The New Era of Sports Fandom with Marketing Guru Ken Turner, Chief Marketing Officer at Fanatics Collectibles

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Now you see, I still talk to folks about this idea, the power of one. So you never know the difference that the number one can make. It can be one team, one goal, one objective, one business, one conversation that you have with a stranger. One word. And that word can be hello. The impact that you can make on someone's life is amazing. And.

To thrive in a rapidly evolving landscape, brands must move at an ever increasing pace. I'm Matt Britton, founder and CEO of Suzy. Join me and key industry leaders as we dive deep into the shifting consumer trends within their industry, why it matters now, and how you can keep up. Welcome to the Speed of Culture. Today we're going to be speaking with veteran marketing executive Ken Turner, who early this year was appointed chief marketing officer at Fanatics Collectibles. He was previously the executive Vice president CMO Red Bull, one of my favorite brands. And he was recently recognized by Savoy magazine as one of the top, most influential black executives in Corporate America for 2022. Ken, so looking forward to this. Great to see you today.

Great to see you as well. Thank you for having me. This should be fun.

Absolutely. So I was looking through your background, as I always do, in prepping for this podcast, and one question that came up off the bat is, you know, you graduated from Marquette and then you went into the workforce and then decided to go back and get your MBA in in marketing. When you look back on that decision, was that the right decision? Because there's a lot of discussion now, is college worth it? Is getting your MBA worth it? What are your feelings on the topic?

It really depends on why you're going back. So I was in a world that was finance driven, a little bit of technology, and it wasn't what I really wanted to do. So I went back to getting MBA to switch careers. It is difficult to switch careers or switch functions in your current organization if you are a specialist in something. And so it was almost like a reset for me. What I tell people is if you're going back to get an MBA to do the things that you're already currently doing, it's probably not a good idea to do it. Even organizations recognize that it's probably not as necessary. I will tell you, like some folks will say, I live in Northwestern and Kellogg is recognized as one of the greatest marketing schools in the world. I didn't take any marketing classes. I took more organizational behavior and finance classes because all the marketers that I knew said whenever you go to wherever organization you'll be, they'll teach you marketing. So it's not necessarily about the education, but if you want to switch careers, I'd say the other thing. There's three things. The second thing is the network's phenomenal. I met some of my closest friends by kind of doing the MBA and going back to school. And the third thing is the network continues to be amazing. So having kind of Northwestern MBA or whatever it is, network of folks you can tap into, not necessarily for work or jobs, but just to have an education area, talk to folks about things, it's pretty cool. If I had to do it again, someone asked me this before, I probably wouldn't do it. I probably, knowing what I don't know, I probably would have started in marketing and probably not done the financing to begin with.

But you didn't know what you know now. And it's always 2029.

Exactly. That's. That's a great point.

And what's interesting is when you were at Kellogg and you started there, it looks like in 2003, and it makes sense to me that you wouldn't learn marketing because I doubt the professors would have been able to prepare you for the change that was about to happen over the next 10 to 15 years in digital. I mean, in 2003, Facebook was barely invented. There was no YouTube, there was no iPhone. All the things that shape modern culture and modern marketing didn't exist yet. So anything you would have been taught probably would have been dated by the time you got out and actually got into the real world, especially for brands like Red Bull. Would you later work, which is one of the most progressive marketers really in history?

Yeah, for sure. I mean, that was a. That's a long time ago. Thank you for reminding me of that matter. But I would tell you though, in 2000, 2003, if you remember, like those were the years of consulting and investment bankers. Like everyone wanted to be on the street. Like everyone wanted to be on the street or in consulting because that's where the opportunities. I mean that was right before kind of the mid, like 2005, 2006, where all of a sudden job market wasn't as good, but it was right before that. And so it was like one of those things where everyone was like, let's do a little bit more of consulting and let's do a bit of more of banking. And so no one was really talking about marketing in the way that we talk about it now. Experiential marketing that you see at Rebel, that wasn't a thing. No one was really doing that. It was about big budget, spit out big advertising budget and linear tv.

