What is like being CFO of the Savannah Bananas with Tim Naddy

Every decision we make, it's an 80/20 decision. Do we have 80% of the information? All right, make the decision. Oh, it didn't work? Okay, come back, pivot, go. It's very, very fast. Our long game is to gather fans, not dollars, because if we gather— Meet Dr. Tim Natty, VP of Finance at Savannah Bananas, an adjunct professor at Savannah College of Art and Design, also the founder of Legacy Forge. He is a finance and accounting professional with over 20 years of experience spanning public accounting, entrepreneurship, and sports entertainment finance. Social media has eradicated all regional barriers. I've got to create a class called Strategic Financial Management. It's like 3 big words to basically say how not to get screwed in business. And so what I realized, and one of our core principles, is that what everybody else is doing, do the exact opposite.

What are some of the misconceptions you hear? What do people picture your job being a CFO like, or you hear people talking about?

So misconceptions are that—

Do you know what the difference is between an accountant and an FP&A profession.

Oh, here it comes.

Welcome to another episode of FP&A on Law, where strategy meets finance. I'm thrilled this week to be joined by my co-host Glenn Snyder. Glenn, how you doing?

Doing great.

How are you doing?

I am doing awesome. I have to say, Glenn, I know, is really excited for this episode. If anyone knows Glenn, all you have to do, if you've ever watched a video, is look at his wall. How many baseballs back there, do you know?

I have 167 individually signed balls from members of the Hall of Fame.

There we go. 167. So I don't even have to ask what his favorite sport is. This week we're going to be joined by the CEO of the Savannah Bananas, Dr. Tim Natty. Doctor, welcome to the show.

How are you? Quick adjustment there. It's CFO.

CEO with 5 G's. That's why it does say CEO.

The CEO would probably be pretty upset that I just took his job on your show.

I meant CFO. Thank you.

Totally fine. No, no. Yeah, doing great. Thanks for asking. You know, once we first met, gosh, a couple years ago at the Financial Accounting and Technology Expo, which is about as nerdy as it gets in finance. You know, I saw this guy over there wearing cool hats, had a giant beard, and I was like, hey, I wanna be that guy's friend. And you're like, hey, I wanna be your friend. And then we just made a friendship and now you're introducing me to you. I have other friends who like baseball and this, that, and the other. So, but we're here to talk about FP&A today and see how we can make it fun for, uh, you know, people out there who just don't have a home. They don't live in accounting, they don't live in finance. They're kind of right in that middle. So, you know, maybe we can, we can sway some to either side.

We will definitely have some fun. Before we jump into our questions, why don't you tell us the audience a little bit about your background? I'm going to let you introduce yourself.

Okay. I appreciate that. Thank you. Well, okay. In a nutshell, right? Very, very Austin Powers. All right. In a nutshell, grew up in Cocoa Beach, Florida, went to University of Florida after 5 years, graduated with a bachelor's and master's in accounting while in school, got my CPA license, which again, I believe is the crown jewel of our profession. So you guys can all, you know, throw barbs at me later on if you want to, but then moved over to— got a job over in Tampa with PricewaterhouseCoopers, worked with PwC, Deloitte, and another local firm inside public accounting for about 8 9 years, moved out of public accounting into, get this, an internet platform, because in 2008 that was all the rage until, of course, the bottom dropped out of the housing market and investors didn't want to put money into new things. They wanted to try to save their current investments. I ended that year after 4 W-2s at, get this, a real estate organization. So, so I got to watch that one kind of whittle down. It was private equity owned. So I got some good private equity experience. What, what kind of reports are out there that are, that are superfluous to running anything in the business, but it's just because they have a whim and a fancy and they're like, run a report. And you're like, ah, I can't run a report. So that was a fun experience. But from there, once I finished my doctorate, I took a job in 2012 with Shorter University as an on-ground professor full-time. And that's where I really learned that I love being a professor. I love the performance aspect. I love bringing the technical to the tangible. I just enjoy being around youth and helping them make better decisions. And so from my perspective, I was in my element. But naturally people like us, we have a proclivity to, to learn. And when we get, we stop learning, we get a little bored, start, start adding on, dovetail this and add this thing. Well, decided I needed to start a business because that's what you do when you're a professor. And so started a, started a data company, ran that for about 9 years, had defense contracts, was working with healthcare. But what was really exciting is that we, that we kind of branched out into sports analytics, specifically scouting analytics. So think Moneyball, but now bring it all the way into 2023. And now you're looking at it saying, okay, how can we make this draft room more efficient? Well, guys, here's the problem. I saw— I solved a problem that nobody wanted solved because part of the draft, part of the fun of the draft is actually arguing with the guy across the table who thinks you're an idiot and throwing mugs at you and stuff. And you're like, no, the data says this. And it's like, I don't care what the data says. I know what it says. And he's like smoking a cigar. So all that said, got to where I couldn't, I couldn't sell the software. It was everybody's like, this is great, but you got to make money doing that stuff. So ended up doing one year of CFO consulting with CliftonLarsonAllen. And from there, ironically, I was traveling way too much and decided, hey, you know, there's this, there's this kooky baseball team down in Savannah, Georgia, that, that needs a finance guy. Maybe I'll go down there and ply my trade there. Well, the instant I land with bags, putting it down, I put down some roots in Savannah and they decide, hey, let's take this show On the road. So since for the last 4 seasons, if you will, I've been at the helm of the finance arm and trying to keep this traveling circus moving, literally duct taping the wings as we're flying the plane. And that's where I am today.

