Retail Relates
Welcome to Retail Relates — where commerce gets personal.
Each episode brings you inside the world of global commerce — across retail, consumer services, hospitality, and brand marketing — through powerful human stories and the ever-evolving forces shaping what we buy, why we buy, and how we connect.
From entrepreneurs and icons to industry veterans and rising changemakers, we spotlight those redefining how people lead, create, and connect in a fast-moving world.
Hosted by our roundtable of industry experts, we offer a 360° view of the marketplace through honest conversations, lived experience, and practical insights that resonate.
Let’s get started — this is where the story of modern commerce comes to life.
Retail Relates
Where Culture Meets Commerce: Alan Miller on Building Brands Fans Love
What happens when sports, music, and food collide? For Alan Miller, it’s where culture transforms into connection.
As founder of COLLiDE Agency, co-owner of the Portland Pickles, and CEO of Official League, Alan has built his career at the intersection of passion and possibility. From campaigns for Converse and Dr. Martens to collaborations with bands like Fall Out Boy, Alan shows how premium, story-driven products turn casual fans into lifelong advocates.
In this episode, Alan breaks down why most merch fails—and how better design, quality, and storytelling create both revenue and memory. “Stop ignoring the one that wants to drop $90 and show off for their friends,” he advises. Beyond merch, Alan shares why community is built through genuine engagement, not shortcuts, and why curiosity and hustle remain the most underrated career tools.
From walk-up songs to time travel, Alan’s perspective is a reminder that inspiration rarely happens behind a desk. If you’re in retail, sports, or simply building community, this is a conversation you’ll want to hear.
Alan Miller Bio:
Alan Miller is a marketing innovator and entrepreneur at the intersection of culture, sports, and entertainment. He is the founder of COLLiDE Agency, an award-winning marketing firm known for creating groundbreaking campaigns for global brands including Anheuser-Busch, Converse, Dr. Martens, and Hard Rock Hotels. In the sports world, Alan is co-owner of the Portland Pickles, a top collegiate summer baseball team recognized for its fan engagement, community impact, and 2024 West Coast League Championship.
Alan is also the founder and CEO of Official League, a lifestyle brand celebrating sports culture through high-quality, artist-driven apparel and merchandise. Since launching, Official League has partnered with organizations such as MiLB, USL, and AHL, opening its first retail location in Portland in 2024. A creative force with a track record of building brands that connect deeply with audiences, Alan continues to push boundaries across marketing, sports, and fan culture.
Welcome to another episode of Retail Relates. We have another engaging conversation in store for you today. I'm Rich Honiball co-hosting today with two of our favorites Guy Courtin, our supply chain and tech guru, who keeps us honest on how ideas actually scale, and Jamie Lynn Curley, our brand storyteller and experiential creative, always tuned in to what fans feel in the room. Today's guest lives at the intersection of culture, where sports, music and food collide, and he's made a career out of creating brand moments that drive real engagement. We get into why passion plus tenacity beats perfect plans, how inspiration rarely happens behind a desk and why leaning in and asking better questions open doors that you didn't know were there. We'll talk merch's memory how great bands can lose fans with bad merch because we all want to capture a piece of the experience and how to build products and spaces that people are proud to wear, share and revisit. We'll also touch upon AI, not as a strategy machine, but as a challenger, something to pressure, test our assumptions and push what's next thinking, without outsourcing judgment If you're building a brand, leading a team or just getting started. This episode is packed with practical lessons on curiosity, grit and showing up.
Rich H:Alan Miller is a marketing and brand innovator and entrepreneur at the intersection of culture, sports and entertainment. He is the founder of Collide Agency, an award-winning marketing firm known for creating groundbreaking campaigns for global brands including Anheuser-Busch. Sports and entertainment. He is the founder of Collide Agency, an award-winning marketing firm known for creating groundbreaking campaigns for global brands including Anheuser-Busch, converse, doc Martens and Hard Rock Hotels. In the sports world, alan is co-owner of several teams, including the Portland Pickles, a top collegiate summer baseball team recognized for its fan engagement, community impact and for being the 2024 West Coast League champions. Allen is also the founder and CEO of Official League, a lifestyle brand celebrating sports culture through high-quality, artist-driven apparel and merchandise. Since launching, official League has partnered with organizations such as MILB, usl and AHL, opening its first relocation in Portland in 2024. A creative force with a track record of building brands that connect deeply with audience, allen continues to push boundaries across marketing, sports and fan culture.
Rich H:In this conversation we break down, turning curiosity into opportunity, designing merch that carries the memory, building community through food, music, sports, touch points and using AI to challenge not replace human strategy For emerging talent. It's a playbook on showing up and asking the next question. For leaders, it's a reminder to keep what's next in motion by getting out from behind the desk and into culture. Let's welcome Alan to the shop.
Rich H:So welcome to this episode of Retail Relates. I'm joined today by two of our rookie co-hosts, Jamie Lynn Curley and Guy Courtin. Welcome, and we have the pleasure of having a conversation with Alan Miller. Alan, welcome to Retail Relates.
Alan M:Thank you, I appreciate you having me.
Rich H:So, instead of going through your bio and all the twists and turns that you've gone through in your career that have brought you to being a guest on this illustrious program, what we'd like to start off with, in all seriousness, is this question you think about the span of your career, your personal life. What are the three pivotal moments that have brought you to where you are today?
Alan M:Wow, it's a great question, Rich, not quite as easy to answer, but I think you know, I think it's interesting to be a little retrospective on a lot of different industries. I think what we, I think what, maybe what people don't tell you, you know, when you're starting to get into a career, is that careers in the world changes around us. And I feel like if you were talking to the guy who built the railroad and said, oh yeah, where are you going to be in five years? And they'd be like, oh, I'll be building it towards California. Or you don't realize in the moment that those are things that just aren't going to exist anymore.