Well, because it was before the Internet as a mainstream consumption habit. So the only way brands could build their brand rank 32nd spot so the notion of marketing didn't exist.

And freestanding inserts like you remember those, those promote promotional things. Yeah, right. And then the mailing, like so you get the little things in the mail and the snail mail. I mean those were the marketing levers of the day back then.

So after how you spent endless thing 10 years at SC Johnson, obviously one of the preeminent CPG companies in the world. And it definitely is a common theme at the Speed of Culture podcast where we speak to people who are in prominent positions like yourself, who cut their teeth, got their chops, so to speak, at a large CPG like Procter & Gamble or SC Johnson or Unilever. Why is going that path sort of right out of getting your MBA right out of school, a good one, what do you learn from working at a CPG that's applicable to other things you do?

We talked about it a little bit earlier. You kind of learn what you don't know. Like you don't know and you don't know. And going into a CPG organization that has some tradition, it helps you to understand that there's probably three things I would say I learned from working at SC Johnson. One is process. I mean SC Johnson is probably 150 years old right now. And you don't get to be a fifth or sixth generation organization without having some process and some clarity with respect to what it is you want to do. So process isn't. It doesn't exist to slow you down. It's there to make you more efficient. So how do you get through things and do things with impact process kind of helps you that. So that's kind of one. The second is foundation for what's important with respect to marketing. That is the consumer. It is consumer centric marketing. It is a marketing led organization. And there's nothing like being in a marketing led organization because at the end of the day, the we all know the consumer, the fan, the collector, whomever it may be, they decide being in an organization that thinks consumer first and then goes to product based on the consumer, it helps you to understand the importance of the consumer. And the third thing is, as I look back, I didn't realize how much I would actually like marketing. I actually thought I'd go to SC Johnson for a couple of years and then figure out how to get back to finance because I want to be a general marketer. And then it was the love of the consumer and the impact that those brands made on the consumer is that, you know what, this is pretty cool. Like if you think about the role of marketing to motivate consumers, spectator, an audience, to think, to feel, to do in a positive way, that was just kind of where I wanted to be. And it's like, this is really cool. I'm glad I did this.

Yeah. I mean, I'm always asked why I love marketing so much and I just love the notion that you could dictate another human's behavior through strategy and through delivering on their unmet needs. It's just a lifelong challenge to be a great marketer. You never fully succeed. There's always more to uncover, more insights to cover more, uncover more consumers to learn about and impact.

I always tell people there's so many different ways to get to a point in finance, which I mean, I still love Excel. There's an answer, there's an R squared, there's a regression. And marketing you have an opportunity to explore, to do something different, to reach the same point. Exactly as you said, to motivate consumers behavior, which is really, really cool.

Absolutely. And one company that has really been incredibly effective at motivating consumers behavior is Red Bull, who really in my energy drink category. When you joined Red Bull in 2015, they had already kind of rose to dominance and you joined as director of marketing and worked your way up to cmo. When I think of Red Bull, I think of, you know, lifestyle marketing and I think of a company that really sort of embedded their entire strategy around the notion of extreme. Right. And they just owned extreme across the board. When you joined. That strategy was kind of off the ground, but I imagine you were tasked over your career there. As you progress with kind of expanding that, how were you able to do that and kind of what were the handprints that you left on Rebel during your time there?