All righty. Love the background. Glenn, you're about to say something.

Great background. Obviously, you know how you got there, but tell us a little bit more about— I mean, people are not too familiar with the Bananas in the sports league. And I also understand you got a book that just came out. Tell us a little bit about that.

I do. Yeah, it's, um, so, uh, first, first question first is, um, so people that don't really understand or haven't yet been brought into the cult of the Bananas, um, it's, it is a giant bubble. It's really funny because you can go around the United States and ask, and people are like, they'll look at the, they'll look at the logo and you get one of two reactions. The reaction is like, hmm, or it's, and so, so the people that are, you don't have to explain anything. They're already inside the cult. They love everything about the Bananas, the, the, the familial nature, the fans first approach, um, everything everything about just the kookiness, the backflips, the dancing, all of, all of the showmanship that comes with baseball. Yes, I said baseball. I know all those, all those little balls behind you are, are like, are like starting to, they're starting to smoke. They're about to be all on fire by the time this podcast is over. 'Cause we're gonna, we're, we're, it's, it's not that we take the traditionalists and we step on them. We actually embrace the tradition of this amazing game called baseball and, and actually give it just a little bit of, a little bit of a kicker on the entertainment side, right? Shorter, shorter game, things going on all around you, very three-ring circus. There's a, there's a game in front of you, but there's a guy over there in a dugout and there's a girl over there doing something crazy. And the, all the fans are just a giant family. So that is banana ball in and of itself. Now, as far as the second question, which I can't remember because I was too excited to answer the first question, um, ask it.

Uh, your book.

Oh, the book.

You remember that one.

Yeah.

Yeah. So, so all the while, um, I, I've, I've, so. I also, one of the things that I do to put on this, the SCAD hat, I teach at Savannah College of Art and Design. Have been teaching here actually ever since I've moved down to Savannah and I absolutely love it. Again, being in the classroom is what I really, really enjoy doing. Well, while there, I was part of the genesis of the Desolée School of Creative Business Leadership. And what they've, what they realized at SCAD is that you have all these, all these students. By the way, if I call them kids, it's my fault. They're all younger than me. They could be my kids, but these students that come in, they have great intellectual property just swimming around their heads. SCAD does a really good job of pulling that intellectual property out and creating these amazing portfolios so that when they go into fashion or luxury and brand management or industrial design or video game, whatever it is, they can go in with like this confidence that, hey, I kick ass and you know I do. And this is the kind of stuff that I'm gonna bring to your establishment. Well, what they realize is that some of these kids, when they were going out to their new employers, probably making good money. These artists, they do well. SCAD is a very giant stepping stone for a lot of artists. So even though they're making good money, they started seeing that people were a little miffed because like, well, but that's my idea. And maybe they're paying you $100,000 to work here, but they're making $10 million off the idea that you brought into the door. And the instant you signed that piece of paper and said anything you do when you're working on our computers, you're doing this and the other, we now own it. Well, hold, hold the phone, hold the phone. We need to make sure that you guys understand that your intellectual property is yours. Nothing wrong with going to work for other people, but if you really wanna do something with the IP, let's teach you how to generate your own income streams with that IP. So that was kind of the, the genesis behind the School of Business Leadership. And my role in it is that I've got to create a class called Strategic Financial Management. Told you guys earlier that it's like 3, 3 big words to basically say how not to get screwed in business. And, and so What I realized is that they were, when they first initially wanted this course to be around, they wanted it to be a managerial accounting course, a cost accounting course, right? But they were using an intermediate cost book. So they didn't even ask an accountant like, hey, what would you serve up to people who want nothing to do with accounting? And so it was like, definitely not this 900-page manifesto of what to do. And like, no, get this Bible outta here. We need to have something that we can actually sink our teeth into. Well, there is nothing you can sink your teeth into that marries entrepreneurialism and cost accounting. And so I decided, let's write it. So, so wrote it. It's out and came out in March. So this is, this is the book. So it's EDYM, Every Decision You Make, What's the Cost of the Dream? And if you want the Cliff Notes, pause your screen right now. Okay, there we go. So, but the whole, the whole point of this, the book though, is the, is the idea that as creatives, as, and by the way, I wrote it specifically for creatives, but really it's just non-accountants. Or it's people in their— in their—