Alan M:So I think from you know, from my perspective and I've been very fortunate to work in a ton of really interesting industries, from companies that I've created to purchase to just the good fortune of getting to have a marketing agency and see inside to how so many other big brands work I feel like I've really used that. But from my perspective, I think you know, I think a lot of it comes out of conscious efforts. I think when you look at it and say like some things are forced, you know when, when Geffen Records, when I worked there in the nineties and Geffen Records closed. That was a big, you know, a big element of like, oh wow, music business does this. You know industries stop and you've got to really set set the stage to understand that. What are the skills you're learning and how can you then be able to attack a different passion point with that? And also, what's really interesting is I've really found, I think and people have talked about this that when you're really able to kind of master a specific industry or be able to understand how it works and be able to get ahead, those strategies, when you move them into a different industry, are like superpowers, because people are not seeing things the way you're seeing things.
Alan M:So I always thought the music industry couldn't have been a better place to start, because it's the hardest thing in the world to market. I don't know how are you actually supposed to get someone to buy an album, a record, a physical piece of something that they've never even heard before? And I mean, that's what we were talking about back then is baby steps. How to get someone to hear a band, how to get someone to hear this in different contexts, from lifestyle to retail, to everything, and so you know, I spent a lot of time in music retail, another industry that just doesn't exist anymore, I think, as it evolves. I think sort of being able to see what's coming up ahead and trying to pivot by using the same skills has been very meaningful to me.
Alan M:You know I did that when we at a certain point, during Filter Magazine, we were sort of on top of the world. We've been publishing for 12 years, we were the number one, you know, like music magazine in a number of countries. But I saw the writing on the wall. I said you've got a music industry and you've got a print industry about to fall off a cliff. Pivoting now is probably a better thing than trying to drag something out over another 10 years when I can only see the people that consume in that nature are constantly changing.
Alan M:And I think you know if I'm going to give you a third Rich, I'm going to say COVID gave everyone a good chance to really think about what they wanted to do. I was. You know, when all of the work that you're doing completely stops, you have to think about where you want to be in the future, when this, if this were and probably will, happen again to saying I have to make a conscious effort to work in what I want to do now, which is going to be using the skills from other industries to make sports teams completely unique and interesting and successful in the ways that I've used in other industries in the past.
Jaime Lynn C:I love that, alan. I'm so fascinated by people who allow themselves to evolve, you know, throughout their career, and I've taken a few left turns with myself, so I admire that so much in your story. I'm curious like what has helped you stay confident in making this shift. You've gone from industry to industry.
Alan M:Well, having great partners and friends, I think, has always been really good. I think, you know, I've always really kind of prided myself on being authentic and being curious and always trying to learn more. And you know, as I've looked to friends and partners to throw things at them and sort of see, what do you think about this? What do you think about this? I think having a really diverse group of people that you're able to talk to and communicate, that are in different places, I think really helps. That. I mean, confidence is great.
Alan M:It does come from having success in a lot of places and I think at a certain point it's like you know, you do a lot of things for a lot of number of years to prove to other people or prove to this, and I think I get to a certain point where you're not really proving anything. You really kind of start to narrow down okay, why am I really doing this? What does the success look like? And then I think it becomes a lot more clear. How do you kind of get over the goal line and what you want to do. But I'm fortunate, like I said, I'm very grateful. I have a phenomenal staff and they helped me be confident and allow me to kind of really help create the path and the vision for everyone to follow.
Guy C:Alan, I love that story. One thing that struck me when you were talking about your experience, right, is to know when this is not going where it's supposed to go. Maybe I should get out. I'll give you a funny side story. I work at Forrester in the late 90s, right, and I remember talking to companies like Borders and shopping malls who were just like this internet thing, it's a fad. We're fine, we all know where that happens. But people, I think, especially coming up that are young in their careers, right, it's, it's tough, right, it's hard to make that leap, to have faith, and you said, like how you have the confidence, but what would you tell people? How do you know when it's time to pull the record and get out, and how to have that courage to do it?
Alan M:Yeah, that's a really good question and I think it's a really. I think it's it's going to be different for for everyone and how they assess the situation and where they see their goals. I've actually found, you know, that quitting not quitting but quitting at things that aren't paying off the way you want them to you know it's the old sunken cost fallacy. You know you put so much money and time to something, oh, I can't really quit it. Well, sure, you can Just start over and think about something else and oftentimes there's a great relief that comes with like with that.
Alan M:You know, and it is interesting and I've thought about this over the time is that you know a lot of your expectations and kind of what you want, I think changes all the time and I think if you sort of stay true to really what your passions are, I found, you know I will be honest and I get bored quickly and I'm always looking at the new interesting thing and I'm researching something new and I think that's the fun of the fun of all of these is starting, is getting to learn and going really, really deep into something you would never think about before.
Alan M:And you know, and I was, you know, brainstorming on a project this morning with someone who wanted us to come in and do a retail pop up on a project this morning with someone who wanted us to come in and do a retail pop-up, and we were just kind of talking back and forth about, oh, this would be interesting to look at the history of the area and go back and deep and deep. And so, sure enough, I find myself going back and looking at baseball cards from 1909 and trying to put together these really fun stories. But I think that journey is important because it gives you the opportunity to really help educate and give value to a lot of the projects that you're working on, so they don't feel like they're hollow, they don't feel like they don't have soul. There is a reason for it and I think once you've really solidified your why, you really can do great things.
Rich H:So let's transition into the lessons that you've learned. And I'm curious so you started in music, now you're involved in music and sports and we'll get to talking about official league. But what I find fascinating is that the retail industry today, seemingly, is rediscovering the need for experience. We're going back to the days of Harry Selfridge and Retailist Theater. You were coming from a music background. How important was the product, the merch to the music and to the sports experience?
