Welcome to the Merchant of DIRT Podcast episode number 5.
Thank you for joining me for the Merchants Adirt podcast. This is your insider's guide to prep call recreational engineering where I teach you the art and science of building, promoting, and directing offered races. I'm your host, professional recognier and race promoter, Kyle Bondo. Coming up on this episode, we'll talk about the rant I recorded at the DC podcast this past weekend. Tell you about the new race promoters group I started on Facebook, and and we get into how you should handle the politics that mess with your race promotion business.
Alright. Today is a great day for racing. This week, I had the opportunity to go to something I've never done before. I mean, this being episode number 5 of the Merchant Center podcast, I really haven't met a whole lot of podcasters, especially podcasters here in the local in the local area. So the DC Podfest was a small intimate gathering of maybe a 100 or so folks over the weekend that were all pretty much local podcasters.
There's a few people from out of town, but most people were were here in the local DC and Northern Virginia, Maryland area. It was a great opportunity to come out of the, you know, come out of the bomb shelter, out of the basement, and talk to people about the technology of podcasting. Different tips and tricks on how to be a podcaster, ways to to talk, or ways to bad humor, ways to oh, and certainly something that that I've never done before because this is currently a solo show,
is interview guests. And how to interview guests and how to get connections between phones and Skype and how to get the audio channels all hooked together. So tons and tons of detail. It was way more bang for the buck, especially if you're if you're in the podcasting. It was fantastic. And I made some great people, made some great contacts. The networking there was fantastic.
But 1 thing that I gotta do there that kind of put me a little bit in the in the hot seat was the ability to record a live podcast. Now I do I do prep. You know? I write the blog for wreckingear.com. They usually organize my thoughts, takes me a couple days to write a blog post, format it, make it grammar. And even then, I still I miss I misspellings like that. Blog writing blogs is tough. But for podcasting, I
do the same thing I do for writing a blog post and then try to work that into a script. So at least I know what the heck I'm gonna talk about. Right now, I'm I'm, like, off script. You know, I'm coming. I'm trying something new. I'm trying this this kind of off the top of my head type podcasting. So this is a interesting, new
scary way to talk to you. But what I gotta do is I gotta do a live show. And so in a live show, I decided to to sit down with the guys there who were who had all their equipment all set up. And a special shout out to Justin Emery, was running the booth there, part of New Media Recording Studios. I I believe they're based out of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I think their address is Turboose,
which I think that's how you say that. But they sat down a couple microphones, a mixer, and I was able to to do a little 5 minute show right then and there at the at the festival, which I thought was really cool. So right now I'm gonna I'm gonna share with you my my little show, my my mini show that I did at the DC podcast, in which I I talked about something that's I think is, you know, in in in racing itself is race directors and race promoters
running in their own race. And I know everyone has seen them happen. Everyone knows that race director or the race promoter that does it. And this is my little rant about that topic. Enjoy. Alright. This episode is coming to you live from the DC Podcast in DC. At the Winter Bread Factory in Northwest.
I got a chance to talk to some some great podcasters and listen to some talks. And it kind of thought me thought to to bring up this topic that it's been on top of my mind for a while that it's been really bugging me. So this is a rant that goes kind of those race promoters organizers' records. They think they can build a race and race in the same event. And I wanna tell you that you can't. And you're gonna ask yourself, why not? You know, I built it.
Can I race it to? No. And I'll tell you why. Reason number 1. Who the hell is in charge of your race? If you're out racing, who's in charge? The answer is not you. The race is your responsibility and you're It's missing the captain if you're out on the course.
Now I know the pull of wanting to race with your friends is gonna be strong. But you need to resist it. Your race needs your direction. It's your job to keep track of. The the race on track, maintain the schedules, solve the problems, and you can't do that if you're not there. So that leads us to reason number 2. This is your name, your company's name,
on the permit and the insurance policy. Right? And if that's true, if you are responsible for this race, then safety of your racers is your responsibility. If you're elsewhere and something bad happens, how can you respond? Of course yet, your insurance may not cover the accident if you're negligent in overseeing your events. Being out on the course as a racer could put you in your company in a very bad situation and liability is no joke. By taking part in your race, an injury or worse a death.