I can read it. I'm not Nick Cowen.

Okay, well, there you go. So it's people in their journey, whether, whether they're, they're financial people or they're accounting people or they're marketing people, what have you. But they have an idea. And but understanding that, that the idea is just the beginning. How do you cultivate this idea and mature this idea to the— to where you can now get out of your mom's basement and actually go out and maybe, maybe get some funds, do an investor presentation, get some funding, get some investors, really put some, put some rocket fuel behind your idea and then launch it. Well, there's so many things that you have to do to prepare this, these businesses. And, you know, in the world, you guys are always looking forward, right? So this is exactly what I'm trying to teach these non-accountants, these creatives who the last thing on the planet they want to do is accounting, but they don't even know they're doing accounting because I just kind of slip it into this one, this, this anecdote, this story, this story, this story. And all of a sudden it's like, What did I just learn? It's like you just learned how to do Cost Accounting 101 is what you learned and how to build a business and how to, how to launch it, how to market this, that and the other. So that is the gist of this. I would call it a textbook. They— I would say you could probably pick it up at an airport if an airport wanted a book this big. But yeah, I'm super excited about it. It's, it's so far had a really good reception in the— certainly in the CPA world, but a lot of students are really enjoying it as well.

I almost went like this when you said textbook.

That's right. That's right.

No, thank you for sharing that. That's awesome.

You're welcome.

Appreciate learning a little bit about the book. So kind of shifting back to, uh, our Savannah Bananas and working for a sports franchise. What are some of the misconceptions you hear? What do people picture your job being a CFO like, or you hear people talking about? Then we'll talk about what you really do.

Uh, so misconceptions are that it's, it's fun every day, all day, right? Um, the, the They also think that we do the same thing every day, right? Because from the accounting and finance perspective, they're like, oh, accounting and finance, you can do it anywhere. That's true. There's, there's so many moving parts in an organization like this. And by the way, this is any entertainment organization. It's not just the Savannah Bananas. It's, um, but the Savannah Bananas, it just happens to be we're in hypergrowth mode. So everything, every decision we make, it's an 80/20 decision. Do we have 80% of the information? All right, make the decision. Oh, it didn't work. Okay, come back, pivot, go. It's very, very fast. And we experiment, we test. And if it doesn't, it doesn't work out, then fine, pivot, go the other way. What we're trying to do is have the most efficient approach to really putting the best show that we can out there for the fans. Right. And all the while, my job internally is to make sure the internal fans, the HR department, the creative department, the Bananas Television department, all the people that I would consider my internal fans, that I need to make sure that they can be successful. And so that finance isn't a stumbling block in front of them, but it's actually a support function that's kind of kind of right behind them, doing everything that needs to be done to make them successful. If they're successful, then finance naturally will rise with the, with the rest of the organization.

So you're not signing the player contracts?

Well, you know, it's, I, I, I've had, when we use ChatGPT to write them, I don't know. I mean, I guess I could sign 'em. No, I don't sign the contracts. That's a, that's a reserve for the, the CEO who was a CEO before this podcast started. Remember?