Alan M:Well, to me it's everything. I mean, I think that there's something about and I have this conversation with artists all the time, or their management, and it kind of boggles the mind when you've worked two years on an album. You've worked two years writing, recording, bringing in musicians, grinding on tour, working with publicists, going back and forth, and the output of that is so important. You know the instruments, you choose the lyrics, this that everything's so important from an artistic integrity, and then you go on tour and you put up a screen printed t-shirt and expect that's what your fans want. It's broken, it just doesn't make any sense. And so I think that you know it's and I understand why. I think the why is important because you know it's hard to control everything and I think oftentimes it's a last minute. You know we race the finish line, you finish it and then everything is the afterthought. Sports teams do it all the time. They try to solve for whatever the easiest thing is. We're low on inventory slide in some other best sellers, the cheapest things we can get, and they don't have time to plan strategically and I think that's kind of you know what. What I hope we're able to help with, with teams and artists and creatives is to say slow down, let us help you, let us collaborate and we will build you something that's considerably more meaningful than what you have. And it's exactly what we found is that?
Alan M:You know, I was doing an interesting case study. Even last night, we had an event and we had a retailer in Toledo saying yeah, I can only sell a crew neck that's going to sell for $60. I can't sell a $90. So I can't buy your $45 crew neck. I know it's embroidered, I know it's beautiful, I know it's three times quality, but my, you know, I don't think they're going to buy it. And I was like, oh okay, let me show you something. And so I went back and we have a team outside of Cleveland and I looked at both of the.
Alan M:We sell two different things. We have a cheaper screen printed crew and we also have a beautifully embroidered multiple hit with amazing product that we make by hand. And I looked at them and we make by hand. And I looked at them and well, he was right, they did sell. We do sell more of the cheaper one, but guess what? Selling fewer of the expensive one actually created more revenue for the team. And so there is an opportunity, and there is a case study to say there's two different consumers here. Stop ignoring the one that wants to drop $90 and show off for their friends. It's not just a utilitarian, you know, I just need a hoodie because it's cold outside. They want a crew, a hoodie, a t-shirt that's memorable and can tell stories and create something that's really, really meaningful, and that's, I think, the big difference in this, and I think that's what we're trying to bring to it. It's just, it's not easy, it's not their first thought, but everyone is definitely coming around to it.
Rich H:How did you land on that. You're starting in the music industry. You you progress through creative agency and print journalism. Was there that ah ha moment? Or to just evolve over time, how important the merchandise was to the overall experience?
Alan M:Well, I have a passion and I go to a concert or I go to a team and I go somewhere around the world and some people do it amazing and I drop all this money and other people are like I don't, I just, they're leaving money on the table. I mean, it's the same thing from a team perspective. You see it a lot with you know F&B, and how are you more efficient and how can you make more money? How can you do this? And there's a lot of different strategies to continue to do that.
Alan M:I think, from the problem that we wanted to solve when we started acquiring and working with a lot of sports teams, we sort of understood, we looked at what the landscape was, you know, and I was pretty surprised, I would say, over the course of, you know, having the Portland Pickles, which is the number one collegiate wood bat team in the country, and we do a lot of merch and we have a retail shop and after about the first, I guess, six, seven years, we never we did not get approached by one vendor, partner, collaborator who wanted to do merch with us in a meaningful way. Not one, and we were selling incredibly high amounts of things and we just weren't on the radar, so they wouldn't work with us. So, you know, there were brands I really wanted to do collaborations with and it just wasn't interesting to them and everything was too expensive. What do you want? You want a corduroy, you want this jacket, you want these things. How do we? You know, we have our amazing silhouettes, but how do we solve for what you need, which is a lot of really cool customization and short, you know, creating smaller amounts, which sells out faster and continues to build demand?
Alan M:So that was really what we started with, and then we, quite as part of, try to solve every problem we had how come I have to wait 12 to 14 months for a new hat?
Alan M:Well, you shouldn't.
Alan M:And we found out that was just a bunch of crap, and we can now turn around hats in 30 to 45 days and they're premium and amazing, and so each one of those kind of challenges was something we wanted to solve for us first, and then be able to go out and solve for partners and teams and artists all around the world. And so it is a little even surprising when we talk to big teams and we're like, oh yeah, we can get this for you in time for the end of the season. Or, yeah, we can get it for you in 45 days. And they don't even believe it until they work with us for a little bit and see how we're able to do it, because we understand their side of it. We understand that, hey, by July 4th you better be full of merch and you better you know you better be stopped up and ready to go, because you got Father's Day, you have July 4th, you have tours coming for fall. There are things that are really important and we want to help prepare you for it.
Guy C:From my perspective. You know and I think Rich mentioned this, you know I'm a supply chain guy at heart, so I love this story where you're constricting the time right of products to get from conception to shelf, and so quickly. Can you talk a little bit about how are you guys solving for that problem, because that's one that all retailers have right Is oh, I got to source it, I got to plan it, design it, manufacture it, ship it, put in a warehouse, et cetera. Can you shed some light on that?
Alan M:Yeah, I think you know we're in an interesting position because I'm not. Our typical order isn't going to be 20,000 units, so there's a lot of problems that big box and other retailers are going to have that just simply, we're nimble enough to move things around. The other thing, and luckily and this is all changing from a tariff perspective and the world thing is that we spent a year, year and a half, going to factories around the world and trying to find people that were going to be good fits for us, going to factories around the world and trying to find people that were going to be good fits for us, people that had opportunities to grow, people that really wanted to be in this business, people that we knew had incredible training and could do those things. And so, you know, we built really good partnerships, you know, and we've become, over the course of the last four years, really able to trust in our partners and become much closer than that. So I think a lot of it is trial and error, you know. I still.