Maybe seen as gross negligence. Now that's a legal term for someone who's going to be fully responsible or something bad happening. Gross negligence. It even sounds bad, doesn't it? So don't put yourself or your livelihood or your business and personal wealth at risk. Stay in charge and vigilant at all times. K. Reason number 3. Do you really think your part time or volunteer staff can solve everything?
If you have staff and maybe an assistant race director, you might be able to get away with this by going on racing. However, most race promoters don't have any assistant anything. Some barely even have enough volunteers to cover everything in every position. If everyone covering for you while you're out having fun, is temporary help who is representing your company and your race. Volunteers? No way.
Don't put your reputation at risk by leaving what amounts to strangers in charge of your race. And I've already pointed out in another blog post about how reputation is a key event and that the number 1 reason volunteers can ruin your race is by being the ones who have to answer the questions, not you. If you put 1 of them in charge of complaints, scheduling issues, other conflicts. What do you expect them to do if they're never prepared for the situations? All I can say is this.
I will get the race director for you as soon as he or she comes off the course. Yeah. That will fly to a pissed off customer won't it. If you wanna look completely unprofessional, disappear for an hour. I won't be the only 1. The video it won't be the only thing that disappears. You're the leader of your race. So you need to act like it. The buck stops with you. Your role is to lead, not just when you want to, and not just before or after, You've raced your own course.
But from the time that you put your first arrow up to the time you take the last bag of trash away, You are the first 1 at the venue and the last 1 to leave. Always in charge, always vigilant, always leading. Do not put your event at risk by disappearing to a race. Your own course, save that for other races that other race promoters are putting on. You put your racers at risk. When you neglect them for a quick bit of fun, and you put yourself at risk by delegating responsibilities to other.
Stay focused, Stay visible and stay in charge of all time. If your family, your business, your reputation, and even your livelihood depends on it. Alright. That was me live on location at the Wonder Bread Factory. Let me say it right this time. You know, Live is tough. You gotta think on your feet.
But in downtown the northwest DC, there's a place called the Wonder Bread Factory, and it used to be the building where they used to make guessed it. Wonder bread. Well, they turned it into an office building. It's very hipster, very chic. Still has all the old I beams and brick places where the ovens were and it's conference rooms now and offices. It's very cool. So for tiny little conference like this, it was the perfect setting.
So during that conference, I learned a little trick from a couple different podcasters about how to reach out to audience. Now some podcasters have an email address. You have a website. You have all your contact information. You have Twitter. But Facebook, a Facebook page, it's kinda more directed towards kind of a business atmosphere and not really a good tool for discussion. Per se, as far as the page goes.
Now what they recommended was to do things a little more intimate, which is create a group. Now, why create a group for Facebook for this kind of topic? Well, because this is a, you know, this is a a podcast dedicated to the building, promoting, and directing of offer of races.
This group, which I formed called the emergence of dirt, Race promoters group is a forum in which race promoters and people who wanna be race promoters and people who are thinking about starting their 1st race, can join for free, and talk to other race promoters and ask questions and have a very open dialogue. And be able to talk about anything you want. So again, that's the that's the emergence of dirt race promoters group on Facebook in which it's not
it's not just, you know, pipping you for sales and all that kind of thing. It's it's a serious discussion kinda like just like this podcast is. About topics that are near and dear to building a race promotion business and
already have a several at least some several race promoters here in the local area have have joined in, and I'm hoping some more will come as well. I'm hoping to grow this group. And it becomes kind of the the venue for discussing race promotion topics beyond the podcast, beyond the blog. So that's where I started this week, and I think a couple other podcasters have groups like this. And it's a great way for reaching out to your audience.
