Greg Tilque

Guiding conversations with community leaders.

In this podcast, we'll explore the human journey of leaders, their stories of humility, triumph, roadblocks, and lessons learned. Come join us as we journey together and uncover the questions you've always wanted to know. This podcast is brought to you by the Gilbert Chamber of Commerce, providing resources, connections and belonging for business professionals and modern moments.

An event and meeting venue in the heart of Gilbert. Sarah, are you ready for this?

I don't know if I'm ready for this one, to be honest with you.

I asked you earlier if there's anything I can't ask and you said nothing, so that means everything's on the table.

All right, here we go.

All right.

Today's guest happens to be the very first executive director of the Gilbert Chamber of Commerce, which led him to become the very first economic development director for the town of Gilbert, and then the town's first development services director. He founded Gilbert sister cities in 1995, a program still operating today. He's married to his wife Kathy, and they share a blended family, including four grandkids. He is skilled in the kitchen, an avid gardener, and the ultimate cheesehead from Wisconsin. He's also the best father in law a girl could ask for. Welcome, Greg Tilke.

Welcome, Greg.

Thank you very much. Glad to be here.

This is going to be a fun conversation. We're going to dig into Sarah's past and get all these things that everybody wants to know.

I'll tell you everything about Sarah.

Right. Actually, I'm perfect to him, so.

Okay. Okay. Well, in that case, let's jump into what we call rapid fire.

Here we go.

You go first, Sarah.

Would you rather sing in public or dance?

In public, I definitely dance.

What is one of your nicknames?

Pa. Pa. Would your 12 year old self think you are cool?

I don't think so. I don't. No, I don't think so.

That's a long time ago, right?

That's a long time ago. Okay.

Have you ever won a contest?

Yeah, I've won contests over the years.

I mean, you're here today, that's like winner, winner, chicken dinner, right?

It is. It's a great contest.

Favorite movie of all time. This is a hard one.

It is a hard one, I think. Lincoln.

Oh, okay.

I'm reading the book right now. That's based on from Doris Kearns Goodwin and it's just a fabulous team of rivals, 750 page book. But I love that movie.

That would take me a bit. Okay. How do you overcome failures?

I think just keep trying and learn from what you did, look at it and see how he can improve.

All right, fill in the blank.

Joy is, I think, spending time with family. And also we have a cabin up north and it's spending time at our cabin.

Are you more of an introvert or an extrovert?

Introvert?

You gotta look from Sarah on that one. She might disagree.

I don't know if you ever have the opportunity to observe him at the cabin. He's the first one to jump up and talk to every neighbor. But do you have a favorite book?

I do. To Kill a Mockingbird.

Okay, last question. What is one thing, only one that you're grateful for?

There's a lot. But I am grateful for my 25 years at the town of Gilbert to help kind of shape the community. That's been very helpful. Very grateful for that.

Awesome. Well, thank you for that. That's always fun. It's good to hear all those quick answers.

It's the first time I felt like I really needed to just like fill in all the details. I knew these answers. Yes, I was surprised by the introvert, but okay.

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Learn more@dignityhealth.org Arizona. All right, so we like to start in the very beginning of your journey. And so let's go back to where it started and hometown and what that was like and fill us in a little bit of that. Give some picture of that.

Hometown is Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Okay.

Born and raised, as I said earlier, not a cheesehead, a Packer fan. But there's just.

Is there a difference? Am I supposed to know that there is a difference?

Yes. I don't. I don't want more cheesehead.

Okay, yeah, okay, do that.

But just growing up there it was. The packers during that time were a big and still are a big part of the community. I think there was about 50,000 people that at the time in Green Bay and the stadium held about 50. So on game day, nobody in town, the malls were open, nobody was at them. And so even one year they had not too many years ago, Halloween fell on a Monday night and it was Monday Night Football. In Green Bay. And the mayor declared Halloween to be Sunday night because nobody would come to the door. And so smart mayor. Yeah, everybody. Nobody had a problem with that. That was fine. Just grew up. I stayed there until I was 1979 so my 20s and decided to want to get out. I came to visit here to see what it was like in Arizona. I was supposed to go to Florida that year and because of some circumstances I ended up coming here. And I just really liked being here. And so I'm coming back in a year and a half. Nobody believed me. But I found a way to get here. So that was a big moment to come out here. I always knew I could go back if it didn't work. But it was still a big change. And I came out with. I had no job in mind. I just figured I'd find something. And I did after about 10 days went into retail business at general nutrition centers for a couple years. Then I went from there to insurance business, Life, health and disability insurance, selling that. And through that I got involved with the Mesa Chamber of Commerce and I got on the membership committee because that was a way to get to meet people and sell some insurance. I really didn't like the insurance business because being kind of an introvert, it was very difficult. I remember going to a high school reunion. Nobody wanted to talk to me because I was in the insurance business. So that's not my thing. So I did that for almost two and a half, three years and the Mesa Chamber of Commerce. I happened to go to a meeting one day, some membership thing in the morning and I realized I had an appointment. But at that meeting I found out that the membership directors retiring and I was the top membership sales as a volunteer. So I thought. So I went back that day and said I'm interested. And a week or two later I had the job.

