George Sharp - Economic Development

George: 0:00

This is George Sharp and you're listening to One Hour to Doors.

Jon: 0:08

This is One Hour to Doors, a podcast about the business and soul of the festivals and events industry. I'm your host, Jon Stone. Every episode of One Hour to Doors explores the people, issues, insights and trends impacting the enterprise of bringing people and communities together in common cause. My guest today is George Sharp. I know George through the Washington Festivals and Events Association, of which he has been a fellow past- president, and this year he was inducted into the Association's Hall of Fame, the highest events industry honor in the state. George works tirelessly to promote tourism and commerce in Thurston County, which is home to the Washington State Capitol, and beyond. He has served in impactful roles with Washington State Tourism and the State Department of Commerce. His awards and credentials in his field are too many to list. The festivals and events industry is George's native language and, by my observation, his advocacy for our industry is nothing short of relentless. I want to learn more about what fuels his extraordinary drive and love for what we do.

Jon: 1:18

We are recording today from the Sharp residence in beautiful Olympia, washington. George, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me, john. My pleasure, I'm excited to catch up with you. I don't know your origin story. How did you wind up in the festivals and events biz?

George: 1:34

So in 1988, my wife and I opened up a balloon store in Pullman, Washington, and we also did Gorillagrams. So I was a gorilla, black gorilla, pink gorilla. I was a monster, a chicken, and just did all these kind of fun Gorillagram stories to people out of their houses. Well, the festival went from a harvest festival in Pullman where we said there's 3,000 harvest festivals in America. I was on a committee. I said why don't we do something different? And then Jim Crow from the Coliseum said why don't we celebrate something that's here in our own community, which is lentils? And they grow 98% of the lentils in the United States right there in Pullman. So the National Lentil Festival was born and they said, well, let's create a mascot. So they created a mascot. He looks like a big cookie with eyes and lips and about six feet tall.

George: 2:21

And then they had a contest to name him and a sixth grade teacher named him Tase T Lentil and they said we need somebody to be Tase T Lentil. And they said, George, well, you do all these mascot things, how about you be our first mascot? And I said I'm gay and let's go for it. So we did that. That first year. We wrote a rap for it. The only thing I can remember from the lap rap now is it was low in fat and high in protein, but it was like a minute and a half rap. And in Spokane Channel 4 called and so Tase T Lentil got to go up to Spokane, be on Channel 4 News and do the rap for them. And that was the birth of me being Tase T Lentil, the first mascot of the National Lentil Festival.

Jon: 3:04

Okay, that's first of all. That's priceless. But of all the folks who have been on this show so far discussing origin stories, you're different. You just jumped right in at the deep end.

George: 3:15

Yeah well, I was on the visitor and convention bureau committee that was kind of in charge of bringing visitors to town, and one of the things we wanted to do is put Pullman on the map by creating a foodie and a festival that people would go oh wow, that's different, let's go check that out. And so that really intrigued me as well 98% of lentils are grown in Washington state.

George: 3:35

In the United States are grown in Washington state. Not enough. That's still true today because that was back in 1989. I think there's some other states like Montana have started to grow lentils. That didn't grow lentils back then but I'm sure a lot probably the highest amount produced in the United States is still right there on the Palouse.

Jon: 3:54

Is it? It must be the particular climate or soil, or something.

George: 3:57

It's the soil right, the Palouse Loam soil. It's a good rotation crop too that they put in, so they'll do wheat, then they'll rotate to lentils, they'll do garbanzo beans and then they'll go back to wheat. I did not know that.

Jon: 4:11

Okay, so gorilla balloon, grams, lentil festival. How long were you with the lentil festival?

George: 4:18

So then the next year they needed a visitor and convention bureau director and my wife and I ended up closing our store because we lost $45,000 in 18 months and we put the last six months of our inventory on credit cards and we're proud to say that we took seven years to pay off that inventory on those credit cards. But we did. We didn't file bankruptcy, and so when they opened up the next year for the visitor and convention bureau position, I applied for that because I had been Pullman's kind of biggest cheerleader already anyway, because I had owned a restaurant and a motel and understood the industry, and so they hired me to be the visitor and convention bureau director and with that you became immediately executive director of the national lentil festival, and I may have fibbed and said that I liked lentils during the interview. I like lentils now, at that time not so much.

Jon: 5:06

I just want to be clear. I was laughing with you, not at you in terms of your loss. I've been there, done that, so did you go from Pullman to Olympia then? Was that a direct no actually?

George: 5:19

Mike and Chicky Brennan recruited me to go to the ski to sea festival in 1998.

Jon: 5:25

So you, didn't know anything about that.

George: 5:26

Yes, I went up there I worked with them for a year, but I missed tourism so much that I called the Washington state tourism director, then Robin Pollard, and said, hey, I'm going to be looking for a tourism related job and would you mind being a reference for me? And she said, well, I just happened to have a world tourism development manager job, new job opening up, and I encourage you to apply for that. So I applied, and I think there was two of us that were the final cut when somebody was from Tri-Cities area than myself, and I was lucky enough to get that job. And so then I went on with that job and worked for the department of commerce for 11 years before a governor cut me out of the budget during the hard times there are 2009, 2010. And so my position was eliminated. Then I went to work for the Visitor and Convention Bureau in Thurston County, and I ran that for five years as well.

Jon: 6:14

And so now you're with the Economic Development Council of Thurston County. That's correct. Yeah, tell us about that organization.

