Join us in this engaging episode of The Fresh CrEd Podcast, recorded live at the Viva Fresh Expo in Houston, Texas! Hosts Craig Slate and Ed Bertaud bring together Patrick Kelly and Shay Myers, two pivotal figures in the produce podcasting scene, for a deep dive into the trends and transformations within the produce industry.
🌟 What's Inside This Episode:
- Introduction to Viva Fresh Expo
- Patrick Kelly on transitioning from citrus sales to podcasting
- Shay Myers discusses the impact of farming innovations on business growth
- Insights into the future of the produce industry from our guest speakers
Discover how these leaders leverage their unique experiences to drive the industry forward. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and comment with your thoughts or questions!
🍊 Visit Our Website https://www.thefreshcred.com
Remember to check out our guests' podcasts for more insightful content:
Produce Industry Podcast with Patrick Kelly
https://www.theproduceindustrypodcast.com/
Produce Common Sense with Shay Myers
https://producecommonsense.buzzsprout.com/
#VivaFreshExpo #ProduceIndustry #AgriculturePodcast #BusinessInsights #InnovationInAgriculture
Join us in this engaging episode of The Fresh CrEd Podcast, recorded live at the Viva Fresh Expo in Houston, Texas! Hosts Craig Slate and Ed Bertaud bring together Patrick Kelly and Shay Myers, two pivotal figures in the produce podcasting scene, for a deep dive into the trends and transformations within the produce industry.
🌟 What's Inside This Episode:
- Introduction to Viva Fresh Expo
- Patrick Kelly on transitioning from citrus sales to podcasting
- Shay Myers discusses the impact of farming innovations on business growth
- Insights into the future of the produce industry from our guest speakers
Discover how these leaders leverage their unique experiences to drive the industry forward. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and comment with your thoughts or questions!
🍊 Visit Our Website https://www.thefreshcred.com
Remember to check out our guests' podcasts for more insightful content:
Produce Industry Podcast with Patrick Kelly
https://www.theproduceindustrypodcast.com/
Produce Common Sense with Shay Myers
https://producecommonsense.buzzsprout.com/
#VivaFreshExpo #ProduceIndustry #AgriculturePodcast #BusinessInsights #InnovationInAgriculture
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Do not adjust your monitor, your phone. Yes, it is right, what you're seeing is correct. We've got actually well we probably count as one podcaster right Between the two of us, but we've got a covey of podcasters here maybe a gaggle or a herd of podcasters. Here we're live at Viva Fresh Expo in Houston Texas Beautiful Houston Texas and joining us today, aside from my very dapper, handsome co-host.
Speaker 3:Mr Craig Slate. Oh, thank you very much. I appreciate that shout out.
Speaker 4:Is Mr Patrick Kelly from the Produce Industry Podcast, Patrick thanks for being here, hello Patrick, hello, hello, great to be here. Thank you, good morning.
Speaker 1:Good morning, and Mr Shea Myers, ceo of Owyhee Produce and also host of Produce Common Sense podcast.
Speaker 3:Thanks for having me, thanks for being here, man. Yeah, yeah, absolutely so we know it's a busy day, it is.
Speaker 1:Y'all, the show just kicked off. We had the ribbon cutting just a few minutes ago. What do you guys think so far of the show? Obviously, today's the first day of the expo, but we've had a couple days here. You guys have had some meetings.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is our third time this is our third time being here. Sorry to cut you off but, we've liked it.
Speaker 2:every single time we'd like to come back and, uh, the crowds are good. Uh, obviously, the, the business, business, uh, in this part of the world is great and it seems to get better and better every single year. So, uh, if you haven't come, you should be coming, because it's a, whether you've got a booth or not, just to be here. I mean, the crowds are great, the people are good and the way they treat you as like the, the, the, the event itself, the food, the snacks, the in-between stuff I hate going to trade shows and starving all day, and that doesn't happen here.
Speaker 1:You know that's a good point actually. So very early on, when we were conceptualizing the event I'm talking 11 years ago, that was a key focus. Like we'd all been to trade shows and conventions where the food was lacking and, honestly enough, or oddly enough, as we started working with the chefs at these huge resorts because you don't think they can actually produce something that's, you know, of high quality they're super into it, like they want to do special things and they want to work with our guests' and exhibitors' product. It's just a matter of you know, bringing it up and they'll work with you. So I've been in kind of the back bowels of the kitchens, like that. They're huge, industrial, enormous kitchens, but they have 15 different chefs working back there, so that's pretty cool. You guys come from far away, so I'm going to go on a limb. You said it already. You see the value of being here, which is phenomenal. We're super excited. So you guys are doing any interviews, talking to people. I think you said you were doing some stuff yesterday.