Alan M:You know it's important to keep trying and seeing oh where? How are these factories in Vietnam working compared to some of the things that are happening in Sri Lanka? And, you know, is India worth working in? Or, you know, keep working through our Pakistan factories, and I think it's working with them and always trying to find the best ways to do that. And, as you said, you know, some of these places don't have, naturally, the supplies that you need. But is that still cheaper to ship them there and be able to create somewhere somewhere different? And then a lot of it comes down to where we're shipping to, but it's, I think it's just constant trial and error and working with your core partners to keep building relationships that really support them. It's not, you know, good partnership isn't like I need this for $4. It's how are we going to work together? Can I, if I remove this and you do this and we do this, can we get it to a place that that works? And and so we have that trust now and we're really happy with our partner.
Rich H:Well, I think that's an interesting comment, because you're talking about a relationship with your, with your vendors, and you're also talking about a relationship with your customers. That becomes symbiotic. How important is community to what you do? Again, something else the retailers are talking about today moving from the notion of social media to community and authenticity. How have you found that aspect of the business?
Alan M:Well, authenticity is. I mean, it's the core of everything we do. I really wouldn't want to do anything that wasn't rooted in an authentic, important way. So you know, the key to that is community is everything. But it's hard to get there, especially when tactics right now are not authentic, and I think you have a lot of brands that are trying to solve for marketing by saying very simple things like oh yeah, we'll just get influencers and spend money against this or that, and that's reach, it's not influence, it's not community, it's not sustainable, and we've proved that over a long period of time.
Alan M:There's no quick fix, there's no quick win. You really have to if you really want to build community. You got to do it right, you got to do it over a period of time and you have to be sort of really engaged in a back and forth dialogue with your customers. And I think you see this a lot when it's like they're not listening. They're not listening, they're just doing what they want. And I think for us it's always important to speak and understand and listen and ask for feedback. Ask for you know, because there are always things you're not thinking about or directions you think you may want to go in, but that's not actually where your community wants you to go.
Jaime Lynn C:Ellen, how do you ask and how do you listen? Is it on social media? Is it through surveys?
Alan M:How are you connecting with your core client? I think a lot of it is through a combination of a lot of things. I think one of the things that people make a mistake about and they overreact when you hear someone saying everyone's saying that you need to do this. There is no everybody. It's just like when it's like I've been hearing about no, there is no, I've been hearing about that's you wanting something or one person? So I think the number one thing is, from a feedback perspective, we always we have a rule and most are things like unless you hear from five people, don't, I don't want to know about it. So from that perspective, I think that's important.
Alan M:On the positive side, we do surveys. We want to know what kinds of things they like. We look at upcoming trends that are potentially relevant to what we're doing, but I think we have a very good idea of kind of what we want to play in. I think our aesthetic and what we aspire to be is very modern, vintage. I think we're our, our aesthetic and what we aspire to be is very modern, vintage. Um, I think we want to take inspiration from the past and create new things. I think that the surprise of the familiarity of the past and the surprise of something new is is always where we strive to be from a creative side. But yeah, it's a, it's a. It's a constant process of how we listen to people and and and and, where we think there's value in listening, and oftentimes where it's like this is just a complaint.
Guy C:What's your measure, alan? Like when you think about this, right, sometimes it's, you know, quoting Henry Ford like if I listen to my customers, I build a faster horse, right. But where do you find that balance? Where you're coming up with something that you might say you know what we're going to try this embroidery on this type of style. I'd say you know what we're going to try, this embroidery on this type of style, and we have no sense that anybody's going to like it. But my gut tells me this is going to be cool. Walk us through that, because I think that's the cool part, right, where you're doing stuff where we're just surprised by it.
Alan M:Yeah, we do a lot for us. I think we have a very small team and we collaborate very well together and I think what we always start with I think this is cool, I think this will be fun, I think this will, and we're very good about going through and it's like add this little detail. Then I think it's really good, add this little thing, so we don't waste time by saying this and we all, luckily, are always aligned on the aesthetic that we want, and I think getting that feedback and being able to collaborate with people well, I think, is a gift. I think it's hard to do with a lot of people, but when you've built a culture around people that are excited to be here and share a vision, we do it for us, you know, and it usually works.
Alan M:I would say, most of the time we come up with things that are really interesting and I will say, working with a lot of teams and artists is also really interesting, because some of our best sellers or best ideas are things that we didn't come up with. There are things that an artist said you know, I really would love to try this, and we don't even know we're like. Well, we'll try that, we'll see if they like it we might get feedback on. You know a particular product and they want to try and go into it. You know some an R and D thing on some specific new thing and we're like, yeah, I think there is a need for that. We've heard that from multiple teams. Uh, and then we'll go into it and work on on building something special.
Rich H:Is there something that you or the team did that you would have banked was going to be a wild success that just flopped that to this day day, you're still kind of scratching your head over.
Alan M:I don't know that anything has flopped. I kind of think that anything that flops there's a reason for to a certain degree, I think you've got to look at the sort of the things that you can control and then really, I would say I probably am guilty of getting too esoteric and too niche on things, where I'm like, oh yeah, everyone's going to care about this 1943 amazing team because they have this great logo and it's super awesome. And then you think about it and it's like, yeah, I do care and it is cool, but is it enough storytelling? Is there any real shared interest that people are also going to like it? Or am I just making myself a cool hat? And I think we've really looked at ourselves. As we come into new products and new projects, we really have to look at ourselves and say, ok, how do we have time to support this in the right way? And if we don't, it's probably not worth doing right now.