Wow.

So from there being membership director in Mesa, the Gilbert Chamber of Commerce said we would like to have a membership drive, can you help us? So I came over and helped them and they were a volunteer group. Then they had a part time executive director I think. And so I said okay, I'll try that. And we got successful and they came, approached me and said we'd like you to apply for the executive director position. I was like, really? So people have recommended don't take it because you're going to fail. It's small. I said how much worse could it get? It's part time person. I remember the first time I came over to Gilbert. I stopped at the chamber to look at something and they had sold T shirts and said, I spent a week in Gilbert one night, which was not a good message for promoting the chamber. Not something you should do today, Sarah. And so anyway, they approached me and I decided I would take the job. And that lasted two or three years. And the town had a position for economic development director. First full time position they had for that position. And I said, you know, I was going to apply, but they wanted a four year degree. I only had a two year degree. So I thought, I'm not going to apply. I just, I'm not qualified. Didn't have the confidence. The day before the applications were due, the town assistant town manager, the personnel director and the vice mayor all called me and said, where's your application, Tilke? So I decided to put it in. And that's. That was the start of some good, good stuff with the town. There you go.

That got you in the, the door there.

So 19 years as economic development director and then the last six were economic development services for the last six years. And that was just a great opportunity to start a new department because I went to the town manager then and said, what do I need if I want to advance here? Not knowing what's. I know we're going to change. He said, need to get your degree and a master's. So that's what I did and I got the job.

You got the job. You just unpacked an entire journey, which is amazing. And now I want to unpack each of those segments. So you mentioned high school. When it brought me all the way back there. What was that like for you? What were you involved in? Because that kind of usually builds a little bit of context as to who you are, because those are foundational things. Right. So are you athletic in that time? What kind of things were you into then?

Sarah's gonna laugh at this, but yes. An athlete. Sarah. I was an athlete. I played basketball. I have a twin brother and he played football. A couple inches short of stock year. Well, you know, well built for football. I tried football once, I think in eighth grade or something. I almost got broken half the first day. Never went back again. That was it.

Okay.

And so basketball, I was just, you know, one of the reserves on the team. Didn't play that much, but it was a great experience.

Big school. You got a lot of kids in your class or a few.

Not huge. Good size.

Okay.

Okay.

And share a little bit about your home life and your siblings and your, your parents and what life looked like for you.

Well, I have twin brother and I Have two sisters that are younger and life back there, as my wife says, lived in Mayberry, RFD it was. Seemed that way. It was just a great place to grow up. We had a good family life. My dad worked at the post office, worked two or three jobs at a time, which is, I think, where I got a work ethic there, because he really worked hard to put food on the table. We never knew we didn't have a lot of money, but that's just the way it was. And we just enjoyed. Packers was part of it and just enjoyed ice skating in the winter. And it's a good community to grow up in.

I'm surprised you didn't say you're a hockey guy.

I played hockey there, just out for fun at the rinks. But you used to skate down to the rinks if you had enough ice on the road. That was a fun time.

So having that childhood and that lifestyle, what made you want to take a leap and go somewhere else?

I thought it was. Well, when I came out to Arizona, like I said, I just really liked part of it. I came out at spring break here, went over to ASU and saw these beautiful women. I thought, oh, my God, I'm moving out to Arizona.

That'll do it.

And so it was just a. It was too cold in Wisconsin. And at the time, I was working at the post office on the night shift. And so six days a week and you'd. Sometimes you'd work for 10 days and then the day off. You only got one day off somewhere in that time. And all my friends, all they wanted to do is go drink. And I just. There's got to be more than, you know, I want to go see museums, and it just wasn't. Wasn't the place I wanted to stay.

Yeah, well, and let's. I want to unpack that, too, because I don't think I've ever asked you. You are a very cultured individual and you have a lot of appreciation for art and, you know, even founding sister cities and exploring different parts of the world. Where does that come from?