George: 6:22

So the Thurston Economic Development Council's main job is to retain jobs, recruit jobs into our community and then grow and expand the economy. And we do that in several different ways. We have one program called the Washington P-TAC, which is now Washington Accelerator, and they teach businesses how to get government contracts with cities, counties, state and federal agencies, tribes and then large contractors who are required to hire smaller contractors to do their job. That's eight offices around the state that we have, so that's a big, impactful program. We also have the Washington Center for Women in Business. That serves 34 of our counties in Washington state and they're teaching businesses how to start up, how to grow, how to expand, how to double their income over a year's time, and so that's two of our major programs there. And we have what's called the Center for Business and Innovation as part of the EDC and that program takes people all the way from start up, all the way to expanding their business. And those are the three main programs we have at the EDC.

George: 7:23

But we do a lot of other things. So I'm the Rural Program Manager and I run a program called the South Thurston Economic Development Initiative, and so we support six rural communities. We support Yelm that's 10,000 population, Rainier, that has about 2,200 population, Tenino, that has 1,800 population, Bucoda, that has 580 population, and then Grand Mound is not an incorporated city, so they're overseen by the county and they have about 4,000 population. And then Rochester, which is only four miles away, also has about 4,000 population. So that's my job is to serve all those communities to do community and economic development activities.

George: 8:03

We meet on a monthly basis on the third Friday we meet from 8 to 9.30. And I have all three county commissioners there. I have an elected official from each one of the cities in town. We have all three chambers. So there's Yelm Chamber, Tenino Chamber, Grand Mound, Rochester Chamber, we have the Visitor and Convention Bureau, we have the Thurston Regional Planning Council, we have Washington State University Extension, the Conservation District, and we all get together and we talk about what are best practices and community and economic development, what are funding sources that are coming available, and then how can we all work together? And more importantly is what are the lessons learned and best practices and some lessons that some of the communities learn? We want the other ones to know that, hey, we never, ever want to do that because how it turned out, or wow, that was a great win for them. How can we repeat that in other communities? So that's what we work with in doing that from the rural program.

Jon: 8:58

I follow you on Facebook and so I can see your work, your travel to these communities and local festivals. Local events is a constant, year round theme that I see through all of your travels.

George: 9:12

I attend over 25 festivals every year, and most of them are all in our rural communities. So, for example, Yelm puts a festival starting on that first Saturday in June and they have a festival every single weekend through almost the end of August, and so I attend a lot of those festivals. I'm an advisor to all these communities about how to grow or make their festival and events better too, so I'll attend and I'll give them feedback afterwards. This went really well, and this is some places where I think it could create a better wow factor for your audience.

Jon: 9:42

And are the festivals having a positive economic impact on these communities?

George: 9:46

They are. And one example is for Bukota, which is B-U-C-O-D-A 11 months of the year and then by proclamation they changed their name officially to B-O-O-C-O-D-A for the whole month of October and we just put on a whole month long festival. The first weekend was a family fun day. The second weekend was a Hearst procession, which is like a parade, and viewing is, which was like a car show. Then the third weekend was what's ours are casket races, and last year we had six caskets. This year we had 18 caskets compete and it was phenomenal. In the bar there called Joe's Place, the 125 year old bar fifth generation owns and said we had our biggest day in the history of Joe's Place on the Casket Race Day, and so from an economic development standpoint that was a big win for them. But they've had a good weekend every weekend in that. So wow, I also coordinated through the EDC. We have contracts with the city of Tanano for do economic development, but also for me to serve as their creative district manager. And then we have contract with the Tanano chamber for me to serve as their staff, because they're only like a 50 member chamber, so they don't have enough money to generate to have a full-time or even a part-time real staff member, whereas they can contract with us and I serve it. So this year I actually coordinated the Tanano Oregon Trail Days the fourth weekend and they reports this year was it was the best vessel they've ever had and that all the businesses experienced a lot.

George: 11:15

We have one retailer there. She normally does about $250 to $500 on a Saturday. On Oregon Trail Day weekend she did $2,000 in revenue so she was extremely excited. And then the restaurant there in town. The chamber president actually owns the restaurant and it's one of her biggest days of the year is the Oregon Trail Days. And then we bring in about 40 vendors there who are also making money arts and crafts vendors that are selling their product there at the festival. We have also food vendors, like most festivals. So we had 10 food vendors that came in and they were making some money off of that. And then our museum gets more donations during that time of the year. So it really is a truly economic impact for these communities to do these festivals.

Jon: 11:58

So, George, historically we only really see each other at the WFEA events once, twice, three times a year or something like that, but, as I said earlier, I track you year-round on your Facebook. What made me reach out to sit down today is the fact that, over the years and years and years, your enthusiasm for the festivals and events industry appears to be stuck on level 10. It's like your enthusiasm never wanes through ups and downs in the industry, through sunny day or rainy day, it makes no difference. You seem to be almost immune to being slowed down, put down about anything with the industry. You're perhaps one of the greatest advocates cheerleaders out there that I know of what drives you.

George: 12:48

Well, it really comes down to my personal mission statement that I've had since I was 17 years old and that was to make a difference in the lives of other people. And one of the easiest and fastest ways we can do that is through festival and events, through threefold. One is just for the consumer who comes to the event, brings them happiness and joy and experience that they can have. And then two to the community, who's putting it on, or the organization allows them to brand their community around, so brand their organization to prove that they're credible through their community and they're important to our community. And then third is the impact it has for the business community which, having been a small business owner before and had a festival in my town and did benefit, didn't benefit sometimes.