Speaker 4:Yeah, we did some stuff yesterday. I got in on Thursday, love Houston. I told it to someone the other day and they were like I'm sorry what you like Houston and no, it's great. I mean we have customers here, the ports here. So when I flew in on Thursday, obviously went right to the terminal market, went to see some clients, went to see some of our produce, right, I mean that's one thing, and did a lot of retail store checks as well. One thing that I do when I travel is I always go check out retail stores. Heck, I mean John Pandel, I'm trying to beat his. I think he does about 72 store checks.
Speaker 4:Good luck with that, you know, per every hour and a half right, yeah yeah, but you know, getting here and it's a good show.
Speaker 4:This is my third year after, you know, kind of after COVID I never experienced Viva and kind of lobbying to come to the show, seeing what it is. What I like about the show is it's a differentiator A lot of vendors and clients here that you don't see at other traditional shows because they stay to the regional showcase of Texas. So it is it's amazing to see the different clientele and networking that can be put together here. As for food, I starved yesterday everyone. It had nothing to do with the show, though.
Speaker 3:You were fasting, Intermittent fasting, right, that was your program. That's pretty much what it was. Fasting is the new starving Apparently, though the speaker said that's not good. So I don't know. It's definitely not. Oh, I don't know. I disagree with that. We could have a debate on that.
Speaker 4:We did our interviews nine to twelve. Yesterday we had a small room and you know if you guys see my stuff, you know I'm just talking having fun. You know what's happening, and we did about. We did ours yesterday too. I think we talked more about flying in your plane than we did.
Speaker 1:Well, that's what I wanted to talk about today.
Speaker 4:We did about produce, but yeah, I know it's great and what I like about it is certain clients go to certain shows, right like I just said, and I'm able to see some international clients that I don't see at some of the other shows that will fly in specifically for this because it falls around their fiscal year and their planning cycle.
Speaker 3:So yeah, pretty cool, all right. So that's Viva Fresh, absolutely off to a great start.
Speaker 1:It's been a blast putting that together. That's been confirmed.
Speaker 3:And not only is it off to a good start. You know it's been a great part for us to be part of with the podcast right and participate in, but what I really want to know is I want to know you guys. I want to know about you and your history. We charge for that yeah Well you know, what I think we paid a pretty pity for this Guys?
Speaker 1:this ain't free Coffee and water. You think these guys know?
Speaker 3:Start with you, Patrick. I mean, everybody knows you as the produce podcaster, the main guy as it goes to produce. So how did you get there? Because I know I don't think you did. At least you started out podcasting.
Speaker 4:Yeah, no, I didn't think you did. At least you started out podcasting. Yeah, no, I didn't. You know the podcast. I always say and I laugh about this because it's like I love and hate telling the story, because it's one of those ones, as an entrepreneur, it's I love talking about it, but it's like I love progressing, right, I love growth. So it was. It all happened in 2020. You know, shutdown happened.
Speaker 4:I had a podcast called Millennial Boom. It was based on my book that I co-authored with a baby boomer. It was about growing together, thriving in life and work, and I pretty much talked about how, as a millennial business owner, trying to work with baby boomers, right, how to present how to do technology. You know how to's. You know rules of engagement and I remember a buddy of mine. You know how to's. You know rules of engagement and I remember a buddy of mine. You know, shay, we talked about this. Like I remember, my buddy goes man, that's a controversial subject, you're talking about the people that feed you and pay your paycheck every week, and I always go. Well, they don't pay my paycheck. I own my own business, you know. And it was funny because my buddy was like what do you do for a living. And I said funny because my buddy was like what do you do for?
Speaker 3:a living and I said I sell citrus, and he goes what right?
Speaker 4:yeah, oh for sure, when I sold, when I sold bananas.
Speaker 3:Uh, that was always the question. It's like you're a banana salesman.
