John came in and...
It was like he had been there from day one.
It was
terrific.
Yeah, and I was going to ask, I mean, obviously all of the analytics, the data-driven insights that you guys had for marketing and everything else, you credit him for a lot of that then, huh?
He might have been the first accounting person we had on staff.
It
was.
With an accounting degree.
Sounds like more of a finance person.
Finance person, yeah.
Way beyond that.
And as
we grew, I mean, we
Sadly kind of ran out of what we could get here in wassa with the banks.
Yeah, and
yeah money wise.
Yeah, yeah
capital and he had the connections and made it happen made it happen and where
did he go on
to after
you guys went
IPO?
Really run a ran a two or three companies One of them was like sportsman's warehouse and
the last one
he came out of retirement and he was the head of
Fleet farm here.
Oh, yeah for them and so he's running like probably four or five other companies and
is he still
awesome?
He lives up north right now.
Okay.
He was in Madison.
He lives up on northern Wisconsin Probably pretty close to between Monaco and Rylanda.
Yeah
hard to beat the Northwoods.
He
lives down in Palm Springs
and was instrumental in in helping decide whether to go IPO
He was instrumental and putting everything together to do.
Yeah
So
to
pitch to all the different firms and everything else.
And we went down to Land's End because once we got to know some more of the catalog people, you know, always looking for ideas
and
how you can get better.
And John went down and Bill then pitched him.
I think this was after, was it after Harry left?
I'm not sure.
Or just before Harry left and pitched John to come to work for him, which he did.
And he ended up running a cornerstone.
What was it called?
Cornerstone.
There's a number of mail order places, I think that were struggling.
And John turned them around and he turned around the company that you mentioned.
So he's been
great at not only making things successful, but keeping things from falling off the face of the earth.
Well, I mean, we've had so many.
great people.
Yeah, East Bay has produced quite a list of people who have gone on to an amazing success.
Yeah, like a good coaching tree.
When
you talk about happenstance, so when we started East Bay, it was Art and I and Don Trebotusky.
Trebs.
And shortly after our first, we started in January, so I think around June or July, he decided that he grew up in Wisconsin and it was time to
look outside the state of things.
And so being a partner, we owed him $5,000 that he had put in over the course of those six months.
And he said, you don't have to pay me back.
You can pay me back over time.
So that saved us.
And then he came back, what, six months later, eight months?
That's about a year.
About a year later.
It was in California.
We went up to
California.
came back and said, you know, I gave up my partnership, but I sure would like to work for you.
Well, he really missed our soccer, our baseball team.
Our softball team missed him.
It was a great center
of
field there.
But he came back and he ran our shipping, created our shipping process, created all of the soft, created all of the processes for the software.
That we had went on and eventually found L Langson camp Sigma micro because we tried a couple others that didn't work right.
Yeah
Don came back and created so many things out of nothing And he was a partner and decided he was okay not being a partner.
That's why
and we credit him for so many things that he
made happen from the operational standpoint.
Yeah.
Was it a tougher decision to go public and IPO on the stock market and they have to think quarter to quarter and be beholden to shareholders and be responsible for your friend's money instead of your own?
Or was it more difficult to decide whether or not to sell the footlocker at the time?
Which was a harder decision for you?
I would say if we did, we just needed money.
That's
why you
want an
IPO.
Otherwise the business is going out of business.
We don't raise enough
cash.
Yeah.
And so you had to raise that money by going public.
We thought going public was a way to do it.
Yeah, I see.
It was that or venture capitals.
Yeah.
And you didn't want to deal with them.
We wanted to keep more control.
Yeah.
And we were happy because it gave wasp people and our employees and obviously others a chance to grow along with us
by investing.
Right.
But both things were at different times.
Yeah.
And we weren't a great candidate to be sold, to be bought when we were going public.
Right,
okay.
didn't have the record and didn't have the structure to do it.
Going public gave us the time to build on that and Foot Locker finally came.
Do you still
have Foot Locker shares?
You guys?
There is no footlock
or
anything.
When Dick quit, I sold my last shares.
That's it.
I'm out.
All right.
This guy's not
CEO.
My buddy's not CEO anymore.
I can't trust the
next
guy.
He obviously didn't tell us he was quitting.
I had a time.
Okay, SEC.
There's no insider trader going on here on the Wassup Business Show.
He would never tell us.
I think we
say that in the book that Dick never told us a thing of
what was going
on.
And we're so glad he did and grateful that
he's
got
that
kind of integrity.
Yeah, frankly, I'm certain that East Bay lasted a lot longer because Dick was ahead of Footlocker.
Yeah, and Foot Locker now after Dick left Foot Locker's board of directors gave up and sold to Dick's sporting goods.
Yeah, ironically to a different dick.
There's a different dick in charge
now.
All right guys, thank you for coming on the show.
And if you threw a party, invite it everyone you knew You would see the biggest gift would be from me and the card attached
Casting with 1.21 Gigawatts of Wasonian Power for Wason.