Rich H:So let me I'll ask a follow up to that. So you've obviously been involved with retailers and retail brands that have become involved in sports and music. What kinds of strategies have you developed for them and what have you seen work and not work at times?
Alan M:I think this is a really interesting time. We've seen a really big shift over the last few years. That are just. They're not in real life. I think the biggest trend that we always see is people wanting just to push more digital. Push, push, push. Double your spend on digital, double your spend on social, double your influencers. I've seen more than one brand that we've worked with go from doing things that are very authentic in communities and turn that right into influencers and I've seen that fail dramatically very, very quick.
Alan M:The best things that a brand can do with any culture and a retailer is to very carefully and cautiously talk to the community and find out what the community needs. You know, if you want to do a music strategy, well, in that hometown or your multiple towns where you're doing a lot of work, what do they need? Do they need a venue? Do they need a recording studio? Do they need support on getting their visibility out there? Do they need brand partner? What do they need that a brand can do in a very authentic way? And you'll find oftentimes it's the easiest things, it's not the hard things.
Alan M:I mean years and years ago, you know, when we had a challenge with Denny's and Denny's wanting to bring people back into the restaurants. It was actually really simple. You know, we said you know artists are going there after their shows, especially ones that are younger, and there aren't. You know, if you have a show from a band that has fans in high school, well they're not going to a shady show and they're not going to a bar afterwards. Find a place. You know they're going to Denny's. That's where they're going after the show. So why don't you surprise them and have the bands there and playing after shows and serving them and serving their fans? And that kind of connection was, like I said, so easy. It doesn't cost much, but it was incredibly meaningful for everyone involved.
Rich H:Was it Denny's in Canton that we almost had Rich Eisen come to.
Alan M:No, it was not. It was Waffle House Rich.
Rich H:There it was. Waffle House. Okay, another fan favorite, and our friend will never live that one down.
Guy C:Oh, terrible. I love both of them. I love both. I want to build out what you just said and Jamie Lynn said this earlier too about communication and the genuine side of it. Can you talk a little bit, because I have to bring this topic up? I hate it.
Guy C:You guys don't give me the dirty looks, but I'm getting a lot of oh. We're going to use not just social, but we're going to use AI to do more communication, which literally makes me want to throw up in my mouth. But what I love, what you just said, al, is a lot of things you're talking about is on the personalized level. Right, go to the local Denny's. How are you talking to some of your customers or your suppliers or whomever Like? How do you break away from this hype around oh, more influencers, more social, more AI to be like no, be locally focused, touch your customers, understand the community. To Jamie Lynn's point earlier like, communicate the way they want. But how are you getting that message out there so that people are like okay, I'm going to ignore the AI hype, I'm going to focus on what you're saying.
Alan M:Well, it's a great question and I think, as you really talk, I mean, the AI is, without a doubt, going to take over everything. I mean, that's just the reality and faster than anyone expects it to, and I think it always it creates this are you being responsible for how you're using it, how you're communicating, how you're doing things? I'm a huge AI proponent. I think that it is absolutely game-changing on everything. I think the problem is humans. I think we are not asking it the right questions.
Alan M:And you talk about well, I'm going to go into AI and develop a communication strategy and there it is. It's like well, that's the wrong way to use it. The right way could be to develop something and ask it to find all the holes, find you all the problems, find all the challenges, find out how I can, what's missing, how can I communicate better? What are the issues with that? I think that's the thing. We're not. We're just not communicating correctly.
Alan M:You know it takes time to adopt the things correctly. I think the biggest challenge I have and I'm surprised at it too, because we have a lot of younger people on our staff and it has taken time to get them to adopt their thinking, to using it properly and using it to make themselves smarter, more agile, more efficient. They're not using it that way yet and it's maybe they don't have the experience yet to understand what good ideas or bad ideas are yet, but there's the potential, is lasting, and communication, as an example, is the most important thing that we do in our company. If we're not communicating well, somebody is going to be angry and something's going to be done wrong, and it takes much more time to undo and redo and make sure everyone's good with it than another way of doing it as well. So it's definitely an interesting thing and it's going to consistently change over the course of the next few years.
Jaime Lynn C:Oh, and I think by Camino, you've built communities around everything from music to sports lifestyle brands and it's authentic, right? You know I've said that's something that really is the thread throughout everything that you do. What do you think it really takes to build an authentic community today? Because everyone's trying to do that and, as you said, some are failing?
Alan M:Well, it's hard and I don't know that there's a silver bullet to it, and in fact I know there's not. I've had conversations with a lot of owners of other businesses or teams and they're like, okay, great, how do we do that? How do we get 3,000 more people next week? How do we? And all of those short-term things are facades. I think sometimes we're not doing a good enough job of thinking about how we ourselves want to discover new things. Do you want to see it on an ad 10 times over? Do you want to see it from someone who you don't relate to? Where are you getting your messaging from? Are you able to relate to those people? Does those people have credibility in the world that you're bringing to it? There are a lot of questions you have to ask yourself and, more than anything, you've got to make sure there's a need and a desire for that community.
Alan M:You know we started a soccer team in Portland this year the Portland Bangers community. You know we started a soccer team in Portland this year the Portland bangers and it was once again something out of nothing. There was no team, there had been a tech, there had been these teams, this level, in the past. They've all failed and this is the first one that's been successful and we did it in a very, very short period of time. Why that was able to win is one. There's a huge need in the market If it's marketed to the right way.
Alan M:I think people had to understand the value of the level, understand the value of the community, understand what we're bringing to it and feel like they could be a part of it. And it's taken. We've seen it over the course of our season that it's gotten louder every game, noisier, rowdier, more exciting. We had a player the last two games, our captain actually jumps up into the stands now when we score a goal and just goes crazy with the crowd and that to me, was like they buy it, they get it, they understand the players, understand what they're trying to do.