You know, I had. I don't know, but I had the chance. When I was going to move out here, I had a friend who was going to go to Europe and stay in youth hostels for a month or whatever. I had enough money to do either that or move here. So I moved here. I don't regret it. I regret it at a time because I really wanted to go to Europe. I don't know where that came because we didn't really have it. Growing up, we didn't go to museums, didn't have a lot in Green Bay for that kind of stuff. So I don't know where that came from. Just had an interest in it. Probably because we're never exposed to it or something. Yeah.

So this insurance life that you found yourself in, that's a complicated industry, as you mentioned. I started really thinking of like Groundhog's Day, the gentleman that's always telling them to buy insurance. Right, but who mentored you in that timeframe? Like, who brought you into that and how did you get through that and what was that like?

Well, I just wanted to get out of retail. And so Bruce Hubbard was the guy. Can't even remember how I met him, but he got me into the insurance business and mentored me. I was on a draw, so I had to sell to kind of make up that draw. I didn't make a lot of money because I wasn't. It was hard to sell. I remember putting together a list. You had to put together a list of 50 or 100 people that you knew and prospects.

Yep.

All the people that I had on that list, nobody had any money. They're either in retail or they lived in Wisconsin. Nobody had any money. If I could have put a list together, 15 years later, my CEOs of companies, but I. Nobody on there had any money. So it was very challenging to sell insurance.

Okay, so then you're at Mesa Chamber and then Gilbert Chamber. So now I'm curious. What did the Gilbert Chamber of Commerce look like then? What programs did you have? What did you do?

We really didn't have any programs. There was not much there. We didn't have a ton of members, but we had, I think, myself and a part time person. I brought a lady from the Mesa Chamber over with me, an elderly lady, and she just wanted to work part time. So she came and it was that way for a while. We were on Gilbert Road, I think it was 1400 North Gilbert Road, kind of across from Sam's Club. We were in there, just a small little office, and we really didn't have much to offer. Interesting at the time because the Chamber said, you know, this is an organization that's got to grow and you've got to earn your money. So they had a lot of realtors and salespeople on the board and they said, we don't. We think you should earn it. So you got to sell memberships and we'll pay you. I said, no, that's not the way you pay. A direct executive director. You I said, I'll do it for six months and after that you pay me a salary. And then because my motive, they said, what's your motivation? My motivation? If I don't sell memberships, we close our doors. That's really the big income we had. We do some events, like a annual dinner and stuff like that. But other than that, it was be very difficult to stay there if you didn't sell memberships.

Well, sure, yeah, that's still true today. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So then obviously though, while you're at the Chamber, you've made relationships then with others in the town. And so who are some of those individuals that sort of guided you into the next steps?

I think the two that were most important were Kent Cooper, who was the town manager at the time. He had been here. I think he ended up being here about 15, 20 years. And then George Pettit, who was the assistant manager and later on became a manager. So Kent and George trusted me, they gave me the job. And I didn't think I, as I said earlier, didn't have the confidence. But also we had just had a big issue in Gilbert that on the southeast corner of Gilbert and Baseline, there was an eight story building proposed. And the chamber supported it. As Sarah knows, the. The board supported it, even though I did too. But the board supported it and people held that against me. I got called out for taking money out of the table and don't attack my integrity. That was a challenge. But so I thought, I'm not going to get the job. But the town really appreciated it because I stood up for what was right. It was a good project. It never came out, but came about, but it was a good project. So Kent and George, I always said Kent was one that would give you enough rope to just not hang yourself, but get you out there and you really had to work for it and learn. And George was kind of the same way. Both very supportive of trying to get me education all the time in the business. Because at the time I didn't have any staff here either. It was me and I shared a secretary with one of the other departments. And at that time, Gilbert was pretty small. When I started the town, we had 12,102 people. Wow. When I left, we had 230.

And what was your employee number?

181.

181.

Okay.

Okay. So what. Obviously as economic development director, you were charged with bringing business to Gilbert and sustaining businesses within the community. What are some of the cool projects that you look at now and you celebrate the fact that you were part of.