Rebel is a great organization. It's one of the best, if not the best, that I've ever been associated with. When the organization called me, I was working on Ziploc. I actually thought it was a mistake. Oh, yeah, you got the wrong person. What they explained to me was, hey, we've got this great organization that's really known for marketing now. We've introduced competition. Competition is there. We've got extreme athletes. They have extreme athletes. We've got experiences, they've got experiences. So they've blurred the lines of competition. And when you blur the lines of competition, consumers or shoppers are left to pick on the thing that they know, which is price. The role or the expectation was how do you come in and really set ourselves apart with some really strong brand foundation. So they were looking for someone with a foundation like an Eston Johnson or typical CPG to say, hey, let's figure out what we do in order to have some distinction, not differentiation. Differentiation is short term, distinction is long term. How do we distinguish ourselves around from the other brands? My response to Rebel at the time was, you're making a mistake. Don't hire anybody in traditional CPG because they're going to come in and they're going to do Dr. Tv, they're going to try to do fsi, they're going to try to do all the things that you don't do, and your brand is amazing and special. And then the conversation turned because I was a big follower of ripple content. And I asked, hey, as a follower of content, you have some amazing things out there. How come you don't ever ask me to buy your product? And now you know why we're talking to you. And so it was one of those things where you kind of come in and at the time, Red Bull was a great organization, continues to be a great organization. It was from household penetration. Things have been flat. The role in conversation was how do we continue to grow the category, grow household penetration while elevating the brand, allowing ourselves to offer some distinction. So that's kind of what we did, like when I started in Chicago, and there's really more. How do we test and learn some things that we may pilot for the future? As you mentioned, the brand was already strong, really based in, I would say, a Couple of things. Strong experiences from event marketing, a really strong sampling program, and a history of sports and extreme. And then also there was the other aspect of it, which in an on premise standpoint, which is like the nightlife. So do you choose to embrace some of those things or you choose to move away?

Because that happened sort of organically. The whole Rebel vodka craze was something that Rebel didn't push the beginning. It just. The on premise business kind of just on its own just took off.

Yeah. And even to this day, Rebel doesn't push the on premise. But it's just like you said, it happens organically. The question is, of those levers, which do you keep? You still want to engage with consumers, with spectators and audiences in real life. That remains the same. You still want to make sure that things that are happening organically continue to happen organically. Having a can in the hand from a sampling program, that makes sense. So the opportunity became, how do you expand your brand outside of extreme sports? So how do you do things that are really more mainstream playgrounds? How do you do things in basketball by signing an athlete or having a team deal? How do you do things in football? How do you do things in baseball? So those are kind of the things that we kind of learned and tried. And then we came up with a really cool strategy we kind of implement and execute. To get to the last point of your question, if I were to say one of the things that maybe two things we kind of did at Rebel that I'm proud of, the one is the introduction, I should say, of process and the introduction of marketing language, ideas of household penetration, buy rate, share of requirements. And those things become kind of. It's the way that the marketers talk now, which is really, really cool to kind of here, like, I'll have someone from Rebel call me up and say, hey, someone just talked to us about marketing objectives. But we know those aren't marketing objectives. That's cool. We talked about marketing objectives. I guess that's the first one. The second one is diversity, equity and inclusion. And so those are some of the things that, not necessarily from organization and a people standpoint, but really in the consumer facing communication. So being able to kind of pilot and or shepherd some of those things in an organization that is already an amazing organization like Rebel and kind of being afforded the opportunity to teach an organization to learn and grow in a different area was really cool.

What's interesting is you talked about you're working on Ziploc, which is like an incredibly low involvement category. You're talking about sandwich bags and then you were a rebel and you talk about signing athletes and I see the Muhammad Ali poster behind you and I would imagine this is pivoting to our next part of the discussion. They you are a big fan of sports. I imagine that like your passion, meeting your work life when you joined Red Bull was something that was new for you certainly relative to S.C. johnson. Did you find that injected you with sort of more energy towards your career that you were able to actually work on something that interested you out of work.

Is this for. For Rebel in particular?

Yeah, for Rebel. And then you know currently in fanatics like is working in sport much more. Like you know, obviously you learned a lot at SC Johnson. You and you were at the web role and then fanatics where you got to work on the sports. And as a sports fan does that make work so much more fun? Does that make it you so much more passionate towards work?