So, you know, I'm I have a what? I think I have scheduled 10 topics in advance for my podcast and, you know, Christmas to come around. Enroll in the new year. Got it some more. I wanna talk about my my 90 year road map I've created. I've got a whole bunch of of great topics about the race direction, some of the nuances within the race day planning, permits, etcetera. But
I'm just 1 guy. You know? And I'm kinda big amount of bike racing. I love trail running. That's cool. Trailer is not really my favorite. I love adventure racing. Check across, you know, I can do it. Don't really, you know, not really my thing either. And orienteering is kind of fun. But that's just that's me. That's my personal opinion about the kind of off road racing I like. Someone else, especially some of these other race promoters that are in there, that they're in this group will
have way more information about a topic than I will. You know, I'm not the the oracle of of Delphi that didn't tell you everything you know about race promotion. You know, if you heard it from Kyle, it's gospel. You know? Not at all. I'd you know, my ego is not that big. Alright? You all can eatles next time. He's not to join my ego.
So I understand that there is race promoters and race education out there. And the whole point of Rechinir emerges as a dirt is to teach you the art and science of of this of this industry. And what a better way to do that than to get a whole bunch of other people just like just like me, in a room, you know, virtual room on Facebook to talk about this. So the mercies of dirt race promoters group is that forum.
Now I think you said that Thursday is gonna be the day that race promoters will be allowed to to pimp their stuff. And if they got a blog out there and it's, you know, blog for educational purposes not to to be this whole sales y stuff,
then that's know, that's a perfect opportunity to to throw that stuff in there. So they get a little self promotion. You get to learn about some of their things, some of their offering, some of the races out there because some of the races they're creating are just fantastic. And you get the opportunity as someone kinda learning and developing the skills of a promotion to have a place where that information lives and places where you can ask the questions that maybe you're afraid to ask.
So, again, as the emergence of dirt, race promoters group just started up on Facebook. It's closed group. So Just ask to to be joined as a member, and we'll let you in. Also put those links in the show notes so that you have you have everything you need to to become a member. So and I'll be talking about this over the next couple of weeks too, especially especially at the end of the broadcast. So That's our that's our second topic for today. Now on to the main event. And because it is
Let's see. This is recording on the Monday before the national election to elect president of the United States. In the United States. That's kind of a big deal. I mean, it's the 1st Tuesday of November every 4 years, and place is bananas. Everyone is talking politics right and left. I have trouble even reading Facebook. Can't watch TV. Plical ads everywhere. There are signs everywhere. It's just nuts.
But that being said, I thought it'd take this would be a perfect opportunity to start to talk about the politics that mess with your race promotion business. Because who said there was no politics in racing? I mean, chances are it was you. And it's understandable. I mean, we often think that offered racing sits outside the political struggles of Washington DC. You think you're carefully scheduled mapped and ready trail fun?
Doesn't seem like a place you would find politics anyway. I mean, you're probably the kind of person that finds a way to avoid all the drama of politics in the first place. Right? I mean, if it gets too bad on TV and Facebook, I mean, just like me, you probably take a trip out to your favorite trail, like, escape it all. Know I do. A lot of times, the DVR is my best friends, skip all those commercials. Right? I mean, besides politicians don't care about my off road races. Right? Right? Well,
only that were true. Unfortunately, in this day and age, even off road racing has been politicized. But you wanna you wanna ask yourself, when did this happen? I mean, when did all these politics and these politicians suddenly show up to my trail? Case in point, here in Northern Virginia, there's a local congressman. And if I say Northern Virginia, you can probably guess who that person is. When he was a county guy, made his
life's mission to create this green space that spanned through the county. Which is really cool. I mean, party aside, a guy who's interested in making sure that over development doesn't take place and the green spaces maintained is great. Natural trails. I mean, you kinda had to figure out how it all piece together because roads and stuff got through it. But once you got figured it out, it was a good ride, and it coulda linked some parks together. It was fantastic.