Speaker 4:Yeah, you do that like that's a job, yeah so like you actually like sell citrus on the side of the road, like in bags? I'm like yeah like, technically, yes, I did. So. You know, my buddy was just like you should do a produce podcast and I said, yeah, no one wants to listen to some 33 year old bearded millennial that sells citrus all day. And sure enough, he was like I would and I'm like, yeah, but you also teach people how to start podcasts like yeah, exactly yeah.
Speaker 3:I was like what do I'm like?
Speaker 4:I'm becoming another notch on your belt, bro.
Speaker 4:And yeah, no, he goes, listen, let's do it. Boom, Literally a week later COVID hit, he calls me and goes I'm doing a masterclass March 27th. He goes why don't you come in? We've got three business owners and you've heard this story. We have three business owners. Come on in and let's talk about what we can do together. I walk in, there's a board, three boards. You don't remember in high school or college there was three boards. One had someone's name on it, the other one had someone's name on it and right in the middle it said the Produce Industry Podcast with Patrick Kelly. I didn't even know what that meant at the time. I sat through an eight-hour master class and hour masterclass and, uh, I went home that night, that night and I recorded a one minute intro. And april 1st uh, well, it's funny because I had called a few people that had podcasts in our uh, in our industry industry yeah you know, laurie taylor the
Speaker 4:produce models, brent aaron, worth the produce life and then try to get a hold of university of riverside in florida, but they didn't. They don't answer their phones, okay, um. So I realized there there's a niche, there's a need to get on-demand information out right, as, watching Shay do videos and coming in with fresh plaza every week, I was like there's no audio sources out there. That's giving on-demand marketing trends through COVID. So we started. I recorded my first day, uh, monday April 1st of 2020, with Brent Ehrenwert. Four years later, we recorded with Brent Ehrenwert, april 1st 2024.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's no theme there. Right, that April 1st date? No, no, no, it wasn't.
Speaker 4:And it's funny because now we're over 420 episodes later and it just went from I'm going to have fun and just build a community together, like I was trying to do with Baby Boomers and Millennials, and it's just something that I never expected. That would happen, has happened and now, like I said, 420 episodes, four shows. Shea is a sponsor of the show since inception of this deal and I believe it grows our industry in a way that other associations and groups aren't doing. It's thriving together, it's building together and it's utilizing relationships that we didn't before, and that's what I love most about it. So the journey obviously I'm enjoying the journey, as I say all the time, like I love to talk about it. It's just it's happening so fast that I'm just trying to sit and enjoy the journey and and process it more than you know, going after it so much right, right so, but let's, let's go back a little further.
Speaker 3:So, citrus, right. So before, before you're deciding to write a book. So hats off to you on the book writing. But how'd you get to citrus? How did that get started? Because you're originally what out of california, correct?
Speaker 4:california, yeah, yeah so, uh, grandma started at hughes, markets in pasadena. Yep, you're shaking he knows?
Speaker 4:yeah, I know hughes uh, she was a produce manager at hughes markets. Sold to el rancho supermarkets. Uh, grandma lived in huntington beach all her life. My dad worked at the same grocery store. My dad went to Pasadena High. So over the years both my nana and immigrants from Canada they came down and started life for themselves and at the end of the day dad was stocking shelves. As a young man and back in the days when you could get promoted right in the store, he got promoted. He got promoted and went to work for like Shasta Cola, started selling like citric acid for Shasta Cola, got into Sarah Lee selling orange marmalade for Sarah Lee and then ended up meeting a grower pack shipper in his early days and got paired up with citrus packing houses, juices, things like that. So my dad became a juice broker brokering juice out of Brazil and Florida and then, like I said, partnered with a packing house in California for over 20 years. So that's where I started right.
Speaker 3:Yeah Well, you were born at some point, right.
Speaker 4:So you were born, and there's this citrus deal going on and at 15, my dad had us picking oranges, so my dad was an entrepreneur as well. So we were picking oranges at 15, worked for my dad for a few years and you know, as I say, dad and I didn't always get along and I started my own company and I did citrus right Like I just I was brokering.
Speaker 3:That's saying natural.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so we did other things pineapples and grapes and other things. And then, yeah, and then, like I said, said just progressed through my career and then when covid happened, just kind of kind of picked up, uh, doing the podcast got it still sell citrus to this day yeah, so I'm still.
Speaker 1:That's a hell of an elevator speech like that is well, yeah, that's a, that's a empire state building so it is uh, but it's a bit of fun journey.