1.21 Gigawatts!
This is the one and only Wason Business Show with Ryan and Paul.
I'll be back in time.
What does it take to run a successful business?
It takes incredible courage to start at the beginning, incredible grit to achieve success, incredible determination to sustain results, and incredible perseverance to leave a legacy.
But most importantly, it takes an incredible local partner dedicated to helping you achieve your goals.
At Incredible Bank, we are that partner.
Let us help your business do the incredible.
Incredible Bank, member FDIC.
The Warsaw Business Show!
All Warsaw, all the time.
It's the Warsaw Business Show.
I'm Ryan.
I'm Paul.
And Polly Wyland James is here.
Hey Polly.
Polly.
Good afternoon, guys.
How are
you?
Good afternoon.
You're the famous doer of stuff.
Doer of stuff.
Yeah, you got a whole chapter.
I am the doer of stuff.
How many years did you work at East Bay, Polly?
Lots.
Do you count?
I mean, I know there is a whole quote here that says, some people want to go back to college or high school.
I want to go back to East Bay.
Yeah, that's true.
Those were the days, right?
Those were the days.
I would guess maybe all in, I was probably there for 15 years, but there were probably about two and a half, three years in the middle where I left and went to Chicago and worked for WASA Insurance down there.
That's where you met your husband if I'm not mistaken.
That's right.
I met and married my husband.
I'm pretty sure I met and married the only guy in Chicago to take a job in Wausau, Wisconsin.
Well, I married the only wife to do that.
There
you go.
There you go.
That's right.
Yeah.
I was always sure my parents had something to do with that.
But in the end, I was thankful because insurance really wasn't for me.
And I was very thankful to get back to wearing sneakers and working at East Bay.
Yeah, and I'm sure they were happy to have you back because you seemed obviously like a very integral doer of stuff for them.
Yeah, I think I plugged holes, you know, just figured out new stuff or really whatever they needed me to do.
I just kind of jumped in and helped out.
Well, they shared great things to say about you, Polly.
And you started there when you were a junior in high school.
Is that right?
Yeah, I think it was the summer before my junior year.
I was hired for a tent sale, and I worked the cash register, which at the time was like a metal tackle box.
It was pretty fun.
And you had ambitions of moving to LA or anywhere, right?
I did.
I mean, growing up in Wausau, I thought I couldn't wait to get out.
I was going to go to school.
I'd already been accepted to go to school in Madison and I just deferred for two years because I was having so much fun and really had a fortunate, I recognize that I had a great opportunity for someone my age to be participating in a company that had such a fast growth trajectory.
And let's face it, they were letting me do things that I don't think most 17 year olds or 18 year olds were fortunate enough to get to do.
Obviously, during that time, you had a lot of different roles at the company.
What was your favorite role?
That's a good question.
I don't know.
I honestly can say I did so many different things from driving our team sales initiative, product development.
I guess I really kind of enjoyed what I would think of as customer service or sales for a lot of our fulfillment partners, kind of shepherding them through our processes.
We had fulfillment programs that we ran for
the NFL, which was the largest.
We ran all their catalogs, uh, fulfilled all their catalogs and internet stuff, eventually their internet stuff, but it started just with catalogs.
Um, we did the same for like Steve Young's fan club.
49ers, Steve Young.
Yep.
49ers, Steve
Young.
Yeah,
that's a good clarification.
Back in the day, you say that name, everybody knew
who it was.
Well, he's no Dave Craig, but he'll do.
Yeah, right.
That's right.
That's right.
But we had programs like that, and I was kind of the salesperson, customer service person to help those companies understand how East Bay did business and were able to help them with their needs.
So I got to meet a lot of really fun people and go fun places.
Including Steve Young, I'm assuming.
I never met Steve Young.
No, I did not.
I think I had a conference call with him once, but that was about as close as I got.
That counts.
Yeah, sure.
That's a meeting.
Yeah, yeah.
Who are some of the people that you got to cross paths with, Polly?
I did get to meet Joe Namath, which was pretty exciting.
Whoa.
Was
he
sober?
Was
he
sober?
Actually, yeah, he was, I think.
We met at a Super Bowl event in Atlanta, and he was my husband.
I were just sitting at a table having a cocktail at one of the NFL events and he came and just sat down next to him.
And I was always in a habit of
introducing myself in a kind of long, um, protracted way because I really assumed that nobody had a clue who we were.
So I
would say,
hi, my name is Polly James.
I work for a little catalog company in Northern Wisconsin called East Bay.
And as soon as I said East Bay, he's like, Oh my God, you work for East Bay.
I love them.
That's
cool.
Um, and he started telling me about how his daughter ran track and we talked about, you know, her events and what kind of things they bought, but it was, it was very eye-opening.
for me to have someone like that actually know who we were.
Um, it was very surprising and truly a thrill.
East Bay was a famous brand.
It became famous, you know, and, uh, and had a long reach.
Yeah.