But then he became a congressman and suddenly he was pressuring everyone to pave everything he created in the green space. So a green space now with a 10 foot wide cement path rolls in the middle of it. You know, money aside, roots, tear and all stuff, bridges out of, like, anything. I mean, some of them, it looks nice. But if you're a trail runner, a mountain biker,
man, it is not cool that he, you know, they went and paved. You know, went back to Ohio and everything was paved. Right? As the song goes, So, I mean, that's a that's a just a personal example in the Ansodotical at best of politics kind of rearing its ugly head just in your own backyard.
I mean, now what's the flip side of that? Well, a paved trail allows accessibility to older folks, younger folks, you know, kids with train wheels, older folks with with their single speed beach cruisers, wheelchairs. Mean, that makes the green area more accessible. Okay. Grant you that. But, you know, still heart broke that, you know, so much got paved. It's not all paved, not yet, but it's still 1 of those kind of things where I can see both sides. So and it makes that tough.
So when you ask yourself, when did this happen? The truth is it actually happened a while ago. Having a long time ago. I mean, the Wilderness act was packed passed in what? 1964. So As long as there have been politicians, there have been politicians managing public land, trails, wilderness, etcetera. K? Here's the deal. You were probably just ignoring it. Because by avoiding the actions of your politicians, they acted on your best interest without you.
I mean, and how did they know your best interest? Well, they didn't because you never told them. They pass bills, laws, new regulations, hundreds of miles away from your races without any of your input. Only when these bills laws regulations had a direct impact on your gun money, on your races, gun money. Sorry. That's a that's a Washington state thing. Do you suddenly notice that something is wrong? You know? But but then it's too late. Right? Where is it?
I don't believe anything is ever too late. And if you haven't been hiding in a cabin in the woods and cut off from the world, just like I said, as I I started this, you might be aware there's a national election for president of the United States coming up. And in fact, it starts tomorrow morning. Actually, it's early voting has been taking place for weeks. So it actually started a couple weeks ago. But, you know, the Super Bowl happens tomorrow. It's the big day. Yeah.
Wall to wall TV coverage, radio coverage, it's gonna be inescapable. And hopefully, unlike other elections, it will be decided tonight because god forbid, it drags on for weeks with courts and, you know, hanging chads and stuff. Let's hope that doesn't happen. Right? So Many of your friends and family and even your social media outlets are gonna they're talking endlessly about who should win, who should lose, who should be offended, who should go to jail.
Just like most elections are president. This election has all sorts of people politically charged. But unlike other elections, you can only put your head in the sand and pretend politics do not have an impact on your races, especially when you go about operating a business. Using public land, operating a business on public land, or just trying to make money with a business in general. Now any race promoters do not want to even think about politics, and I get that.
I mean, politics sucks. It's complicated. It's You know? Some people say it's the it's what? It's the politics that are for the oh, I'm not gonna say that. So it's like, you know, I gotta face a rage you. Right? That kind of thing? Okay. Politics kinda at the same point. But they often say, leave me out of politics and just wanna build races. Yeah. Well, that's that's where Mister Murphy loves to come in. Mister Murphy loves to hear people say, leave me out of politics. I just wanna build races.
Because he's gonna pass a bill or a law or regulation that's gonna screw your race completely up. So sorry, you can't avoid it any longer. You need to be involved. Me to be a successful race promoter, you need to be aware that people are making the political decisions that will have a huge economic impact on you, especially on how you plan to promote and direct your events. You need to be ready for that.
I mean, in this season of political drama, you need to know what issues can aid or disrupt your racing efforts and who is for or against those issues. Do you know what those are? In the case, you are someone who just came out of the wilderness, you know, just in case you are. Here are a few issues.