Alan M:The fans then appreciate that the players care so much, then appreciate that the players care so much, and I think a lot of it just comes down to creating a culture that supports each other and we're all sort of united on what our goal is, and I've always kind of felt that sports brings that out better than anything else, because you really get to teach and learn teamwork in a way that is so crucial, and then a lot of brands and retail communities.
Alan M:They don't have that and they don't see it. So it becomes very hard for them to really visualize what a great community looks like because they don't see it and not everyone has the vision. And I think, going back to AI, it's another great opportunity to say you know what it's going to look like, it's going to look like this, and that helps us tell our tale and it helps us sell in concepts, whereas before it might be too hard for them to even understand what that could look like that admiration that athletes had for musicians and almost envy and the musicians that had the same for athletes, and then bring in celebrity chefs.
Rich H:To what extent have you been able to leverage that in building brand communities?
Alan M:Well, rich, that's a great callback and it's funny that you know that is a. It's a concept that I really have leaned into and talked about for a number of years and I mean we were probably talking about this 10 years ago in different ways and we'd expose each one in different ways. But actually until the last couple of years I wasn't able to facilitate that in a meaningful way until officially got its legs under it. But what we found in probably one of our biggest success stories, as officially, is collaborating with artists and musicians and, as you can imagine, there's a lot of voices. But when you have partners that are excited about that and want to work together on it, and you put the artists in the sport world and vice versa, it's absolute magic because the biggest artists in the world become little kids on a baseball field and these sports athletes that go to a backstage at a concert is the coolest thing in the world to them.
Alan M:And so, you know, we had a collection a couple months ago where we brought together Fall Out Boy and the Iowa Cubs and Fall Out Boy is big Chicago, big Cubs fan all these sort of things and you know and the team really wasn't even they know a little bit about Fall Out Boy was, but they weren't really fully even prepared to understand how big of a band that was, how big their following was, and they absolutely got completely inundated with calls. The entire collection sold out in less than 30 minutes and they were kind of caught off guard Like, oh my, like, what do we do with the rest of the pieces? Like, should we hold them? Should we like what you know? And it became this huge movement and it's like I said, it's very hard to sort of quantify when you take one big thing here, a second big thing, it's not actually three, it's like 10. Because bringing two fan bases together, when you do them right, is the greatest.
Alan M:And we've got a collection coming out next week with Coheed and Cambria and the Brooklyn Cyclones, and then we've got a really interesting one the following month where we have the Killers and the Las Vegas minor league team, the Las Vegas Aviators, and I think that's a really interesting thing. The Killers are from Vegas. There really are not many bands from Vegas. So getting to kind of tell the Vegas story through the Killers, one of the biggest alternative rock bands in the world, and this great team that supports their community, I think, going to be one of the bigger things that we should I have to say, alan, you rattle off a bunch of minor league teams, which is near and dear to my heart, cause, like, as you can tell, I love hats, like you, and I've been to Las Vegas stadium.
Guy C:I've been, I've tried to go to the Cubs and all this Can you talk? Cause I think it's really fascinating all you're saying, these collaborations, but can you talk about would this have been possible 10, 15, 20 years ago, before the rise of digital mobile, the intern, the interwebs? Before the rise of digital mobile, the interwebs, as we call them, instagram and all this? My kid and I just ended up going to a Boston Bolts game the other day. Uslb Sat there and watched. It was fantastic. I'm here in Vermont, there's Vermont Green, that's how it just came up, and they've exploded. They've exploded everywhere, but a lot of it is generated because they're on Instagram, they're on social. I can access them through the. I can watch their games on the internet. I don't have to go to ESPN or CBS. Would this have been possible 20 years ago, as you're?
Alan M:seeing the success today. It would have been harder, it would have been possible. You know, the social has really created something where you know everyone has a voice in it and so whoever's putting money behind it is the ones that are going to be seen. For the most part, the way to counter money is to be ultra creative, to be able to come up with content that can beat the algorithm of having to spend money to do that. It's a really good question. I think there's always been great merch and great pieces, and I think people that have you know 20 years ago, that were committed to doing this, were ahead of the curve and really understood that and did a great job. But I don't think there's been a lot of mixing. I think that's what's really interesting about and I think, once you know, as I got into the sports world like there are not that many people that come in from an ownership perspective, with a creative background. They're oftentimes attorneys, banking, financial services, where they know how to make money and they made a lot of money and they buy teams. The opportunity that we had was well, we want to come in and inspire creatively and that's a different. It's just it's a different way of looking at it and I have really found over my time in sports is that every ownership group comes in with a totally different interest and until you understand why they're in it, they're not all in it for the same reason. I mean, some people are ultra competitive and they want to win, win, win and they're just like winners. That's the key. There are some owners, and a lot of them, that the greatest thing they could do is be on the field for batting practice and walk around and maybe coach third base at one time. And you have other people that are there because it's an ego play and their local market. It makes them a big shot and they get to play off of that. We're the minority. So I think you know I think there's probably a lot of I know there's a fair amount of apprehension when we kind of come into leagues because we're not going to look at what the last guy did or traditionally what they did. We're going to come in with something that you know is authentic to our market and that we think can really grow and be a viable amplification of our market.
Alan M:And I think you know we've had a lot of conversations this week about Portland and you know we're launching a women's soccer team next year and you know some of the things that you know conversations we have about that is, portland's an unbelievable city and I think from a national and global perspective it has just been so much negativity and so so many terrible things. But it's really not the case. In fact, it's almost the opposite. I think people are, you know, really dunking on Portland because they're jealous of the unbelievable amount of creative freedom that you have and that most people in them who live or move to Portland have this ability to do anything that they want, that they feel passionate about. And that's why you have a lot of people that people are like oh, those guys are weird. It's not that they're weird, it's just that they don't give a crap what you think about them and they're going to follow their passion and their dreams.