None of us knew.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's hard to, Rick said the same thing.
Right.
When you're in Wausau, it's hard to understand how popular it is everywhere in the country.
Right.
Yeah.
What was your most memorable day on the job, Polly?
Yeah,
you
know, I would say it had to be like a tent sale day
or,
you know, even our very early days, when you would, when we were answering phones and, you know, you get a coach who'd call who wanted to order 80 shoes.
And it was so exciting and unbelievable that, you know, a coach from California, you know, so far away.
was calling us to get shoes.
It was just always a thrill and an excitement.
It was an incredible opportunity to be a part of, as someone who loved athletics, loved shoes.
considered myself very fortunate to be a part of it.
And that tent sale was legendary.
Legendary.
They all were.
People still talk about that.
Remember when I got the pumps in the 90s?
Yeah.
No, you can't really explain it.
You can't imagine the lines.
You can't imagine the frenzy is when they would open the doors.
Even when they eventually started offering what they call golden tickets, which were kind of friends and family.
Like Willy Wonka?
Yeah, exactly.
And
they
would give every employee a couple of them and you could give them to your friends or your parents or whoever and they would get into the tent sale the day before.
And I never, I mean, I had people asking me if I had extra tickets and stuff and that was just...
It's like, you gotta be kidding
me.
Yeah, frenzy is a good word for that.
I remember going in the tables, everyone shuffling through them and sorting through.
I mean, how in the world did they keep that any sort of organizational efficiency there?
There wasn't any.
It was a total frenzy.
It was
always an ongoing effort.
All day long, you were sorting, finding things that got separated or mismatched.
You had to get them realigned.
True chaos.
It was enjoyable chaos, though.
In your mind, because I always hear Art and Rick, Rick and Art, we were, we spent some time with them this week and last week, which was very special.
But I really didn't know the difference between Art and Rick until they came in here.
I just always heard Rick and Art, Art and Rick.
Yeah.
Yeah.
As if they were one.
Yeah.
I understand that,
yeah.
Yeah.
So in your mind, what's the biggest difference between Rick and Art?
I would say that Rick is always ready to do the next thing and has the vision for the next thing.
And art is more of a planner and kind of, he's going to encourage Rick to kind of slow down and think about it.
So they were, they were a really, really good balance
from
a business standpoint.
You had one that was kind of always pushing and the other one that was always kind of checking.
Yeah.
So really good balance.
And even personality wise, they're very similar, but you know, Rick has just got that just kind of goofy cleverness to them.
They're just a good team.
Well, they're kind of an inspiration for friendships in life too.
That too.
And I think it's hard for a lot of people in this day and age to understand truly how
how incredible their friendship has to be, not only to just grow up together and continue to stay good friends, but to go through building of a small business into going public and eventually selling out.
I mean, those comes with certain extra strains and stresses and their friendship.
Thrived and surely got deeper.
Yeah.
Well, it's an incredible story, Polly, and you're a big part of it.
Yeah, super cool to hear your perspective.
Thanks for spending some time with us.
What was the Junior Mint and Mountain Dew stuff all about?
Oh, when I was there in the early years, there was a little bar.
across the street called the wonder bar.
And they would, I periodically throughout the day, somebody typically myself would make a run for sodas and candies or snacks and some kind.
And art was always up for a do and a box of junior men legendary.
His order, his order never changed over, I don't know, probably the five, six years that we were so close to the wonder bar.
Well, that's so funny.
that he brought his Mountain Dew in last week.
Right.
I believe it.
Yeah.
What are the odds?
Well, Polly, Wyland, James, the doer of stuff at East Bay.
Great to hear your perspective.
Thanks for spending some time with us on the Wausau Business Show.
My pleasure, guys.
Have a great day.
Thanks, Polly.
You too.
Thanks, Polly.
Talk to you later.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
Shay, what number are you up to?
So
long.
She
keeps going and going and going.
Yeah, it's awesome.
Are you having fun?
Is this enjoyable?
So much fun.
I
love it.
Love that enthusiasm.
Have you noticed anybody driving around while you've been doing this that actually can't find a parking spot?
No, I've
not.
That's good to know.
Good market research.
Shay, we got to cut it off there, but remember where you left off.
Yeah,
we got to come back.
We'll come back and finish this sometime in the near future, okay?
Because we need to know definitively how many parking spots are in downtown Wausau.
We got to put this old wives' tale to bed.
Yes.
Once and for all.
Perfect.
Thank you for all your efforts, Shay.
Thank you for having me on, yeah.
Wonderful job.
Stay safe.
Thank
you.
Thank you.
You too.
Okay.
Okay.
Bye-bye.
God, that's a lot of counting.
Okay, so until next week, from Hyatop Rib Mountain.
Way up there.
I'm Ryan.
And I'm Paul.
And this has been a Wausau Business Show Transmission.
Yeah!
If I was the same to you Girl,
we couldn't get much higher Come on, baby, light my fire Come on, baby, light my
fire