I think they're in the Heritage District. Well, there's three probably. Spectrum Astro at the time was a company from California. Thirteen employees. They're now they've grown to Northrop. What's not Northrop? The Orbital. They were north. They had about three or four iterations before they became. So that 13 employee company grew to Orbo and then Downtown Hill Theater. We really had to do a sales job on the owner there because he was coming from California at the time. Downtown. There were some really dilapidated four plexus to the west of where he is today. The water tower was just a gray tower with dirt and chain link fence with barbed wire around the top. So I just told him, dave, just look at what this could be in the future. So fortunately he bought it and he's been very successful. It's fun to go there every month or so when we go to the shows because it's nice to see 400 people that are just having fun. Yeah. And the other one was Oregano's downtown at the time there was, I think two in Scottsdale and one in Tempe. Might have been another one. And they were never done a ground up building before. Just took old buildings and renovated them. So we went out and talked. We had an idea that I saw in the Sunday paper. His first day in business, he made $777. So we put a campaign together, Triple 7, like Vegas. We got 777 signatures to say we want you in Gilbert. And we had a company at the time called Chocolate Creations. He made us big chocolate pizza. We had a big chocolate gift basket. One of my staff took it over to Mark. The owner had a seat belted into the passenger side of such a big basket. And we said, we want you. And some of those signatures might have been dogs, but we had 777 signatures.

That's our secret.

And so he called and we had what we call RFP or request for proposal. And he submitted for it wasn't the number we wanted that he wanted to pay. But in the end we got him up to where we needed him to be. He just said it was the most innovative approach anybody's ever had. So we're still friends to this day. He's just wonderful to have him come here. So that came in, brought a lot of people. It also brought attention to downtown and it brought people that wanted more people restaurants here. So that's what we end up doing.

Well, thank you for that because I certainly enjoy those restaurants that are down there. For sure. Good to know that you helped bring those in. So I think one of the things that would be valuable for our listeners today is to get a little schooling from you here and with all the experience you have with economic development, give us some insight to what it is you're looking for, or you looked for, rather. And how do you entice companies to kind of come to Gilbert? Like that's a skill in itself, right?

Yeah. It depended on the company because if it was retail, it was based on numbers. And yet I have certain demographic within a 135-mile radius. If you didn't have that, the retailer, the big retailers weren't coming to Gilbert, which is good because Joe Johnston, he decided to open Joe's Barbecue. And that had been a number of businesses over the years. Gilbert Deli was the most recent one. So he brought, he brought a whole. He had the mentality because he grew up here. I know it'll be, it'll work here. We also at the time had a high LDS population and people made an assumption that nobody was going to drink alcohol at a, at a bar or restaurant that served alcohol, which was, which was wrong. And so Joel bringing that population in here gave us more clout. And then he built Liberty Market across the street. So we got. But before that, people wouldn't look at Gilbert if you didn't have the numbers. We did have a good workforce, so we always. We could have used that. But the challenge was going to trade shows. People. We'd have a booth and they'd say Gilbert. It was more like a question. They didn't realize what, what we had. So it took a long time. But we, at the time when I first came to Gilbert, the Superstition was even out to Gilbert Road yet.

Yeah.

Right. So that was a big challenge. We were on. I would say we were on the way to the mall. It was. Unfortunately, the mall was in Mesa. Yeah, it was Superstition Springs Mall because we had a site at Higley and Baseline in the north west corner. That's where our future mall was. We. We are. Our border is pretty much Baseline Road. But the piece at Hagley and Baseline, we had that piece as incorporated into town. But then Superstition got it first.

Got it. And now it's all hospitals and retail, right?

Yeah.

Restaurants. Yeah. Hotels.

Okay. That's interesting to me. So obviously when we plan for a community, things that we talk about now don't come to fruition sometimes for another 20 years. What are some of those projects and what do you think would surprise people about the length of time. Like, is there a project that is just now coming to light that maybe you had influence on?

Not now, but the first thing that comes to mind is the freeway, the 202. We had planned that. I was at the chamber actually in 85. We sat down with Dennis Barney, who was. Was since passed on, but with him and Jerry Rickey and Dennis Olson, and they have Vel Vista Lakes and Circle G Ranch, all that. And we said, where should the next mall go? And so we picked that site in 2006. And so it didn't come about until. I mean. Yeah, 2000. No, we picked it in 85. 86. It came about in 2006, I think when they opened the.

You talked about the Santan Mall.

Yeah, so that was a long time coming. But people thought, oh, you just decided to build it. No, it took a long time. And then Kent decided to put the curve in the highway so that would get more exposure on retail side. And I went through and I said, before all the people come in, let's start along there, zone it properly. Let's get the. Because, you know you're going to want more height, more buildings, more residential, more retail. So let's get that in place now before we start filling it in and have to fight merchants and other developers. So we put that in front. So that was the longest one that I could remember.