I think all race promoters need to pay attention to. Alright? This is not an exhaustive list. This is top 3 of things that that Kyle thinks about at, you know, o dark 30 when he's thinking up crazy ideas about what people should think about race promotion. So I I'm gonna hit you up with these top 3. Not in any order. And you may have others. So oh, it's all the top 3 ones that I think about. When I think about racing racing. Alright. Issue number 1. The issue of land ownership.
So at a glance, this issue goes like this. The US government owns 640,000,000 acres of land. Now think about it for a minute. That's a lot of land. Right? It is nearly a third of the United States. Okay? That might seem a lot to some of us on the East Coast, where several states have less but several states have less than 2% of the land control by the US government. We're talking from Texas to the Atlantic Ocean, the US government,
averaged about 5% or less land ownership in most states. I think the biggest 1 is North Carolina with like 11.8%. It's not a lot. So you probably have some national parks in your view, some some places where some national monuments, things like that, are preserved by the federal Not the state, not the regional, not your county, not your city, federal government. Right? Texas, Atlantic Ocean. 11% is the most. Right? Not so much. Okay. If you live on those states, that's not a big deal.
However, If you're a race promoter from 1 of the western states and I'm a kid of group in Seattle, but I live in Virginia, so I I can I can play both sides of this argument very well? You understand the problem way better than the, you know, East Coast folks. Right? Out on that left coast, Just a brief understanding how what US the US government owns in each state.
I mean, Nevada is 84% Alaska. 69 Utah, 57 Oregon, 53 Idaho, 50, Arizona, 48, California, 45, Wyoming, 42, New Mexico, 41, Colorado, 36, Washington 30, Montana 29. That's percentage of the state. Nevada 84%. 84%. As long as the whole state, You know California 45% that's half of California. It's owned by the federal government. And if you wanna see the the whole the whole list, and complete account of US government owns in each state.
I gotta and the show knows I'm gonna have an article called just how much land does the the federal government own and why on out on bigthing.com. And in this article by Frank Jacobs, He states that the map of federal land ownership is stunningly effective at bringing home its message that federal land ownership out west is huge.
I mean, but who who actually owns this land? Who's running this land? Jacobs points out that according to the Congressional Resource Service, a majority of the land is administered by 5 federal government agencies.
They are the department agriculture, which is administered through the I'd say it's force service, 3 parts of the department in in interior, the national park service, the Bureau of Land Management, and the fish and wildlife service, and, of course, the Department of Defense, various agencies, military branches, etcetera.
But the amount of land ownership out west is not the biggest part of the problem. The problem, especially the race promoters, is the federal mismanagement of that land due to complicated, inconsistent, or blocked recreational opportunities. The federal government agencies that are responsible for the rules and regulations have created a bureaucratic nightmare that Jacobs identifies as a fight between good stewardship of the land and too much government intervention.
And how the land is used. As a race promoter, the issue directly impacts your capability to use public land as a race venue. The more land the US government owns and then shuts off the recreation activities the fewer areas you will have to host races. I mean therein lies the political issue. Are you for environmental protection via the blocking of recreational opportunities on federal land?
Or are you for the public use of federal land with conservation guiding your management through a permit process. Furthermore, should the federal government even be in the business of owning that much land in the first place, or should that land land be given back to the states so that they can be the stewards and responsible for the land inside their own borders. Not an easy subject to consider. 1 side wants environmental protection, the other wants conservation by permitted use.
So this is this is definitely 1 of those topics that not something you can just go, oh yeah well that's the right side and that's the wrong side. Is multiple sides. And as an American, which side do you agree with the most? As a race promoter, which side do you think agree with your principles the most. Can there be a balance between environmental protection and conservation? Alright. The next issue
is the issue of land access. So what is this issue at a glance? This issue focuses on how you access public land that is already been set aside for public use. If you're a mountain biker, this 1 is very important to you, especially after a recent report to lawmakers banning mountain bikes in wilderness areas that once allowed them. It takes for instance the case of Bitterroot National Forest in Montana presented by Vernon Felton of the Adventure Journal.