Absolutely it does. So a transition. I'll transition from SC Johnson to Rebel and then Rebel to Fanatics. The one thing that I always tell people because I wasn't exactly sure if that was the right move, the last conversation I had was with their current global cmo. He asked me one question which was a bit of rhetoric and he asked me when's the last time you did something for the first time? It was a rhetorical question. That's what Red Bull is about. We're in the business of doing things for the first time. Like at that point you got me. Like if you can think about and that's not the downfall but when you start to do things process again SC Johnson, it's not necessarily a downfall but you kind of do things that are kind of proven. At Ripple they do things that are kind of proven but they also want to be the first to do things sometimes. Sometimes it's fast follow especially in the area of sports. And so the other thing as we go from Red Bull to fanatics, what I started to enjoy is Rug Bull started to expand culture marketing. So things in music and things in dance and there's this intersection where sports meets technology meets media meets culture and fashion, where Red Bull was playing like this is awesome. So as I transitioned to fanatics the question for me was is there a place where I can do sports culture and media and still sell a product and still be kind of the great person that I want to be and make an impact the way that I want to make an impact and insert fanatics heavy sports. And so of course I knew about fanatics. I knew about some of the brands and started having conversations with the leaders and they talked about this idea of expanding categories more specifically in the collectibles area. And the ideas were really more. How do you take a great opportunity with some of the levers that we have? We have league partnerships and rights. Anything we have, anything you can think of, we have. You have access to the athletes, right? And you've got a leadership team that's willing to smartly invest for success. You've got sports, which is amazing. We have opportunities with content. So there's an opportunity for content, especially as you start to think about original content that you can do with athletes or short form content where you have an opportunity to leverage on those social media things. So that checks the box. There's an opportunity, obviously, with trading cards, physical and digital. From a product standpoint, it's like, okay, that sounds really cool. What about culture? All right, well, there is a place where sports. This is the words from the folks in fanatics. There's a place where there's an intersection where sports meets culture, meets fashion, meets content, meets technology. And that could be the future of fanatics. Like, this is perfect. Like, so to be able to get into an organization like fanatics, kind of what I'd say the ground floor in a business like collectibles, where we have an opportunity to have an intersection of all those things. As you mentioned, culture, meaning music, dance, entertainment, sport, fashion as well as technology all wrapped up in a product like it was one of those things. It's hard to pass up.

It's an incredibly exciting opportunity. So you joined earlier this year. What was the most surprising as CMO of finance Collectibles, I should say was the most surprising thing you learned about the organization more broadly since you've been there, where you didn't think it would be something that you'd be able to lever. And since you've been here, like, oh, wow, this is actually here that you.

Hadn'T thought of the people. Actually, it is like, I heard. I heard two different analogies. When you describe the leadership at Fanatics. Yesterday, someone called the leadership a Delta force. The other analogy I've heard was it's like the Avengers. Like, seriously, like walking through kind of the hallways. It's like a who's who and senior leadership. Everyone's so humble, everyone's done so many different things that it's an opportunity to really kind of learn and digest. When you're a cmo, what you're used to is being the one who kind of educates and teaches and You've got some folks that you want to mentor peers. Like it's. There's a lot of big fish who are very humble and they know so many things. Some of them have been in sports, some of them have not been in sports. And so being able to kind of work with these folks from, and to assemble with these folks, if I can use an Avengers reference, has been really, really cool. Something I actually didn't expect. I also didn't expect the humility that the organization has, the passion for sports and the ability to leverage sports was something I did expect. The one thing I was curious about is I love sports. I didn't want to get sports fatigue. And that has not happened at all. It's not even close. It's just really, really cool.

I don't think I could ever get sports fatigue.

You want to do something that you love, but if you do it too much, like if I go on a mountain and I snowboard, after a while it's like, yeah, I don't really want to do this anymore. But. But I like it. For the first couple of times I was worried a little bit about it, but you're right. Like that hasn't happened. I don't foresee it happening.