George: 13:32

I think there's a way for us to help the community threefold that way the consumer, the organization, the community's name. And then also to impact for those businesses. And that's what drives me, it makes me, that's my purpose, my passion. And then I think it's one of the fastest ways to do it because you bring you know two, three, five, 10,000 people to your community to have this experience and hopefully they have a good experience and they want to come back, maybe not even at next festival, but another time of that year. So it's a great way to bring more, bring more income into your community from outside.

Jon: 14:07

In your EDC work with these various rural communities. How do you define success? What are some of your metrics? So?

George: 14:15

One of the success I had was in 2018, there's a city council member, george Johnson, with the city of Rainier, and he came to our study meeting in January that year and I had the communities tell what were their success stories for the year before and what are they working on, and he got extremely fired up, said I want to do that for Rainier what Tenino did for Tenino. And so he came and he called me. He says, hey, I really want to do something for my community. He said you really want to do something for your community? He said, yep. I said, okay, I'll come out on Saturday. You can show me everything about your community you want to do and what your goals are and that. So I went out there on a Saturday. We spent five and a half hours in his truck driving around the community, going, meeting with everybody, and after we were done with that, he said yeah, I really want to do. I said, okay, let's brainstorm that out and what that looks like.

George: 15:01

Because they had apathy at that time in their community, the people weren't engaged, weren't happening, etc. So we ended up creating what was called we Love Rainier a community organization, kind of like a quasi chamber of commerce for them and create a non profit organization. The first meeting we did, we brought 15 people to kind of do a pilot test of hey, are you interested in this? Would you participate in this If we build something out and do that? So there was interest. So a month later, on May 18th 2018, we held our first we Love Rainier community meeting. We had 30 people come to the meeting and we asked each one of them what's your view, what's your vision, how do you want engaged with your community? And that launched the We Love Rainier campaign. And so then we set up a matrix where we created what are all the projects that you want to do for Rainier? And then I asked them prioritize your top five projects? And they had 20 some projects they wanted to do. So we picked the top five. They will say how are we going to accomplish them and who's going to take role? Well, george, really, he's city council member, but then he became chair of the we Love Rainier program and kicked it off that year. That group has stuck together all this time and now they're phenomenal what they do. They just put on a big Halloween event yesterday. Probably had 2000 kids come to that and they have only 2000 people who live in that town, so people from other. They do a big holiday Christmas time event. They did Easter egg hunt for 10,000 eggs for kids last year. They just got done distributing dictionaries to all third graders in Rainier. So this community has been a big success for me to watch them grow.

George: 16:36

I helped them in the beginning, like I ran the meetings the first year, because what happens the first year? Politics and personalities can stop things dead. So I was a referee and I managed that and set expectations. And then, when difficult conversations had to happen, I managed those conversations and that kept them going, kept them alive. And then the next year George took over and he was able to be the chairperson of that and he ran that for the next four years and now they're getting other leadership people to start and step into that. So that's one success for them.

George: 17:08

And then, of course, Bucoda. They got over 100,000 media coverage in 2018, just because I had them buy a hearse. I convinced the mayor to buy a hearse. He calls me up the day we're buying a hearse. He says, George, you sure we should be buying a hearse because we used a grant from the Port of Olympia for $1,000 and then an anonymous donor for another $1,000 if we would buy a black hearse, she said. And so we bought that. They took that.

George: 17:35

King 5 came down immediately the next week, did the two and a half minute story about Bacota, the haunted house and buying a hearse. And then the Olympian came and they did a one and a half minute story on it and that story got picked up in every single newspaper website across America that Tegna at that time was owner of, and so that was a big deal. And then Q13 came down and they did four stories on it about the haunted house, about the casket races and then about Joe's place. I convinced Joe's place to create, called the spirit of Joe drink which Joe died behind the bar. He was the owner of the bar in 1938. And so they believe he's still there as a ghost, and so he created a drink with a local sandstone distillery bacon, whiskey and then also this sipping vinegar from Wildheart sipping vinegar. So it was unique and characteristic, just that area.

George: 18:27

Well, Ellen Taylor came down and she wanted to do it, so she and I went behind the bar. The bar manager is supposed to do it, but she showed up late and they said no, we got to go now, so I stepped in and taught her how to make this drink. It was really fun. So then that went on there. So four different stories, but just it was a phenomenal. Of all the communities. I've worked in probably over a hundred communities in 30 years because I was with State Tourism Office and I go to all these communities and teach them how to do community economic development through public relations, product development or marketing. And this little town of Bucoda has gotten the more media coverage than any of the other communities I work with, so I call that success for them as well.

Jon: 19:03

Now how many years for Bucoda?

George: 19:06

Festival now Started in 2018, and we only skipped 2020. We did 2021.

Jon: 19:12

Okay, that's remarkable because I have seen media coverage for that event that's not just something in my Facebook that's getting served up because of my associations or whatever, like I've seen natural in the wild media coverage for that event in the last, within the last couple of years, yeah, every every year. That's pretty remarkable for listeners that are not local. I mean, this is a very rural, small town.

George: 19:37

It just blows me away that in every year, I try to create something unique, different. That's going to be the media attention draw for that. So, and it's worked every year, the casket races issue we huge, with, you know, tripling the number. But also I talked to the Chronicle, which is out of Centralia, to become actual sponsor of it, and so they're promoting it through all their media. We had Evening Magazine come down in 2021 and they did a story. Well, they replayed that story again this last week. So every year they replay the story and so it just keeps growing as a those are actually remarkable statistics.