Fascinating. Okay, so now you got a different road, you're trucking down. What's the future look like for a year?

Well, as I said before, I've started Gilbert sister cities in 1995, and I've been president, secretary, treasurer and vice president most of the time president during that time. And I've let the board know that in February I would be coming off the board. And so I'll still be involved, very much so. But I'll find time for other. I got plenty of other stuff I want to do, but Sister City has been there forever. It's in my DNA, so I'm not going to give that up. And our friendship garden opened last year. That was a big, big thing for us to do.

That's over at Regional park, right?

Yeah, yeah. Very nice. If you haven't seen it, go out and see it. So I want to do more with guitar. I've got two of them. I need to learn how to play at least one. And I'd like to do more photography. I love photography and travel some more. And maybe take a master gardening class.

Oh, maybe teach some gardening classes.

Well, I don't know if I'LL go that far, but we'll see.

All right, so if you were to go back in time and talk to yourself, maybe at 20 or 30 years old, what advice would you give that you wish you would have had then?

I think to be more confident. And I was kind of afraid of failure. That fear of failure was, I can't do that. But then I look at it and you mentioned I was the first this, first that. So I guess I did jump out of that. And I did take a chance to go in and took the jobs that I thought, well, I'm not really qualified for. But at the time, like I said, when I went to the town of Gilbert, there was nobody. We didn't have any people here. So I just learned in the job every year was a new thing. So I think I would just say trust yourself a little bit more. Be more confident. Take. Take more risk, I guess so.

I find it interesting because that's what you tell your grandkids. So pretty cool.

You know what he says to his grandkids?

Well, I got an inside scoop.

Yeah, Inside jobs.

I love it. Very fascinating. I love this, the journey you've been on. Of course, it's such a great story and all the stories you've had to share with us about the growth of Gilbert, really and the areas you've been part of. You've been very integral in that. So thank you for doing what you have done and for helping us get all those great restaurants.

But still growing down there too. That's the nice thing about it. It's nice to. The nice thing too is still be recognized that we had a. I had a part in that. So that's makes me proud. That absolutely worked well for the community and having the Friendship Garden has really helped with that as well. Because now people. Sister Cities really got more on the map after that. We exposed. The cool thing was my wife was co founder of Gilbert or Gilbert Leadership and it's the first project Sister Cities and Leadership worked on together because they were part of the garden project. So that was kind of really. We never even thought about that. That was a nice benefit.

Yeah, well. And even with all the work you've done with the town, I think Sister Cities is also something that just will continue to live on. And even just the personal relationships that so many people have gained from that, it's pretty incredible.

Yeah. Because we've sent over 60 kids. One of the programs we do is a youth ambassador program. We've sent 60 kids over and they've sent 60 kids back here so those 120 plus kids have been exposed to the world that may not have seen seen before. So that's worthwhile right there.

And we should mention that you're also an honorary citizen.

I am, yeah. Of Intermutain Abbey, Northern Ireland, in 2017 made me an honorary citizen, which was a complete surprise. We had a trip planned and actually my daughter was going on our first international trip. And partway through our planning, a couple months out, they called and said, we're going to make you an honorary citizen. I had no idea. I thought, that's nice. Then they called and said, just so you know, we have a representative. The queen is going to be there. Like, oh, this is real. I better pay attention. So it was very big honor.

Well, like your quote says, if you think you're too small to make a difference, you've never had a mosquito in your bed.

That's right.

I love that.

I love that.

Definitely not too small.

When I teach at Gilbert Leadership History Day, I try to leave the group with that because those are the people that go out and are now mayors and council members and school board members and stuff like that.

Of course, if you've never been to Minnesota or Wisconsin, you may not know what a mosquito can really do.

That's very true.

Well, Greg, thank you for being with us. This has been a great conversation.

Yeah, thank you.

All right, so this has been an awesome conversation. Of course, you just heard it. And if you want more of these, subscribe to our tribe so you can get more information when we have a great guest like Greg here. Thanks for listening and we'll catch you next time. Guiding conversations with community leaders.

Ben, let me ask you a question. How do you see other community members being involved in this podcast?

This is going to be a great opportunity for so many people in the community to have a chance to be heard if they want to tell their story or if they just want to be part of this journey with us and help sponsor in a way that helps bring more people to the table with us. So I think there's many opportunities at hand. Whether you want to again be on the show, reach out to us, let us know what your story is and how you think you could be part of it. We'd love to hear from you. Reach out, let us know and we'll see if we can make that connection.

Sam.