Right. Not to mention you mentioned fanatics is so much now they're broadening their eyes and beyond sports. And it's a technology company, they're getting into gaming. We'll get into that. So let's start with the collectible space. So the collectible space obviously exploded during the pandemic. You know, the Michael Jordan documentary really exploded. The sports card industry, it boomed just like every other commodity based, you know, industry. It kind of had a bust cycle as interest rates started to rise. But the rise in collectible is certainly here to stay. I don't know if you're at the national or not, which is the annual. I'm sure you were the big sports card event. Over 100,000 people showed up, which is I think their largest audience ever. And, and I really think it signals that, you know, the growing popularity of fanatics really across all demographics is exploding. And now collectibles has gone from cardboard, you know, card going to where we went through an error where there was limited edition numbered collectibles autograph, there's patches in cards. And now we're going to a world where things are becoming digitized. We have NFT level collectibles. And as you mentioned earlier, fanatics has kind of put together this incredible mix of assets, whether it be access to athletes, licensing, the whole NFT platform that you have with Candy Digital. And it's really I would think a marketer's dream to take a category that has had some success, but really sort of a highly pragmatic group of players that weren't well capitalized. And here comes Fanatics where you have probably have an opportunity to really reinvent the category of collectibles for the new generation. So how are you looking at the opportunity at fanatics and what are some of the things that you're working on right now to kind of move that vision forward?

Yeah, I share your enthusiasm and your excitement about the opportunity, especially as a marketer. One thing really quickly, we no longer have Candy Digital. So that was something that kind of moved on from actually prior to time.

You guys are moving so fast I can't even keep up to be on our video.

Exactly.

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You know the history of let's just start trading cards. Trading cards are over 150 years old. It was 155 years ago where that first trading card was inserted into a pack of cigarettes. And then if you think about the industry leader in trading cards, Topps. TPPPS is over 70 years old. It's a heritage brand. It's nostalgia, it's classic. And so what's interesting, the efforts and levels of marketing have mostly been organic. It's not a category that's been marketed heavily. There's a bit of a scarcity principle from a trading card perspective. There are folks who collect it for the extrinsic value investment purposes and that's where a lot of the publicity. But most of the folks collect because they love the hobby. If I use an analogy, sneakers. There are a lot of folks who collect sneakers with the intent to actually sell them. If you go to my closet, I mean you'll see a bunch of sneakers that I'll probably never wear. I'll never actually sell them because I just love the opportunity to collect. And that's what we have with respect to the collectibles business. So it gets back to the point we were talking about earlier, which is how do you leverage the assets that you have at athletes and access athletes and partnerships with the leagues and to really, for a new consumer, expose that consumer and have them explore the art of collecting and enjoy the hobby. There's three reasons ultimately why I ended up here at Collectibles, and that's kind of the first one. The. The first is the job is to grow the number of collectors within the hobby while maintaining the value of the product and the service, which is an amazing challenge. As a marketer like you, you don't want to flood the market with cards because once you do that, then the value starts to diminish. You don't want to have people waiting around in lines because then the service is bad. So what's that balance? Right, and so that's kind of like an amazing opportunity as a marketer.

The second what managing scarcity and access, basically.

Yes, exactly. With an amazing amount of assets to do. So how do you pick and choose from basketball to football to baseball to combat via UFC or entertainment like wwe? Like how do you do some of those things in a way that actually makes sense? So that's one piece. The second piece, as we talked about, was an opportunity to be culturally relevant and inspirational in your communication to the collectors of the fans of the community. That's where the marketing comes in. Because now you have. So now you have an opportunity to actually create the messaging based on a really strong brand like Topps, with the backing of a brand that's growing like Fanatics. So if you think about like just history, like Fanatics as an organization is really only about a decade old. It's different from tops from 75 years. And I'd say the. The makeup of Fanatics acquired tops. So Fanatics acquired tops in 2022. Fanatics Previous to that is was a decade old even now versus three years ago. I mean, and I know we'll talk about it three depending on who you are. So three to five different businesses within the Fanatics organization, which is all kind of built on this opportunity to focus on the passion of sports and telling stories that will allow us to understand kind of a collector, a fan, a consumer, a shopper. And then the last thing really quickly is world class. So you have an opportunity to take what I would consider a senior leadership team that is world class and make an entire marketing organization world class, entire product line world class. And so all those things are just. You're right. It's a marketer's dream to be able to be in that situation.