Speaker 4:Like I said, it's it's. I love selling citrus. I love being in the, in the actual day to days, right, like we all do, but but right. But, but I do love being able to connect with people on a level that is beyond citrus. Yeah, Patrick, that's what I love the most.
Speaker 1:I'm going to go out on a limb and say you're on all the time. What?
Speaker 4:do you mean You're on?
Speaker 1:like you're podcast, whatever, like you're not. No, where I'm going with this is this yeah, you know speaking of millennials, you know folks particularly younger than you. You know, um, I I hate the term work-life balance. I think there's no such thing. Um, if you love what you do, like yeah, and if you love what you do, you know we we talk about all the time for that?
Speaker 2:what was it? I just heard it the other day.
Speaker 4:Listen, I I have a crazy work-life balance. Like people, people me and we talked about that too when we first chatted my work-life balance is my family and my kids. I can tell you right now I will give up a million-dollar deal to go to my kids' soccer game.
Speaker 1:But you might go home and go back to work, or you might have to do.
Speaker 4:I am going to finally say no.
Speaker 4:Really so I have gotten to a point. This happened and everyone I mean this is shane knows about this. So my wife had heart issues a couple years ago. Okay, she was in the hospital for a month. Everyone a lot of people don't know that and I, as myself, always thought like I'm doing my job as a husband. When my wife went into the hospital, I realized very fast how she does 99% of everything and I knew she always did guys like I really did, and but I realized how much of a presence like I was doing stuff but being present in the moment.
Speaker 4:Shay, you and I have talked about this and I got to a point where it was. I was there but I wasn't present. So my wife and I had this idea about doing therapy one for me for behavioral therapy, on trying to let go and trying to work on things like within the family and things like that. So I was always on yes, but over the last 12 months I would say, oh, no, you can't get me. I even have now told people if it's four o'clock and you try to schedule meetings with me, it'll automatically decline.
Speaker 4:After four o'clock I take my kids to school. I don't get to work till eight, 30, nine o'clock in the mornings. Um, I block off my schedules on every Friday once a month. My kids have off school. I take off school. We go to the beach every good Friday. Every Memorial day, every Martin Luther King holiday Um, I've changed. So my work-life balance has gone to being a present husband, father and, I would say, member of the family, compared to, I mean, shea. You remember when we first met, right, I probably worked every weekend. So, guys, yes, I do have a work-life balance. But I've come to the point now where, ed, you and I talked about your son and it's my kids.
Speaker 3:It's like they're growing up too fast, ed you and I talked about your son, and it's my kids. It's like they're growing up too fast.
Speaker 4:Yeah, no, they do you wake up and it's over, and then that's when my work-life balance came in, so it's just like the last year. Yes, guys, the last year, yeah, 100%.
Speaker 1:If you had asked me two years ago, I'd have been like yeah, man, I work on Saturdays.
Speaker 4:And everybody's in a different season of their life.
Speaker 1:You right now I mean like he's old, I'm almost there. No, where I'm going is that you know you pick it up when you want to, you put it down when you want to. I mean that's the beauty of you know, entrepreneurship.
Speaker 4:My wife said that to me, shea, remember we talked like it was like two weeks ago, shea, and it was Good Friday and then Easter Monday and I was like, no, I'm taking off the whole Thursday, friday, saturday. You're like, yeah, I was like, listen, my wife yells at me. She's like you own your own business. She's like I know that means you have to work more she goes.
Speaker 4:but what that means is I get to tell you to take off work and we're going to the beach. And I was like you know what? Tell me, we're going to the beach.
Speaker 1:We're going to the beach. Okay, I'm out. People are like where are you at? I'm like it doesn't matter, I'm like I'm at the beach. What beach do you?
Speaker 3:go to Shay, yeah, I'm a long ways from the beach you don't go to the beach, yeah, yeah. So, shay, as you come in. So I want to get at some point to the plane discussion. You the plane, I take it, you're a pilot, so I want to get to that. But you two are in the podcast game bringing out great information to to the citizens of the the world. I guess, at this point, that's the beauty of the podcast. I mean, you know you're, you're reaching, not just here, but we're reaching all over. But uh, yeah, tell us about you.