George: 20:13

Actually for a little bitty town of 560 people.

Jon: 20:17

That's absolutely remarkable. Congratulations, thank you. Something else that you said that caught my attention was I think you're talking about the city of Rainier and how they were having trouble internally coming to agreement on this or that, and you said that you were able to go in and act as a referee Right Now. That raised an eyebrow with me because, at least in my limited experience in going in cold to other communities, generally speaking, the outsider isn't looked upon as the trusted referee. How did you, how does that work? How did you manage to?

George: 20:52

I think the biggest thing, john, is people know that I care and it comes across that I care and that I have their best interest in it, and then also that I have 30 years experience working in all these different communities and I've seen about every kind of interaction there is. I stopped a fist fight between a city council member and a heritage commission member in Cle Elum, who are fighting over where the visitor information center was going to be located.

Jon: 21:19

No, and when?

George: 21:20

I tell them that story, they go oh, wow, and so, and I'm fair to everybody. And then I also have a problem, a lot of probing questions when there is disagreements, and sometimes I say we just have to agree that we're going to disagree and we're going to create a parking lot and stuff that don't we don't agree on right now. We're going to stick over in that parking lot and we'll come back at another time and we'll ask more questions of what kind of questions do we need to get to and research to do to kind of solve that. But let's not stop all the progress that we're making right now for your community and focus on those top five priorities that you have that you want to accomplish and so brilliant.

Jon: 21:57

You've shared a couple of success stories. How about some challenges or things that didn't quite pan out the way that you?

George: 22:05

The biggest challenges that we've seen is one is time. People have enough time to invest in and be volunteers in and be part of. Second is financial. That's always a challenge of how are we going to pay for that, and I've told communities that if you have a really quality project, the money will come. It will just take time, but we'll identify all the funding sources and we'll apply. If you get told no, then we'll ask why were we told no of the funding source? What do we need to do to tweak what we need to apply the next time for a grant source and then just keep coming back until we're successful? And that's called perseverance.

Jon: 22:44

What's the good news in Thurston County

George: 22:47

Well, I think the biggest thing that's happening in Thurston County is that we're seeing people coming back out to festival and events and celebrating them, and we saw record growth in a lot of our festivals this year. Olympia Harbor Days was a phenomenal turnout that they had and they did some creative things. They had a drone show this year for the first time ever. First time ever in.

Jon: 23:06

Thurston County.

George: 23:07

First time ever in Thurston County, and so that was on a Friday night and it was at night time and just an amount of people that came out to watch that was crazy to me to have that many like I don't know, probably 10,000 people came out nine o'clock at night to watch a drone show on a Friday night.

George: 23:24

And that was over Labor Day weekend too, so you know, some people leave town. But and then she also brought the Tenino Stone Carvers who are pretty famous for work that they do and did a demonstration there and that was pretty cool. What's that? They actually take Tenino sandstone and they carve that into street addresses, artwork, all kinds of things, and so they've that's a 100 year old industry from Tenino and they've got five stone carvers there that are still practicing that. They just did a huge thing in Tom Waterfalls Park of the Olympia Brewery logo and it's like 15 feet wide and 12 feet tall. It's pretty darn cool, and so they're well known. But to bring it to Harbor Days, which is about tugboats and tugboat races and arts and crafts vendors and stuff, so she's thinking outside the box. She also brought Chehalis Tribe who did their salmon bake.

Jon: 24:17

So, you.

George: 24:18

You're there and you're seeing salmon on planks being cooked over open fire, which is very unique and different and not always able to experience that. So that was another thing she did.

Jon: 24:27

I know from talking with Carol that Harbor Days has had its share of challenges in recent years and part of that I can paint a broad stroke over. All of it kind of an identity crisis of sorts, changing times, changing demographics. So it warms my heart to hear t hey changed things up a little bit this year and found success beyond their expectations.

George: 24:52

I say they found relevance, still to be relevant to the community and changed up what they were doing. For that, and Carol to be credited she kept Harbor Days alive when it probably would have died if it wasn't for her. Because, of COVID. She kept it alive and COVID did a many, many, many, many Harbor Days where she had porch. People decorate their porches in nautical theme.

Jon: 25:16

She's a force. So those numbers 10,000 people coming out for Harbor Days, which is fantastic for that event. In the last few years we've been coming out of COVID. I've had a number of small events. We started those back up in 2021. Very early for coming out of the pandemic and the attendance numbers were abysmal. People are afraid still.

Jon: 25:43

Yeah, people just weren't coming. These are all outdoor public events that I'm talking about, but the attendance was poor. The next year, 2022, attendance you know apples to apples, as close as you can get it was up about 50% from that, so we took that as a good sign. 2023, the numbers are up over six-fold and this is across multiple types of events. I'm wondering if you've seen that kind of a jump in 2023 numbers with your events.

George: 26:10

Well, in 2021, capital Lake Fair, which is the biggest festival here in Thurston County, has over 150,000 people attended. We weren't allowed to hold it in 2021 either because they were still concerned. You know, the governor still had an issue out. We didn't know if I was going to be able to put it because it's the third week in July, so we missed two years of putting it on. So 2022, a ton of people came out. It was a record year for them. Then 2023, it was about the same, but not as much. But we think there was such a pent-up demand in 2022 that people wanted to go out and see, and the demographic was a younger demographic who weren't as concerned about COVID at that time. Right, some people still wore masks, but other people didn't For them. For 2023, it was probably just about the same. Before Oregon Trail Days this year, we normally have 7,000 people attended. We had over 11,000 people attended, probably 11,500.