And I think what a lot of people who aren't in the hobby, you don't collect, understand, is it's not about always the thing. It's about the story behind the thing. So if you talk to people, because right now all of our photos are in the cloud. So if you ask people if your house was on fire, what would you grab? They'd say, my old photos. But that's not really the case anymore. Now, if you asked a Yankees fan what you grabbing, and he was around in the 50s and 60s, I. My sign Mickey Mantle ball, my signed Jordimaggio ball, and a lot of people are collectibles, will say, well, it's just a baseball. Can't you replace it? But that guy might have gotten that signed ball with his dad, who's no longer around. And that ball is really a memory of that moment. And I think, you know, I'm a collector, and I go to shows with my son, and it's not about the thing. It's about. It really is about the bond that created me, my son. And it really is. It transcends from a physical thing to an experience which gives it sort of an emotional layer on top of the visible item that a collectible is, which I think is something that is so powerful in terms of the space that you play it.

Absolutely. I mean, you hit the nail on that it is a celebration of a moment that does represent something that is greater. It's a memory. Like you ask a collector about their favorite item and their favorite item, it's not necessarily about the item. It's what that item reminds them of. And there are great stories and there's great history with it. And so what we like to say with the trading cards, especially with the ones that we offer now, is celebration of those moments. Have your piece of history on the tops. We have a Tops now program, which we try to capture moments, like things in the moment and celebrate them and say, hey, do you remember this moment? And one of the ones I thought was really, really cool is, you'll remember this. On August 30th, Lincoln, Nebraska, over 90,000 in Memorial Stadium to watch a women's volleyball game. And so we created a Tops now card to really. I mean, it's not to sell it to make money. It's really more to celebrate that moment and what it represents for someone who's there. It's like, yeah, I could take my own picture, but I remember this moment and to kind of have that in like, kind of in your history as a moment to celebrate. It's really cool to do that.

You, you can always own the moment. It's a way for you to actually own a piece of the moment. Another great thing that and I could talk about this forever and we won't because I want to respect your time. But one of the activations you guys did with major league baseball where the rookie players were a patch, and then you're going to put those patches, actually the actual patch that the rookie played in their first game, into a card which you could get in the pack, which I just think it's like be able to connect that moment with that player, a one of one moment, and then you could own it. I just think that's just a tremendous idea. And that's a great example of fanatics connecting. You know, the ability that since you create the jerseys and you have the trading card company, you can kind of connect those two, integrate those two assets into something powerful. That's really never been done that way before, for sure.

And I think the other thing that's allowed us to do that is the amazing partnerships that fanatics has with the leagues. So with the relationship with major league baseball, the relationship with major league baseball players association allowed that to happen. I didn't realize how much of a, I'll say, quote unquote, controversy of what is the actual rookie card was until I joined fanatics. And then when we started to talk about putting this rookie debut path kind of for the one time that player makes it to the major leagues and they play in the game, it was kind of like overwhelming. The feedback is now we've ended the debate of what the true rookie card is. And so it's to see kind of the reaction of the industry, of the collectors of the hobby, especially those in baseball, to say, this is amazing. I got to have that card. I got to have that moment, especially for players and the ones that they root for. It's been really cool to see that.

And when you talk about the merging of fanatics into culture, there's also kind of a rising sector of trading cards and collectibles for non athletes, whether it be, you know, musicians or whether it be comedians, you name it, or even entrepreneurs. Do you guys see a lot of growth in that area moving forward? Is that an area you also have your eye on?