Speaker 4:What, what, what brought you to start that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, before you got to that, yeah, get us back to how you even got into produce.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So third generation farm kid Okay, ie like, and that's where most of my content you're going to find is on. You know, with that name, shea Farm Kid. They'll be on Instagram and Facebook and TikTok and LinkedIn and I'll explain where I got there in just a second Second. Yeah, third-generation farm kid. My grandfather started post-Korean War, right. He got a GI Bill and kind of went out and began farming and he worked for his in-laws all the way until the late 70s, right. So from the late 50s, for 20 years he worked for his in-laws, but he always knew his— what's he growing?
Speaker 2:So we grow nine different crops, okay, but in our region onions, potatoes, a lot of seed crops are grown there, okay, and then other commodity crops, sugar beets, wheat, corn, et cetera. But you know, really our lifeblood, we live and die by what's happening in the onion market. That's probably 70% of our gross revenue comes from our onion production Onion deal.
Speaker 2:Yep, he started that again on his own but finally was able to break out in the late 70s. One of my uncles came back with him and his dream was to always have a place where his family could work together, and you know. So this is happening in like I graduate in 99. I'm done with college in 2005. I didn't want to farm, though I didn't want to go back to the farm, and I guess the thing is, what's weird is I didn't want to be a farmer.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I liked the idea of the business and I really loved the idea of continuing a family legacy, but there was no one. So I'm like the oldest grandchild, right? So you kind of have these to me. I see this all over the place. The generational or whatnot, generational, but also birth order, like where you happen to fall in in your family birth order and where you fall in in your extended family birth order has a huge impact on the way that you see the world, and I really had like this. I was always really proud of being a farm kid and in fact, I didn't realize like to me, being a farm kid and growing up on a farm, I knew what that meant my first experience in realizing how little people understand about what being a farmer is, happened in a leadership course. I was in the student council in high school and I went to uh, to the big city. I went to portland, oregon right, I was living in nissa, oregon went to portland o.
Speaker 2:And you were supposed to tell everyone a little bit about yourself and then the rest of the group was supposed to draw a picture and I said I'm a farm kid. And everyone drew a barn, you know, with the guy with the pitchfork and the tractors and the chickens and stuff. And I'm like, yeah, that's what I'm thinking of, and that was like probably the first time Like I'm, like everyone thinks I'm just this country bumpkin that you know probably doesn't You're not Just you know, wait what, yeah I know, I know, I know, I mean it's somewhat true, but not completely.
Speaker 2:So I get done with college, I'm not going to come back to the farm. But then I 2000s, guys, it sucked and I, I, just I couldn't, I, I, I couldn't not come back. I had to give it a shot, but I told them I gotta come back and I've gotta run the business side of the operation. You don't want me out driving tractors, you don't want me trying to fix things. You don't want me doing that, you need me trying to grow the business. So, uh, you know, we went from 200 acres of onions. Uh, well, first of all, we, we put our first packing shed in in 2006. They knew the family knew that they wanted us to have a pack shed. We weren't vertically integrated yet they're like Shay, you need to do this, this is what you need to do. So they threw me the wolves. They let me make massive mistakes, and that's something that you got to realize is going to happen and you got to be willing to do if you're going to throw someone at it, uh, and throw them to the wolves. You got to realize that they're going to make mistakes, they're going to get nipped at and hurt, but we did that, um, and you know, from that point in time, we were 200 acres in uh 2006 will be 1800 acres as of this year. Um, so, so massive growth, and I've been able to be, um, you know, a driving force on that part, but with the partnership of, of our farming operation. Right, so I'm on the business side, I've got my family, my cousin and and and my uncle on the farming side, and the benefit is is we can pivot, we can move, we can do things really quickly if we have a vision and plan, and so that's you know kind of how I ended up where I am today.
Speaker 2:Uh, to speak to one thing that I think is interesting why did I start creating content? Uh, we, and there was what we call snowmageddon in our area. We had a bunch of buildings that collapsed in 2017. I was already kind of on linkedin 20 winter of 2016.
Speaker 2:I was already like sharing content, but on a limited basis, and I, uh, we had, uh, seven onion storages collapse, our, we were able to save our packing facility, but, but I started talking to people and they had no idea what's happening, cause this is really in a little micro climate just outside of Boise. I was a small area and people didn't know what was happening. My customers are like dude, they just didn't believe me, right. So I started shooting the content out of like sheer almost desperation. I had to get out there and like and show what was happening and as I did that I got the feedback and I started to understand how well what I learned in high school in that course in Portland Oregon, like how little people understand about ag and it just kind of built from there the need that we have to share the common sense processes that we do in agriculture and how impactful that is in everyone else's life Right agriculture and how impactful that is in everyone else's life.