George: 27:03

And we did some geo-fencing around the festival to see where they're coming from, so we're able to see from people who came that were from 50 miles away or more and how long they stayed and the kind of things that they did after they left us.

Jon: 27:17

How are you getting that data?

George: 27:19

So we work with our Visitor and Convention Bureau and they have a program where they buy into the market research, and so it's people's cell phones that are pinging that they're at our festival and they have to be there for two hours or longer before they get counted. That's the trigger. Yeah, yeah, that's great, it's pretty interesting.

Jon: 27:37

Many people have asked me this year about what I am seeing, what I predict as far as audience turnout for live events coming up next year and the year after that, and I kind of had an aha moment just a couple of months ago where I realized that I think, coming out of COVID, you know that the general rule, if you're going to start a new event, you can't really judge it until you've run it for three years. Right, get three years worth of data, then you can start seeing trends and stuff like that. I think that COVID has been such a powerful reset of everything in society that we have to take that approach with all of our events now, even if they've been running for decades, even if they've been around for generations. I think it would be foolhardy to make assumptions about what the future is going to look like until we've gone through three post-COVID years, and for many events that'll be next year, 2024 will probably be that third year.

George: 28:35

Well, I think Bumbershoot is a good example of retooling yourself and I think all festivals need to think about that as what keeps us relevant. What can we do that's different and what should we stop doing because consumer really doesn't demand that anymore. They don't like it because we get stuck on our ways of just doing it. We always do what we always did right and I've always tried to add something new every year to a festival that I put on that wasn't there the year before that people can experience.

George: 29:01

And I think that's what festivals need to be thinking about as they go forward is how are they relevant, what consumer trends have changed and what is consumer looking for today? That's different from what it used to be in the past and it really is experiential that people want to have as an experience, not just to go to the festival, but they want to have a real experience at that festival.

Jon: 29:23

Absolutely agreed. The trick for producers comes in how do you come to an understanding of what those changing trends are? In the my Robin Kelly podcast episode, she shares some brilliant wisdom about pretty much said exactly what you just said about how every year they had a rule where every year there had to be something substantially new and then they had to take something, even if it was been a beloved tradition of the event. Something had to go, and so I asked them well, how did they make those decisions? And Issaquah Salmondays is a particularly prime example of that, because of the profound demographic change that's happened there over the lifespan of that event. Issaquah of today is not Issaquah of yesterday not by any stretch. And what they used, which I thought was brilliant, they use their arts and craft vendors as a barometer of sorts of what people are interested in. That's where they make their decisions based on their vendor experience. Because it's such a large sample size, it works.

George: 30:27

Well, I would say the other thing for our festival industry folks is you need to attend conferences. You need to attend the Washington Festival and Events Association Conference, for sure, and possibly the International Festival and Events Association or some other one to go to and listen there as well, because a lot of stuff gets talked about the future and what's worked and what's not working and what people are thinking, and it gives you a broader knowledge of what's happening. The other thing I would do is look up futurists and see what are they saying about the future and what's changing, especially technology and what's changing technology world. And in January, when they got that big show down in Las Vegas, I always watched that to say what are the trends that are happening there and what's the craziness that's coming out of that. Is any of that craziness? Could we have a demo of that at our festival?

Jon: 31:12

Technology drives everything. That's one thing I've learned. That has taken me the better part of a lifetime so far to understand that throughout the course of human history, ultimately, it's technology that moves things forward, whether we like it or not. You can literally look at the periods of history. You can find the periods of history where there was not a lot of technological development. They were called the dark ages. What it meant was just like nothing much changed for hundreds of years. But then there's these breakthroughs and all of a sudden you have Renaissance periods. Yep, so, going back to Thurston County, edc, so are the cities your clients? Is that how you look at them?

George: 31:51

They're also our clients as well. They have contracts with us. All the cities have contracts with us to do community and economic development activities. And then we do a lot of training for their businesses. They'll give us a contract and that will build a specific training program. So we have a specific training just for city of Lacey businesses, just for city of Olympia businesses, just for city of Tumwater businesses. They can. Then they're like the business is getting a scholarship to go into that training that would normally cost them 500 bucks to participate in, but the cities are covering that cost. And then we also have a contract with the county Thurston County to do economic development activities for the county as well.

Jon: 32:30

I can imagine folks will listen to this podcast that we're making today, and they'll be from other parts of the state maybe in other states or countries for that matter and they might, up until this point, be completely unaware of entities such as Thurston EDC. How would they go about connecting and finding these types of locations in their neck of the woods?

George: 32:50

We're kind of the Rodney Dangerfield of economic development activity because almost every community has a chamber of commerce as well. Some places the chamber and the EDC have combined and are working together, like in Spokane and Grays Harbor Counties. In our county we have both the Thurston County Chamber of Commerce and we have the Economic Development Council. So what you want to do in Washington we're called the ADO, which we're officially recognized by the Department of Commerce as the entity in our county that does economic development and we are approved by the county commissioners. So economic development the ADO is Associate Development Organization is what we are taught.