In Felton's article, he cites that the US Force Service changed the rules in 2015 and main mountain bikers no longer welcome on a 178 miles a single track. Why the ban? My critics of mountain biking believe that mountain bikes cause more erosion or disturb wildlife more often than any other trail users. This is including hikers, backpackers, and, of course, horses, you know, mountain bikes, don't get the the same consideration as those other groups.
There's a lot of environmental groups that really do not like mountain bikers. And for good cause, back in the day, mountain bikers kind of made a name for themselves as being the people who built trails that when authorized people who would run people off trails, they were the, you know, the dope smoking bad boys of Offering Racing. Now that that's changed tremendously over the past 20 years.
But the stigma still remains. The mountain bikers are only after their own good destroy the environment, build jumps, and cause problems. So there is a fundamental stereotype that is is at play here. But what happened with with in this particular instance is that they use the Wilderness Act. Remember we talked about that in 1964 to kick these mountain bikers off the trail. 1964 mountain bikes that exists. So how do you take the wilderness act of 1964 and find a way to include mountain bikes?
Well, in Felton's article, he points out that there was a number of environmental protection groups that convinced the US Force Service to change their regulations in 1984 to explicitly prohibit mountain bikes from wilderness areas. I mean, they created new regulations. They created new regulations, not congress. US Forest Service, created new regulations. They expanded the wording to the prohibition from motorized to mechanized transport.
If you're a motorized transport, you gotta have a motor right. But if you're mechanized, well, you know, that can be mean, mechanized transport. And I can think of a lot of things that are mechanized. Can't you? Mountain bikes unfortunately falls into that into that category. So this changed then, of course, not to be outdone, prompted the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, and the Fish And Wildlife Service. To also change their definitions regarding mountain bikes.
So, Felton says that the change resulted into the banning of mountain bikes from 762 wilderness areas in 44 states. Think about that for a second. With no congressional approval, a handful US government organizations kicked mountain bikers off nearly a 110,000,000 acres. Or to read Felton's article, roughly 5% of the American's landscape. Did you even know that happened? Or did you even know this is still happening?
In the there's another side of this issue too. I mean, advocates like Mark Eller, who's the communications director for the International Mountain Viking Association, or IMBA, I will link to that in the show notes at purchasesdirect.com.
Have defended mountain bike use on public lands. IMDb continually argues that, quote, from from Mister Eller, vast majority of independent peer reviewed studies indicate that mountain bikers are no more impacting on natural resources than other recreational trails users, end quote. So science has helped back up mountain bikers that horseback riders and hikers and trail users all have the same number of impact for natural resources Mhmm. Doesn't seem to be swaying a lot of people though. So IMDb,
because it takes it to another level, and they have lobbied heavily to get mountain bikes removed from their the federal portrayal as the motorized vehicle with that mechanized thing. So some mountain biking advocates have gone as far as to create campaigns, to illustrate how mountain bikes are not motorbikes.
So where do you stand on this issue? Do you think we should allow everyone to use public land? Only allow some to use public land? Or allow no 1 to use public land? Do you believe the argument provided by organizations like the Sierra Club and the Wilner Society that exclusively prohibit
mountain bikes in wilderness areas is a good thing, or do you believe organizations like IMBA, mountain biking's largest advocacy group? When they state that they wanna work with policymakers and competing trailer users to preserve access to existing multi multi use trails, particularly by redrawing the proposed wilderness boundaries or alternative preservation
classifications to allow bike access. Is that more Your ball wax when it comes to be a race promoter race promoters who host mountain bike races tend to fall into the work with policymakers on competing trailer use with and competing trailer users camp. However, there's yet another issue hiding in this controversy. See, there's there's always a multiple there's these multiple faceted arguments.