Speaker 3:Right, yeah, your stuff, I mean, you know that resonates not just with people in the industry. I think what you're putting together resonates past that as well. Right, like you said, for people that don't know what goes into it, what's behind all of this. And you know, I think that's super good. You know that's kind of the idea with what we're trying to do, you know, is not just talk to our own folks, but you know how do we reach out past who's in this business and how can we bring people? Because there's people passionate about produce that aren't produce people.
Speaker 3:You know, and there's tons of, but they usually don't understand what we're doing. No, they don't. And there's also the other side of it, too, is we've got a lot of people in this business that don't make it to these shows or don't get the behind the scenes. There's produce managers that they're there on the front lines, but even they, you know, I think, have a desire to get more information. That's kind of the thought process, and you know we're not for you guys, both you guys.
Speaker 3:I think you guys do a great job and you know putting together content that, like I say it's, it's not wonky industry wonky, it really ideally resonates with somebody past that.
Speaker 1:Patrick and I were talking a couple weeks ago and we got into the subject of folks that don't get it, and sometimes you just try to explain to them. At least give them a shot, and I think what was the expression I used? A bee doesn't waste their time explaining to a fly why honey is better than crap. Um, if you don't get it, you just don't get it Right. Um, I mean, you want to, you want people to get there, but, um, and it's not all about self aggrandizement, aggrandizement you know the patent ourselves on the back. I truly feel, um, like we're people. I, I know that we've talked about it before. My health was so poor that I prayed to god that if I got better, that I would do. I would be extra for the rest of my life and try to help as many people as possible. At least if I could, you know, help one person not feel as bad as I did yeah, I agree.
Speaker 4:Um, I'm not gonna talk because I still want to hear the whole produce common sense start. So you better yeah we've. I want to get back to that. You just gave us the whole shade of the farm. Can let us like hanging on about produce common?
Speaker 2:I don't, I don't remember how the produce common sense or you want me, you want the credit, is that what?
Speaker 3:you're saying he wants the credit, yeah, he probably gets the credit, but I can't. Yeah, I can't even remember nudge nudge, nudge.
Speaker 1:Yeah, hey, how did you get you know what's funny is is I remember shay and I talking and you know starting that get you know.
Speaker 4:What's funny is is is I remember Shay and I talking and you know starting that podcast and you know we there was another group involved we're not going to.
Speaker 4:We're not going to say but I remember Shay and I's conversation and you know I told him I said I I think you should start the podcast. Um, I've consulted with a lot of people in this industry about starting a podcast. Uh, because one I didn't just start a podcast from starting a podcast, like I actually had a start ugly podcast, right, which was horrible, right. I think I still have like 400 downloads of that thing, like total on like 12 episodes so it's up there, man like it's really up there.
Speaker 4:But, um, I mean on on the fact of, like you know what you said about the encouragement. I mean there's so many podcasts in this industry and everybody I just had someone reach out the other day there's going to be a new Apple podcast starting. It's just going to be about, I think, michigan apples or that area. And I always tell everybody I said you know, if you're going to do it, do it, but don't mess around. And they're like, well, what do you mean? Like we're going to try it out and see if it works. I said okay, I said so I do. Let's go waste money, you know, see how it works out.
Speaker 4:If you're going to do that, why don't you just give me $5,000. We'll go to a shredder. We'll have the of shredding all this money together, right, but people don't realize that when you start a podcast, hosts don't make it past episode seven. Those are the stats.
Speaker 1:Really.
Speaker 4:So when you look at the churn rate of podcasts, All right. So the churn rate of podcasts when you're looking at, there's probably over 5 million podcasts on Apple. Today the churn rate is probably up near 56 to 60%.
Speaker 4:Really oh yeah, and so what they do is they only analyze podcasts that are weekly, biweekly or monthly. Okay, so the churn rate is very high, meaning that these podcasts never make it past episode 7, especially if they're monthly, because what they do is they get to episode 6 and they only see 400 downloads, or even less. So they get to a point where they're like I'm not going to do this. We've seen this before. How many podcasts have been started in this industry? They've had sponsors, they have people, and then now, all of a sudden, they're gone and there was no outro of hey, we're done, thank you.