George: 33:27

But you go to your community, look for Economic Development Council and just look that up and then go contact them and go and meet them in person and say what do you do and how can I get engaged and help do that? And we even do nonprofit work where we teach nonprofits how to start up. We help them write their business plan and to think through all that. We connect them with attorneys to make sure they get all their legal part together. So we do the white variety between nonprofit and for-profit businesses to assist them.

Jon: 33:58

Fantastic resources that are right under our noses a lot of the time and 99% free Right. Other than the events that you work on, what festivals or events have you seen, have you attended lately that have inspired you?

George: 34:13

Again, I go back to Olympia Harbor days because how they had reinvented themselves, how they add things to that, and just Carol was an amazing facilitator of that and running of that organization. The way she was able to go get sponsorship dollars was very inspiring to me, and then how she was able to get volunteers to step up to the plate to help run the festival and then just adding those new events. But the other one that I really like and have admired for over 10 years is the Lacey Spring Fun Fair. The Lacey Spring Fun Fair was run by a nonprofit until about four years ago when insurance became an issue and volunteers issue, and so the city of Lacey stepped up and said we will take over and run Lacey Spring Fun Fair and keep the volunteers who are interested in it, but we'll take over the responsibility, and so following their own insurance. And then they've reinvented themselves and add things. I mean they added a zipline to this small festival and I say small but they probably have 50,000 people attend that over a three day period and it's the second weekend in May which the weather can be a little iffy. And Janet Seiler she's just an amazing person that works with the city of Lacey really admire what she does and she's very inspiring. And not only she does Lacey Spring Fun Fair, but she does probably another 30 events a year. She puts on a Lacey in tune, which is a evening well, lunchtime program and evening program and something on the weekend throughout the summer, and just what they did. They were very creative during COVID too, where they would do stuff in their parks scavenger hunts and things that kept their relevance to their audience.

George: 35:55

I stole one of her ideas this year. She had this thing called Card in your Yard, which is a national organization. They have franchises all over and then this really cool sign that said Lacey Spring Fun Fair and has all this graphics and stuff. And so I took that and I contacted them and I said love to have you do that for Oregon Trail Days. So we did it for Oregon Trail Days. It says Oregon Trail Days 2023. And then we have a motorcycle drill team in Tenino called Tenino Motorcycle Drill Team. That's in our parade. So I had them put a Harley on it and balloons and stars and it was really cool. And then I had them made a frame so it became a selfie spot. So that's one idea I stole from her this year. I normally try to steal one thing from her every year because they do such an amazing job, so You've piqued my interest a city stepping in and saying we'll take over this event.

Jon: 36:43

It's exactly 180 degrees opposite of the way it usually works. I'm very familiar with the notion that a city starts an event and it grows and it becomes successful, but at some point they're almost always looking to offload that risk to the private sector or the nonprofit sector. I don't think I've ever heard of it working the other way around.

George: 37:04

Well, the threat was it was going to go away if somebody didn't step in and help save it and reorganize it and keep it coordinated and going. And Lacey said and Lacey has good leadership the mayor's been there for over 10 years and they have a great new parks and rec person that oversees the whole parks and rec as well, and it's leadership, really what it comes down to.

Jon: 37:25

Well, it's leadership. At the risk of staying the obvious, the city must see the overall value clearly to move in that direction. Huh, now I kind of want to talk with them.

George: 37:37

She's a great person, Janet Seiler.

Jon: 37:38

I've never, I don't think I've ever heard that story. Would you recommend economic development to work as a career path for folks?

George: 37:48

I would. I always say you need to have thick skin, because there's a critic about everything the thing you do, both positive and negative towards it, and especially now with the keyboard warriors out there, you do something, then boom, all this, like 20,000 keyboard warriors say, wow, that's negative, something negative about it, and just so you really have to have thick skin. But it's going to be one of the most rewarding careers that you can have because you can make a difference in a small community, in a county, and you can also make a difference statewide for the economic development activities of your state.

Jon: 38:25

What are some recommendations for a path of entry into that type of work?

George: 38:30

Well, first off, I would start just contacting your local economic development council and say, hey, is there any volunteer opportunities I can be involved with? And if it's a younger person, is there an internship you can create whether it's paid or non-paid internship that I can actually get my feet wet and do something? So this coming year I might be creating some internships for people to assist me with social media planning for the different festivals that I'm involved with, so I can give them kind of an experience and something that they can seek their steeth into so they can say, oh, I do like that or no, I don't really like that so much.

Jon: 39:04

Did you have any mentors in this business?

George: 39:07

Truthfully, I haven't had any mentors in this like long term. Like you know, one person you get with and they mentor you all the way through. I've had people who've inspired me at other chambers of commerce and then I would go meet with them. So one was Pat McGoy up at the Coeur d'Alene Area Chamber of Commerce extremely creative individual, and so I would take my whole staff up there and meet with them once or twice a year and we would walk through what are you guys doing and then we talk about what we're trying to do and they feed us back feedback on that. So Pat was great. I followed him. He became a consultant after leaving that chamber and I followed him for the last 25 years and what he does and how many chambers he's worked across. There. There's Frank Kenny he also. He's created a chamber pro group, has 10,000 people in this Facebook group and we ask everyday questions to that group and get great answers of it. Right now he's doing a campaign about how to benefit from the holiday season for your community. So he's been a great mentor to talk to and I've had him come speak when I was the Visitor of the Community Regional Director. He had just written a book about social media somewhere around 2015, which was, you know, just starting really to launch. So I had him come and do that as well.