This comes from the dark side of the environmental movement, the people who are invested in removing mountain bikes from public lands that are willing to injure even kill riders with booby traps. Yeah. That's right. Booty traps. And we're talking from wooden boards full of nails
that was found in Eagle, Colorado. They'll have a link to that. In the show notes, and punchy steak traps, like straight out of the Vietnam War discovered in the United Kingdom. I mean, Streamers are going through great lengths for event even limited access by mountain bikers, but unfortunately these traps don't discriminate. They injure hikers, backbikers, trailer runners? Could you imagine a horse falling into a punchy trap.
Dear god. I mean, right along this, like, just like mountain bikers. I mean, mountain bikers already. This doesn't help the environmental cause. So it's just yet another issue with multiple sides. So some of these sides have real consequences to them. So far, when it comes to find the balance, the IMBAs
public land initiative is 1 of the few efforts that tries to promote bicycle friendly approaches towards public land protection. The other side wants bikes to be banned from even more wilderness areas. So where do you see yourself on this issue? I mean, can there be a balance between environmental protection and mountain bike use? Or is it banning mountain bikes today? And then maybe it's trail runners tomorrow.
Okay. So all this political talk is is is pretty heavy. So I save the 3rd issue is to be a little more lighthearted. And this is the issue of diets and foods. So that is the issue of diet's foods, how to do politics. I will show you because Kyle is here to help. The issue is science nutrition and dietary philosophies all offer different choices when it comes to what racers eat and what racers want to eat. I mean, so how is that political?
Well, time for the this political will be easier to digest. Pun intended. Right? What's upon a time? It's, you know, it's Kyle Story time. Here we go. What's upon a time? Pizza was a great post race food. Boy have times changed. Take for example, an article I found on theclimb.com. This is a blog post titled 12 items I wanna see on my next marathon aid station table.
Now, the marathon's an exactly off road race but you can have an off road marathon. So, hey. Okay. I think it applies. There you go. There's my justification. If you look at this list and this list is on in my show notes at merchants of dirt.com. You'll notice you don't see Pepperoni Pizza on this list. In fact, you don't see any meat at all. Mean, where's the beef jerky? Where's the pizza? Where's the beef?
Meat, among other interesting foods, is no longer considered an acceptable race food in certain circles. Welcome to the politics or the political world of food. Yeah. I didn't get the memo either. Who knew that food could be so contentious? On 1 side, you have the herbivores. Those who do not eat meat or fish defined terms that are defined by terms like vegans or vegetarians. On the other, you have the omnivores.
Those that eat anything, including meat and fish, better to find the terms like Carnitarian or meat eaters. So which side do you see yourself on. More importantly, which side is most represented by your customers? Don't know? Okay? Try this experiment on for size. Put out 20 pepperoni pizzas at your next race. Yep. Those racers that came up to you and let you know what they've thought about pizza as a post race food will identify themselves very quickly.
But is the alternative to offer only fruits, grains, nuts, and vegetables? It could be, but then there are The complaints you might get from the pro pizza clock crowd, seeing all this rabbit food, what's a race promote to do. Your choices are simple on this 1. Walk the thin line by providing options to both. Take a position, 1 side of the other, and stick to it. Or 3, don't offer post race food at all. Walking the line can work in pleasing most customers.
Like they say, you're only gonna please 50% of the people 50% of the time. Plus, it will require you to spend more on post race food to satisfy everyone. Taking a position can work too. It let everyone know where you stand on this issue. But it may also cost you many of your customers who have the opposite position of course, you could just stay out of the post race food business altogether.
But that might not make too many people happy. So especially if you've been known for providing post race food. When it comes to the politics of food, you have to decide, what is your position? Could try what VenturatiX Racing has done. It's a local event tracing company here in Virginia. They put out spaghetti. How is yours position on spaghetti? Because this was spaghetti was both with meatballs and without meatballs. Plus, both meat eaters and vegetarians alike, do like and enjoy spaghetti.