Speaker 1:Like you know, like when friends left they all came on stage and waved at everybody.
Speaker 4:I was like hey, season 342 is done, everybody. But you know, no, I mean look, I mean you know, I told you, craig. I mean I have a platform that's a networking platform for other marketers and audio and podcasters. So we have a platform that Shay's podcast is on, my podcast is on and many others in the industry right. But again, same thing I said to myself with my book if I could change 1% of Baby Boomer's mindsets, right, and that 1% would just be giving like a millennial a chance right In the presentation, it was like I would be happy with that. Same thing with the podcast. When I get people to come up and say, oh man, I saw you on LinkedIn. It's so funny now because I start to say things like oh yeah, I'm sorry, you know what I mean.
Speaker 4:But you start to realize they want to take a picture of us out there, all of us.
Speaker 1:Look Everybody, look, hey, how we doing.
Speaker 4:You know what I mean, but changing that little 1% right. And when people come up and say, man, I saw your, I saw your onions 101. I saw your market report, I saw this. We, as people, get to a point where we're like us as the host, we're like yeah, yeah, Right. But then deep down inside you know, after the show, when you go back, I sat there and you get to think to yourself and go yes, we touched one more person that needed a little bit extra of an outlet versus just reading the news.
Speaker 3:And that is, at least for me, right and that's always to tell these guys. It's the feedback, even if it's from one or two people right on the podcast, somebody comes up to you. It's the fact that we're delivering content that somebody finds valuable. I mean that's always my Somebody. Well, I mean, at the end of the day it comes down to be somebody, somebody out there. We see you out there. It does not matter to me as much about being on and doing a podcast. It's more about are we producing content that has interest? Are we producing good content that has good information that we can share with people? And super important to me and, and you know, and something that we strive for all the time, and it's the feedback that you get from people that really, for me, it keeps me going in the business. I mean that's why we're still. We're still doing it because, like you said, it's a time investment. I mean it's it's money investment, it's a time investment.
Speaker 4:It's not. I mean I investment, it's a time investment, it's it's not. I mean. I remember talking to shay for the first time. The guys, I, I I followed shay, so I I was always nervous to do videos on linkedin and shay was killing it. And I remember calling shay and I was like what do you do? He's like I just follow up my phone and do it. And I was like you do? He's like no editing, no mics.
Speaker 2:Remember those first, yeah, yo I just do three takes and I was done right. I still do that part of the time, I mean, and yeah, yeah you can tell right. Listen, we did it yesterday, but the the, the don't let perfect be the enemy of good.
Speaker 2:I mean that that in everything you do, like that's. You can't let perfect be the enemy of the good, and so if you don't just create the content, if you don't make the effort now, I you know a beautiful setup like this and and something that's nice and polished, but there's also something very genuine and real about pulling my freaking phone out, you know and I like that stuff and just talking about what's going on, and the good, the bad and and everything in between I agree you're fortunate to have that with of what you talk about.
Speaker 1:Like that's what that like, your content too.
Speaker 4:Like yeah again some of this. Some of the first videos that shea sent to me was him like do you remember you laying in the onion field? Oh, yeah, like so many pictures of that, like I thought that was, but to me I was like I've never been in an onion field.
Speaker 3:This dude's sending me like videos of him laying down on his back and he's like, he's like you know he, you know he's like talking about onions and I was like what is going on?
Speaker 2:and then.
Speaker 4:But it made me realize like I was like I'm not saying it wasn't perfect, but it was to a point where it was shea coming on you know what I mean and it was like shea with a wahee. Hey everyone, boom, boom and I was sitting there going.
Speaker 4:I could do that right and I was like and it wasn't like I'm gonna cut, but I said to myself in my own way, like when I go to a grocery store, if I go to a certain place, right, like who are the people we're talking to? You know, things like that. And and I agree, I agree it was like okay, I'm just gonna start doing more video and I think now it's like my videos, like we've talked about this right, like I don't think we ever do still images anymore, because we'll only get a few thousand views. You do a video and it's like 13, 14 000 views and and that's when, again, and in the comments or the reach outs, you get like oh man, I didn't know, you put sunscreen on your onions, like that was, that was a big one. Remember that one.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I've got millions of views on tiktok too, but.