George: 40:19

And then my mentor, who got me started in the right direction I think from leadership etc was my FFA teacher, Jerry Longmeyer. And so I in ninth grade was headed the wrong direction. Probably would have maybe not even graduated from high school if I hadn't had him come into my life. And so he said I'm going to enter you into a calf scramble. So what's a calf scramble? He says when we take you to Portland, there'll be 14 boys and seven calves in this big arena and they release them, and if you can catch one and bring it over the finish line, then you get to keep it for a year and bring it back the next year.

George: 40:51

So I caught one and that's what changed my life forever and I learned responsibility. And then he encouraged me to apply to be the FFA president. So I was FFA president for two years in a row. I was a star chapter farmer and all the different things that, all the way to the national level, that I could do in leadership there. And then he encouraged me to be the ASB president. So I ran for that and I was able to become ASB president. So he encouraged me and taught me leadership all along the way of that and just totally changed the trajectory of my life.

George: 41:21

You said that taught you responsibility is that from the keeping the calf for a year that, and then I actually went on to raise sheep and pigs and Okay, so you just so. George, did you grow up on a farm? I did grow up on a farm, starting in eighth grade, so eighth grade through high school.

Jon: 41:38

The reason I'm smiling right now is you start listening to some of my other podcasts. You'll hear me talk about this quite a bit. Several years ago. I realized that in the event production world specifically, I learned this through concerts and touring a very large percentage of the great production managers, tour managers, road managers out there. Their common thread is they grew up on a farm. And what is that? Right, I think and I myself included, I grew up on a farm as well. I think there's something to that. I think that, of course, I know that on the farm there is a work ethic that is not optional In your case. The calf. Calf doesn't enjoy holidays. The calf there is no, there are no days off. The work's never done. It's a commitment as a lifestyle. You're either in or you're out. There is absolutely no middle ground in farming or ranching, and I can see I have seen in the world of event production where that is a really, really valuable background to come from that you can't get it any other way.

George: 42:47

Well, you also learned to use baling wire and duct tape and MacGyver type activities as well. Growing up on the farm, you find a way.

Jon: 42:54

Whatever problem comes at you every day and they will come at you every day, problems large or small, but you have to solve it right now, often in the field, with your wits and, like you say, some baling, wire and twine and whatever you've got. If it really needs to be solved, you can figure it out right now. There's just so many skill sets that come off of farming that a lot of people don't think about even just being able to prioritize or determine what's really important at the end of the day and plan ahead also.

Jon: 43:27

Yeah, and that cracks me up. Everywhere I go, I just keep running into people who grew up on a farm. George, I know through attending many of your talks at conferences and seminars and whatnot, that you're famous for the George Sharp formulas for success. Can you share that with us?

George: 43:45

Yeah. So when I worked for the state tourism office, I had to go to all these other communities and help them, and so I tried to figure out is there some kind of recipe, is there some kind of common thread of the successful ones versus the ones who didn't reach their full potential? And so I created what was called my formula for success, and it's three I's plus seven Ps, plus CS, plus Q, plus A equals S, and I'll go through those quickly. But the first eye is for imagination. You really have to have a great imagination of what can be, what can happen and bring new ideas to your festival event and to your organization. The second eye is for intuition and to use intuition in making decisions and what's the right thing to do, and that'll come to you. And then the third is I is for initiative, and you need to take the initiative to be active and proactive and take action to make things happen for your organization and for your community. The first P in the form of success is passion, and successful communities and organizations and the festivals are filled with people, with passion for the community, for the organization, festival, and passion for others to exceed as well, and that's really important. It's not about you, but that you want to see other people succeed. Passion is the field that drives the community and betterment and becomes contagious with the other people, and we Love Rainier is a great example of that. Started with 15 people grew to 30 and then that became contagious and people wanted to see We Love Rainier be successful, and it's also part of helping recruit new people to your organization when you share that passion. But I saw a lot of passionate people in the story I told you about the two people I stopped the fist fight for Right.

George: 45:31

The second P, which is personality. It's important to understand your personality type and how you're being perceived, as well as the personality type of those you come into contact with and work with. Each personality type has a different way of communication that works with and or for them. Understanding where people are coming from and how they operate is vital to building a long term working relationship with them. I've witnessed personality differences stop community organizations and festival efforts dead in their tracks because they couldn't get along, and I've identified about 18 negative personality types and about four good personality types. And so, anyway, from an ego maniac, right, how do you deal with the ego maniac? Well, I learned. You make it their idea, so you plant the seed and then two weeks later and said where are you at with that idea? And they have probably thought about it by them and becomes their idea and then they can own it, because I don't care who gets the credit, as long as we accomplish what we were wanting to accomplish. Devils advocate there's always one of those and they used to drive me crazy until I realized they asked really tough, difficult questions that are going to be asked by Joe Q Public when you go out to do something, and so let them ask them in a smaller setting and come up with what the answer is on that.

George: 46:43

The third P is for a plan. You need to establish an overall plan that addresses the mission and visions and goals and the strategies, tactics, budget, timeline and roles and responsibly of staff and volunteers, and then the measurement and evaluation and really important to put that evaluation in there. After every event I do, I ask what went really well, what could we have done better? What should we stop doing? Because we never ask that question what should we stop doing? We just say what can we add on Then? What should we start doing? And the question to both of those is because technology has changed, because consumers are changed. If you could ask 10 times for something, you may want to consider putting that into your plan and then in the plan, do a strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threats analysis. That goes with it.