It's like the United Nations of food. Complementing this post race spaghetti, they added oily bread, salad, and other side dishes to round out the assortment. So we get your rabbit foods, your meat foods, your pasta food, expensive, maybe. Good? Absolutely. A balanced position on the wacky politics of food? Oh, you decide. Mean, there's a certain world views that you will either have to support or not support. Food is just a perfect example of illustrating some of the absurdity
that takes place. I mean, some people take food very, very seriously. Other people don't really care. And when politics, a lot of that is what you're gonna find. People don't really care about certain things, but there is that 1 or 2 topics they really care about. And in race promotion, there are some topics that you should absolutely care about. I mean, the truth is, you and your customers will care deeply about some issues and not others.
And now at the same time, it's your job to know what those issues are. By taking any position on any evening subject, there will be consequences associated with it. In regards to the issue, always remember to stay cool, polite, and honest about where you stand. And this can be tough, especially an issue that you're very passionate about. But you can navigate politics towards your best interest So long as you understand how these issues can and will affect your business.
However, to help you survive the political world, of race of the race promoter, there are a few important skills that I wanna I wanna tell you about to help keep things from going off the deep end. First, determine where you stand on an issue, most important to you, and then find out where the power bases are. Who are the movers and shakers? That are on your side. And who are the people with hidden clout that wants your side to fail? You need to sort your political enemies
from your political allies understand who stands to win or lose the most on any given issue. 2nd, you need to become adapt to discovering the information that lives in the world of facts, not hidden within the world of spin, rumor, in any window. This might be tough because this doesn't require you to do your own research and to trust sources that you know will give you the Straight Scoop. You're gonna have to go digging for this stuff.
Right? Because you need to know that everyone has an agenda. Everyone, even the people who supposedly are providing you the facts. So trust but verify. It's your job to determine which of your representatives will really address your concerns and who are just telling you that they will address them just to get your vote? Voting records are important, and words do mean something, particularly the use of precise language.
Hold your elected officials' feet to the figure to fire. Don't allow them to use the vague or that non committal stuff. We all know what that is. That's answering a question of the question or not answering the question talking about something else. Everyone hates that. That's why no 1 likes politics. Or politicians. I mean, there's always a reason they do not want to take a position on a subject. Find out what that reason is before you act.
Finally, you need to predict the political pitfall that could hurt your business and determine what you can do to head off an unfortunate event. Have a contingency plan in place, in case the political fight does not go your way. Additionally, be ready to act if a political decision does go your way. And don't like that opportunity to go to waste. Ultimately, success in politics only comes to those race promoters who stop blaming politics for their problems.
And start handling these issues before they handle you right out of business. And now you know. Thank you for joining me for the Merchant Center podcast. If you learn something about this and you wanna learn more, I have a few things I want you to do right now. 1st, go to wreckingear.com/join and drop your email the box. I also put a link on merchantsadirt.com/join.
That will take you to the wrecking your site, and we'll get that all worked out sooner or later. We're at episode 5, so we're trying to work out the kinks in that. 2nd, I wanna hear back from you in this episode, and we created the merchants of dirt race promoters
group that we want you to to join, that where you can put questions in there. And not only will I be able to answer them, but a whole bunch of other race promoters are in there to help you answer that as well. So if you have a question, that's a great way to to ask a question. But if you wanna hear particularly from me that I'm at RET Merchants of Dirt on Twitter.
It's no spaces. It's at merchants of Dirt. 3rd, and most important, if you like this episode, I would love for you to go to the iTunes page and subscribe. Definitely want to subscribe so I can be constantly putting stuff into your iPod or your your iPhone. Or even, you know, if you're you're an Android guy, I've got I'm on Stitcher. I'm on Google Play Music. But definitely go to iTunes. That's where that's a majority of podcasters get their back from. And if you really like to show,
give me a quick review and a 5 star rating. That would really help out. So Thank you for listening. The Merchant Center podcast. I am Kyle Bondo, the Reconyeer, and I'm hoping you take what you learned today and go weave Idol into Epic. Until next time.