Alan M:And I think that Portland's a market that overachieves on that element and to me that's fascinating. And there's just not that many markets. I mean Austin, texas, is one of those markets. If you look at a lot of the counterculture areas in this country, those seem to be where you find a lot of creativity and not that much creativity in sports teams. Oddly enough, that's kind of where we found a really fun niche for us.
Rich H:So I'm going to pivot to the advice part, and I'm going to let Jamie Lynn and Guy take this one. But I want to ask the first question, the more personal one, and it's about finding that work-life balance or work-life harmony. Several years ago I remember having a conversation with you where you were saying it's going to be slow for the for the next few months, not necessarily worried about it, but my son and I are going to go see a few baseball games. Tell me about that.
Alan M:Well, I would. I mean, I feel like I've I've put a lot on my plate because I don't like to not have things going on. I've definitely overdone that. I think I overcompensated for being bored one time.
Alan M:To your point, rich, I think what's really interesting about where you find inspiration is you're not going to find it in front of your computer screen. At least it's not the way it works for me. I think you find inspiration by going out and seeing what other people are passionate about. Oftentimes that's traveling, seeing how somebody else does it. A retail experience somewhere can be very inspiring, seeing how sports teams do it, and I think that's that. A lot of my passion comes from visiting sports teams in other countries, and I think that's where you really can borrow interesting ideas, bring them back and, kind of you know, work them into how you're doing things. But that's why baseball in Japan, korea, mexico. Work them into how you're doing things. But that's why baseball in Japan, korea, mexico, dominican is unbelievable and completely different from how it's perceived here.
Alan M:You need to take time. I'm guilty of this, when I get too busy, of going out and saying stop working on the things I am, Go out and see what other people are doing, just so you start to understand and feel like, oh, that's something that could work really well, solve another problem you might've been having with something else as well. It's a process, for sure, and now I think I'm probably looking for what that next thing can't just go to a baseball game and expect to be inspired anymore. I've ruined that for myself because I actually we're so detailed and we have so much engagement that I actually get bored going to a lot of other games now because we've sort of pushed ourselves to a point where it's tough. So I'm always looking for that next experience. That is super cool.
Jaime Lynn C:Alan, I have a question for you. What is an underrated skill or trait that you look for in people, whether it's a partner, an employee, you know, maybe a new collaboration?
Alan M:I would say it's exactly what you guys are doing today. It's asking great questions. I cannot I just cannot understand this. This is such an easy thing, but people have such a hard time with it is the better questions you ask. It inspires multiple things. You learn from it, but you also can sometimes think about something differently. It helps sort of what you're working on. So I think probably one of the most I mean it's easy to say work hard, grind. I always look for people that work hard, grind, are kind, are great team members, people that want to see their colleagues succeed. I always found that was my biggest problem with the record industry and music business was for you to succeed. Other people had to fail. That's a broken model in my mind. I never wanted someone to fail for me to succeed, I want everyone to succeed. That's our job is to carry everyone, bring everybody up. So I think great questions is something that really differentiates people from just talking about themselves all day.
Guy C:I love that. So, Alan, to build on that, if I'm a little guy like me or I'm a student coming out of college, what are the things that, as you're starting out, you're looking for the next place to find inspiration? You've been to so many baseball games, but how do you and I know it's cliche, right Get out of your comfort zone? But how do you do that? What would you tell people?
Alan M:How do you do that? How do you take that first step? Well, everyone's comfort zone is different. I mean, I think that's the first thing to understand is, you know, a lot of people, and including myself, are very introverted. We spend a lot of time thinking we time on by our own and that it helps us to be able to communicate better to other people. Often, other people are very extroverted, which work great with introverted people, because they can do things that other people can't. There are a lot of tools.
Alan M:I always see this. It's so easy to stand out and I can't understand why more people you know people that work for us don't do this. You know it's making yourself visible. I mean, it's really simple. I believe heavily in internships. I think that the more internships you can do at any age are amazing, because it gives the business owners an opportunity to see what you do and see who you are and see how you perform under pressure which are the hardest things to gauge in an interview and if you can go in there and show people that, oh, I get this, I'm all in, I'll grind, I'll be there at five in the morning, I'll do this late night, I'm all here for the team. I'll support people. I'll grind. I'll be there at five in the morning, I'll do this late night. I'm all here for the team. I'll support people. You're an instant hire. I mean, it's not complicated. I mean there.
Alan M:Very rarely, if ever, has been an opportunity where we see someone and they're like we don't say, hey, let's find a way to bring them through in some way. But it's the constant you're visible, you're doing the right things. And it trickles upward Everyone likes you, everyone's like I want to be around them. They've really helped me. I don't think it's as hard as people look at it.
Alan M:I think it's just a matter of following the things you love. People reach out to me and they're like, oh my God, I love this kind of stuff. I really need an internship, I want you, it's great. And then you're in and then I never meet them Like, well, how come you didn't say hi? Or how come you didn't tell me what you liked or knew, or this or our time is precious. But I think for at least for me, I'm always open to trying to make time to help people and make them better at what they're doing, and I think they just miss those opportunities to ask and to continue to grow and ask these questions, and everyone wants to, you know, is interested in talking about what makes things successful. But you got to ask the questions, you got to be visible.