George: 47:28

The fourth P is partnerships. And it used to be that a Chamber of Commerce or Visit Conventure Bureau or Economic Development Council could do the stuff just by themselves. Take it on, let's do it, but because of the limitation of time of volunteers, limitation of money, resources, that kind of things, then you need to say what kind of partnership can we have? And the partnerships I really recommend that you create a memorandum of understanding that really outlines what are all the roles and responsibilities of each organization involved, then also what's going to be the evaluation process of that. And I really recommend that you celebrate once a year that partnership, because some people who came in the partnership in the beginning may have left. Some people die, some people get new jobs, etc. They get a new person that comes on and they don't know why we're in this partnership together and you never, ever want them to ask why are we in partners with these people? Why are we doing that? So keep that updated with them At least. I really recommend that you celebrate around a meal where you celebrate, you stop and you ask those questions and people get to say together what was successful, what could we do better, and it gets by in that way.

George: 48:38

The fifth P, which people say this never happens, but politics and politics occur at many levels, including the organization. It's important to understand what the key issues are, concerns being addressed. It's important to make sure the local, county, state and federal elected officials know what you're trying to accomplish, because you never know where they're going to meet somebody that will have a resource to help you, especially financially. And there's been a lot of organizations across the state I talked to that. They get involved with that and they ended up getting $250,000, $500,000 because they had talked to their politician on that. The sixth piece of perseverance if at first you don't succeed, try, try again, but adjust. Like I talked about the grants, why didn't we get that grant? Ask the grantor, what do we need to tweak to our grant to do that and persevere? And a lot of overnight successes started 18 years ago. I use Leavenworth as an example.

George: 49:31

Leavenworth wanted to have a train station because everybody had to go to Wenatchee, get off the train there and then bus back to Leavenworth. So it took them 10 years, but 10 years later they had a train station in Leavenworth for that. And then the seventh piece is for purpose. It's about our why. Why are we doing something as an organization, as a festival, and then personally, what's your why? Why are you involved in that? The CS stands for common sense and what I ask is that groups say you get group think right. And so you're going down this path and we're all thinking the same thing. But do we ever stop and say does this make common sense? So if you're working on something new, go to your neighbor or somebody has no idea what you're talking about and outline what you're saying and say does this make common sense? And they go what the heck are you thinking? Or, oh, yeah, that does make common sense. Put you on the same page as with what people are thinking.

George: 50:23

The Q stands for quality. It needs to be done. Everything you do, from your website, flyers, social media, anything you do that you do in a quality way. The A stands for attitude and it should be an attitude as we can do it as what's needed by today's individuals who are working together for the betterment of the community and festival. And some communities and economic development standpoint get known for an attitude of we don't want any business here. And we had one of those in Thurston County and I went to their leadership and they asked me to come and talk to them about recruiting businesses and I said you realize that you're known for an attitude that you don't want any businesses in your community. And one lady looked at me and she says what do you mean? I said what's the permitting process? How long does it take? What's it cost? And you're known for trying to stop things instead of having things start. And that really had an adjustment for them and they've gone 180% different now.

Jon: 51:13

Did they not realize that?

George: 51:15

that's how they were perceived. No, they did not Got it. Yeah, because they didn't ask the question. Then the S stands for success, and you need to determine what success looks like and who determines it with you. And does it take into consideration the community values? Because what success looks like to me in economic development and recruiting businesses and seeing growth, et cetera and we're having that in one of our small towns I'm working with is we don't want any more outsiders and we don't want any big box stores and we don't want that. Well, to understand what their value is and what success looks like to them, their success looks like growing small businesses, no, outside franchises, that kind of thing. And so who determines the success? Is it the city council? Is it the county commissioners? Is it your citizens? Who determines that success? And to know what that looks like, like Stephen Covey said, begin with the end of mind, everything you do. What is it we want to accomplish? And what does that look like five, 10, 20 years from now? And so that's my formula for success to consider.

Jon: 52:13

Who is your favorite ancestor?

George: 52:19

My grandpa, Harvey Williams my middle name's Harvey as well. He was just this awesome old guy. He was an entrepreneur, he was a well-driller, he lived in Baker City and then he owned half of Hermiston, Oregon, at one time. Wow, and just learning from him, he was an inventor. He invented a lot of things with irrigation, and so he actually had trademarks or patents on things as well, and so he was my favorite grandpa. I took him supper every Saturday, called buckwheat spuds the exact same thing, and cornbread every Saturday, my whole high school years until he passed away in 1980.

Jon: 52:54

Who do you think?

George: 52:55

you are. Who do I think I am. I think what I want to be known for is somebody who really cared about other people and wanted to make a difference in the lives of other people, and that's what I try to live up to be every day and just show that I care.

Jon: 53:10

You walk into an ice cream parlor, you're going to get a cone with two scoops. What are the flavors? Vanilla and vanilla. Say more about that.

George: 53:19

So I've always liked vanilla ice cream. In fact, when I'm sick I get a vanilla milkshake, Kind of as my pick me up pick me up. There. We have friends in Pullman who own a flower shop and a Neil's Coffee and Ice Cream store, and so I went on a vegan kick for a couple of years and I did vegan and the only vegan they had was vanilla. So that worked out. I'm not on the vegan kick anymore, but I still just love vanilla ice cream, my favorite.

Jon: 53:46

George, it has been a real treat talking with you today. Thank you so much for making the time and welcoming me into your home, Well.

George: 53:53

I appreciate you coming down. It was a great conversation. I look forward to listening to all the other podcasts as well.