We do for sure. And so one of the brands that we fanatics did acquire was a brand called zero Cool. And zero cool has been focused on kind of culture entertainment. So there are things that are non sports that we do right now, such as we'll do tops that Star wars cars as well as, if you remember, Garbage Pail Kids. Those are still around. So we do this as well. But also there is a mixing of sport, culture, entertainment, music and products that we have right now. So this week actually we released this product called Allen and Ginter now and Ganter, kind of one of the the older kind of brands that's out there. It is a mix of baseball, music, entertainment. And so in that set, you'll see baseball players like a Mike Trout or Julio Rodriguez, but you also see a Kevin Hart, you'll see a Robert De Niro, you'll see a little baby. It is really cool to kind of.

Have those extend your market as well.

For sure. I mean, and you've got autographs of those folks as well. It's like, all right, this is. I can get a Kevin Hart autograph. Allen, get your car. That's pretty cool.

That's awesome. So shifting gears a little bit as we wrap up. So this space is changing so much and the consumer is changing so much. What do you do personally to kind of keep your finger on the pulse of the consumer so you are able to jump on, you know, any new emerging trend that pops up in such a dynamic business like fanatics?

You know, I actually started this time in SC Johnson. Someone gave me the advice. You almost have to have your own selection of a focus group of folks you can tap into because they will know things before you know things. Because you spend all your day kind of doing the things that you do. They spend all the things, all their days doing the things that you want to motivate them to do. And so having kind of like that personal group, that personal focus groups, especially in collecting, allows me to kind of understand the collecting aspect of it. And then from a sports standpoint, there's no shortage of opportunities to learn a little bit about sports. And you name it, there's an app for it. And so for me, it's really more about how do you set up and structure your team that they actually have the opportunity to understand kind of the way that the wind will blow. Like a perfect example. I don't know, maybe you would have done it, Matt, but two, three months ago, would we have been able to predict what was going to happen in Boulder, Colorado? Respect to the Buffaloes and in Coach prime, we heard like, everyone's like, oh, they're going to go 111. They may win two games. I'll give them three. Maybe three. And now just at least as a marketer, I'm watching from afar.

It's all anyone is talking about when it comes to college football.

Yeah, exactly. It is amazing what has happened. And so having someone to be there on the pulse. And I remember being in a meeting and someone was saying, hey, we should do something with Travis Hunter. And I think someone else said, wait, who is that? That was like four weeks ago. Right. It's like we kind of understand how things change so, so quickly. Right. So you just had to be on it.

Yeah. If you look at the story of Colorado, the reason I think it's hitting such a nerve with the consumer is it's about the underdog. You have Dion, who obviously is an icon, you know, and then it's about family because his kids are on the team. So it really just like hits on so many different points that kind of crosses over or transcends sports even into a broader story. And that's why I think of drawing so many people in. It reminds me of almost like Tim Tebow, how he was religious and he brought in a whole different group of non casual fans into Florida football. It's sort of, that's where it reminded.

Me of for sure. I would say, like I'm a fan of Coach prime as a marketer and what I always like to tell people is if you watch a Buffaloes game, look at the sideline and look at the number of folks who are capturing content, organic content, or how about the.

Amount of sunglasses you mold. It was crazy.

Unbelievable. Like, that is very good marketing.

So look out for a deal with fanatics and Coach prime moving forward. I'll keep an eye on that. So finally here, Ken, I mean, you've obviously had a great career and I, you know, it's not lost to me that you put in the work, whether it's getting your mba, cutting your teeth, SC Johnson that gave you sort of the blocking and tackling of fundamentals that allowed you to succeed at Red Bull and put you in a great position as cmo fanatics, collectibles, to really be able to reinvent an incredibly exciting category. If you look back on your career, what are some of the things that you think you did right that maybe we can impart on some of our younger listeners here so they can one day end up with a career like yours and sit in the seat that you're in?