Rich H:Love those answers and I think it is a, and I like the fact that you've mixed the introverts and the extroverts because I think it is a good combination. I think that one can play off of the other. All right. So we're going to pivot to the rapid fire round. I know this is the part that you've been looking forward to the most. I'm going to kick it off and then to set it up. We'll go to Guy and then Amy Lynn and then I'll come back for maybe a bonus. One Depends on if I want to throw you for a loop and we'll close out. But I have to ask with your experience in music, do you have a walk on song?
Alan M:You know it's funny. You ask that and I've been asked it before and I gave terrible answers, and so I wanted to think about it a little, and now I have an answer for you. I'm going to go with David Bowie Heroes as my walk-up song. I love that choice Perfect.
Jaime Lynn C:Okay, I'm going to ask you what is the one superpower you wish you had?
Alan M:Another great question. I would very, very much like to time travel. I get bored of some of the current cities because I've had these experiences, but I feel like if I could go to these cities 50, 100 years ago, a thousand years ago, a hundred years in the future, I feel like I would have new experiences. I had this epiphany recently, and maybe everyone else realizes this. But when you go to a city, you're not going to a city, you're going to a city and a time and a place that will never, ever be the same again, and I don't think you realize it until visiting maybe again five or 10 years later.
Alan M:It's like, oh, this isn't the way I remember, and it's not that you remember it poorly, it the way I remember it. This is a way. And it's not that you remember it poorly, it's that we are changing so rapidly. It's always evolving and I've had both experiences with that. But yes, I would very much like to go and see cities in lots of different time periods. So, thank you, and if you can help bring that to fruition, I would, I'd be grateful.
Jaime Lynn C:OK, a follow up to that what's the one city would go to?
Alan M:Oh, that is good. That that is good. I could go visit all of them. Now I think at this point, I love, I've always loved, southeast asia. I, I have, um, I I was just mentioning I was talking to a friend about this when we, when we first went to, uh, laos like in thailand, you know, 25 years ago the first time, and we were going up into the hill tribe thailand, there's the karen tribes and a few other, and we went all the way up there and we were talking about what do you think is going to happen when they get internet? And we were like, nah, they're so remote, it's not going to matter, it'll be fine, their culture will be intact. And, my God, I couldn't have been more wrong. That is just the biggest difference ever. So I'd like to go back and see some non-tech worlds. Good luck with that, thank you.
Guy C:All right, so I'll ask you this one last from my end, my last question. I'm going to deviate a bit, because you talked a lot about minor league baseballs what are your three favorite minor league baseball parks that you recommend people to go to?
Alan M:Oh gosh, that's a great one. Well, I have to say mine. So Portland Pickles, obviously you need to go to. I would also say our other team, the Lake County Captains in Cleveland, is fantastic. Beyond that, I mean there are, I love all of them. I mean I love all of them honestly. I love them all for the really unique and interesting reasons that make them each special. If you're in Dallas and you want to go down a lazy river in Frisco, you've got a great opportunity.
Alan M:I think Nashville, as you mentioned, is one of the most beautiful, most engaging parks that I've been to. I mean, I really believe some of these new parks is what Major League Baseball should be. It's so intimate, the experience is so electric that I've really felt that baseball should be enjoyed by less than 10,000 people. I mean, I think that's the sweet spot for me is 4,000 probably. I really like that level. I think that creates the intimacy and the community.
Alan M:You know I had someone at the Pickles game recently say, oh, this is the place to be. There's the commissioner up here or our state senators over there and like, yeah, that's the point of a community gathering is that you get to see all these people. So I would say, you know I've been to a lot of stadiums. I'd love to hear what your favorites are. I think they're all really interesting, for I mean, you see there's roller coasters at Brooklyn Cyclones and there's the Altoona Curve as a roller coaster, and you know they're all so interesting. I think the opportunity is how do you tell the story of your community through that experience and I think the best minor league teams. You walk out of there saying like, oh yeah, that barbecue sauce was amazing. I'm so glad I went there. I would never have tried that vinegar based thing and that's what you get in North Carolina. I think that's when you're doing it well, yeah.
Guy C:So I will say, alan, if you haven't been, the Salt Lake City Bees their new stadium amazing, because the backdrop is the mountains, so you could just sit there at home plate and look out, and it's just. The venue is absolutely breathtaking too. I agree 100% with what you said. Those minor league teams, the ballparks, they're such part of the community, it's awesome, that's great part of the community.
Alan M:It's awesome, that's great. No, I had not been to Salt Lake yet, but, funny, I was just looking at a report and they're like they absolutely, from a retail perspective, are one of the absolute top teams in minor league baseball. So they, you know, we can see the value in building a new experience, a new stadium. It absolutely reinvents the whole community.
Rich H:All right. So before we let you go and create your next business, one curve ball, because I know you won't say the Yankees and Metallica.
Alan M:Dream collaboration, an artist and a sports team and who knows, maybe they're listening right now and they're going to pick up a phone.
Alan M:Well, there are a couple of interesting ideas we're working on and, as growing up a Baltimore Orioles fan because I didn't know anyone else was an Orioles fan and they had a really cool logo and I love the jerseys in the early 80s I really wanted to bring something that was special to that, and I think working with somebody like a Joan Jett that's a huge Orioles fan would be something that would be really, really cool. I think the best collabs are going to be the musicians that are obsessed with their local team and I think those are the ones you know when, when we can pull off a Jack White collab, uh, with the Detroit Tigers. I think those are the kinds of things that are really going to be moving and meaningful, because I think the design and everything we would do to launch it is going to be really elevated. So they're coming. There's a lot of fun ones coming back, coming coming through over the next year, uh, that we have some, some things we're working on.
Rich H:Outstanding. Well, appreciate you joining us today. This has been a uh, it's a masterclass. It's uh. I love the passion that you bring in for sports, for music, but for authenticity, community and damn good merch.
Alan M:Uh, thanks, rich. Well, it's always a pleasure.