Speaker 1:But yeah, you see what?
Speaker 4:I'm saying, like that's where it's like amazing, right, like that's where it's like you get somebody that's sitting at a desk and they're, they're not able to go. And I just ran into a asparagus grower and I was like, hey, is your guy? Oh no, he didn't come to this show, but the guy's commenting on linkedin on everything we're posting to the show, those are the people we are reaching. Yeah, those are the people we want to see because they value. Yeah, they are valuable in our supply chain, and just because you're not here, it doesn't mean that we don't value and you need to get the same value as that we're getting here.
Speaker 1:That's exactly right well look, I've seen one more thing on shay's content. What I admire a lot about is that, um, you know, you can be provocative with what you're talking about. You have an opinion, right I? Mean you have the ability. For some of us that work for larger companies, you kind of have to write a fine line, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't have that. I don't have that filter.
Speaker 1:I really I really enjoy that. I mean I admire it. I mean I'm jealous actually. I mean I think that's a really cool thing that you do. I mean I know you probably get some blowback regardless, but you know what you're signed up for, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's pretty fun.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, that's the thing that I like. We're all passionate, and if you don't share the passion, then what's the point? Right, and so that's kind of what. When it comes to some of these rants that I occasionally do, I think I can only think of like three really good rants that.
Speaker 3:I've had against.
Speaker 2:But the reason that I've done that is because I feel like sometimes as an industry, we don't stick up for ourselves. Oh true, and especially on the grower-packer side, and especially on the farmer side, if I go one level below that. Farmers are so bad at just accepting everything that comes at them, and so someone's got to be provocative enough or forward enough to be loud and try and be heard.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I read something you had said about how do you expect someone to pay your price if they don't know what it took to produce the product? Absolutely, I really the product Absolutely.
Speaker 3:I really like that 100%. All right. Hate to do it, Eddie, but it is that time.
Speaker 1:We can't keep going.
Speaker 3:We can't keep going.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:We can keep going, but we just have to do it on another day.
Speaker 4:We have to do it on another day. So we're doing this world, but are they listening to us? We don't know yet when we do this world tour.
Speaker 1:We didn't get to talk about Shea's flying, so maybe you can take us out.
Speaker 3:I was going to say we'll hit Shea up for the plane and maybe he can take us to Spain.
Speaker 1:Whoa, whoa.
Speaker 4:Patrick, sorry to hone in on your. There's only two parachutes. You guys can come. I'm just saying.
Speaker 3:But no guys really appreciate. Like I say, you know the background story, you know most of that. I did not know right how you guys got here, how you got in the business, and ideally that's really what we want to communicate for the folks out there when they tune in, learn a little bit about you guys. They know about you on the podcast, they know about the content you're putting out, but a lot of times they don't know about who you are and how you got there. So really appreciate it. You know different journeys, right, and you guys it's interesting with you because you kind of took the journey together somewhat. You worked off each other with you know you and laying in the onion field inspired him with some stuff and then it sounds like he inspired you to really take it to the next level and put it out there.
Speaker 1:So really really good story on that and your entrepreneurship.
Speaker 3:Congratulations on your success, yeah success for sure, and it's great to see and certainly love having you guys on.
Speaker 1:We will maybe not that you need it, but any plugs you want to share with our audience you got any plugs? I don't think I have any plugs.
Speaker 2:I mean, if you want to go, find us uh, kid, I mean, I'm anywhere you want. Whatever platform you're on, that would be it. I'd love to have more followers. I'd love to share what I do.
Speaker 4:I like it. I mean, I always say I hate doing plugs, so I will be at the Continental Fresh booth here. So no, listen, everyone. I always say my plug's going to be this you know, choose your platform, choose your network. You know, choose the people that you are dedicated to listening to and then give others a shot. You know, try something new. If you haven't listened to our podcast, take a listen to it. If you haven't listened to Shay's, try it out and develop and understand the content that you want to see. And then help your organization develop dynamite content that we want to see. All right, darn it.
Speaker 2:I had another question but we're going to save it for part two. Save it for part two.
Speaker 1:And that is so you guys are prepared for next time what your favorite podcasts are to listen to, Because we could talk probably about half an hour about that Easy, Awesome.
Speaker 3:Gentlemen, thank you very much. We appreciate it. Shay, thank you.
Speaker 1:All right folks.