The most important thing, there's probably two things. One, you have to deliver results with integrity. Integrity meaning just do what you say you're going to Do. It's such an easy thing, but it is so hard to do sometimes because sometimes we don't realize we're outside of integrity. If you and I, Matt, say we're going to meet for lunch at noon and I show up at 1205 and I don't acknowledge it, then I'm outside of integrity. And that's such a small thing, but it means so much with respect to others. The second thing is having clarity on a couple of things. One, you have to have clarity on what it is that you want to do. Not necessarily from a role perspective, but you have to put some thought into the things that you like to do, the things you don't like to do. For me, I've had a career journal for decades now where I'm still writing in there, hey, here are the things I want to do. You want to be able to have clarity on what it is you want to do. You want to be able to deliver results. If there's one thing I wish I would have done earlier, it's the power of the network. And I don't think I actually started to. I don't think I started to build a network until someone asked me why I wasn't building a network. And this was after Kellogg. So I really thought about it, like, what's that for? Like, being able to do those things early on. Never wise. Lifelong friends that you have an opportunity because you're not actually talking to them because you want something. But being able to have kind of a group where you can reach into to get advice or thoughts or even pick their brain on some things, that's been kind of a game changer for me, 100%.

I can't think of many things more important in your career than the power of network. Especially at times where you're switching careers or you need help with something, that's who you lean into. And the network is also two ways. Like, one thing I often find with our younger employees is they want me to call and ask for a favor of some exec I know. And my whole thing is, well, I want to add value first. You can't just take, take, take, and that work is two ways. And yet you have to give over time as well and figure out how you can add value yourself, for sure. So, Ken, finally here. Is there a quote or mantra you like to live by? Is there something that comes to mind if I ask that question Now?

You see, I still talk to folks about this idea of the power of one. So you never know the difference that the number One can make. It can be one team, one goal, one objective, one business, one conversation that you have with a stranger. One word. And that word can be hello. The impact that you can make on someone's life is amazing. So I'll tell you a quick story from the natural quick story. I am in the. This. I mean, a hundred thousand people, it is like one of those things where it's like at some point you're bumping into people. It's kind of tight, it's snug. And I remember I was in the bathroom. This is a lot. This is my first national, nice year from getting out of it when I'm supposed to get out and there's a guy behind me and he were washing our hands. The only thing he said was, hello, how you doing? I looked to my right and it was Derek Jeter. And that's all he really said. But it was like, all right, this is worth it. Like, if I can go to. To a bathroom to see the captain next to me. And he. He didn't have to say anything at all, but the fact that he decided to. To say something and. And even ask, how's it going? It was one of those moments where it kind of brought me back to, like, there's a power and just speaking and saying hello and putting down your phone on the elevator and trying to.

Have a conversation versus the opposite of one, which is zero, which is doing nothing, where it's like you only make the way Gretzky said you only make the shots you take. I mean, you're not taking a shot. You have no chance of anything coming out because there is no one.

Absolutely right.

Well, Ken, this has been amazing. Seriously. One of my favorite interviews on the podcast today, and we've had many. So thank you so much for joining. I can't wait for our listeners to hear this. It was awesome, and I wish you nothing but success and this exciting new role of yours.

Thank you for having me. It's been great.

Absolutely. On behalf of Suzy and Adwee team, thanks again to Ken Turner, CMO of Fanatics Collectibles, for joining us today. Be sure to subscribe, rate and review the Speed of Cultural podcast on your favorite podcast platform. Till next time. See you soon, everyone. Take care. The Speed of Culture is brought to you by Susie as part of the Ad Week Podcast Network and a guest creator network. You can listen subscribe to all Adweek's podcasts by visiting adweek.com podcasts. To find out more about Susie, head to susie.com and make sure to search for the speed of culture in Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Google Podcasts, or anywhere else podcasts are found. Click follow so you don't miss out on any future episodes. On behalf of the team here at Suzy, thanks for listening.

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