So Tim, let's talk about the FP&A function within the bananas. So, you know, tell us a little bit about what the FP&A function is like, you know, your budget process, how often do you reforecast? And here's the unique thing, because you're not— the Savannah Bananas are a team, but you guys are also a league. How do the other teams in the league come into play when you're looking at forecasting and budgeting?

Budget's a strange thing around here because, because this thing is growing in leaps and bounds. And, and, you know, when you— let's just go back to this. All the teams are, are centrally located inside Savannah, Georgia, right? So everybody lives here throughout the year. It's very similar to the, the formerly the XFL, the UFL. So the United Football League and the XFL merged, became the United— the UFL now. So they are, they are all, I think all 8 of their teams, they might have 10 now, but they're all centrally located and then they go and they play games in different places. That's very similar to us. Everything is company owned. There are no franchises, there are no external dollars coming in. Everything is owned and operated by Jesse Cole and his wife Emily. And so what that allows us to do is it allows us to be very flexible in the way that we manage the team, but also extremely consistent across all the brands. So whether we launch, this past year we launched two more brands, the local Beach Coconuts and the famed Indianapolis Clowns, who by the way, this weekend are gonna be in Indiana Indianapolis for the first showing. It's, it's gonna be an amazing weekend in, in Indianapolis. When you're running this organization, it really becomes, they, they become units, right? So it's just, there's 20, 23 players, there's a, there's a slate of coaches and maybe some baseball ops people for that team, for this team, for this team, for this team. So, so 6 teams across the board, it's actually not, it's not like exponential headache. It's, it's more of like, okay, if you built the process right for the first team, the second team, the third team, then it just assimilates right in. I mean, from a spreadsheet perspective, you just add another row, add another column, and it's everything just kind of falls right in. You just drag the formula across and it works, right?

Yeah. You drop the next team into the column, you put whatever other things you need to add to it, and you start calculating their numbers.

Yeah. And so, and from a chart of accounts perspective, you know, you have the 0.11 would be the Bananas, 0.12 would be the Party Animals, and it's 0.13, 0.14, 0.15. So you just build out the table to eventually have 8 teams, which is, which is where Jesse would like to be eventually at 8 teams. So we already have the infrastructure set up for 8 teams. Just right now there's a bunch of blanks in teams 7 and 8, right? So, so that stuff's not too difficult. I think to, to answer your question about the Bananas versus the league, you are correct. There's, there is a branding issue that comes up when we initially were the Savannah Bananas and everybody called us Savannah Bananas, but our technical name, our, our legal name is actually Fans First Entertainment. Fans First Entertainment is the umbrella organization, not only over the Savannah Bananas, but also every other team in the league, right? So what the interesting thing that we're, that we're learning today is that what are people going to think when they come to a, come to a show because it's now Banana Ball. It's not the Savannah Bananas, it's Banana Ball, right? So it could be the Party Animals versus the Coconuts. And are people going to show up and think, oh no, the Bananas aren't here. Oh, I'm so disappointed. Or are they going to be like, dude, this is Banana Ball. This is going to be great. Each one of these teams has their own shtick, right? So you got the, the Bananas are the, the All-American team, the, uh, the, the ones they, they beat on their chest, everybody's super excited to see them. The Party Animals are supposed to be the alter ego, right? The Bananas after dark, they're, they're a little edgier, they have punk rock and things like that. Then the Firefighters came along, and there's— they are the ones, they are their local hometown heroes, right? They're the, the firefighters, the police, the, um, the, the EMTs, the teachers, and all these local heroes that make living in small town America. Amazing. Then you take the next one, which is the Texas Tailgaters. Now, it's the first one that we had, obviously, other than Savannah Bananas, first one that actually has a regional name attached to it. And the thought was, well, are we going to place the team in Texas or are we just going to make Texas kind of their entire home state? If they ever play in Texas, are they the home team? And that's exactly what we ended up doing. And I'll explain to you the reason why in a second. So then after that, we had the Loco Beach Coconuts, which is actually a made-up name. It, but it's, but it's based off of Cocoa Beach, which is awesome 'cause that's where I'm from. But then the last one is the Indianapolis Clowns. Again, another regional team, but that was born out of history, right? It's tradition because the Indianapolis Clowns were an actual, gosh, I would, I would almost be willing to say that they were one of the original banana teams in the way that they expressed, not only were they amazing athletes, but they were doing kind of kooky things on the, on the field already. So then in this case, you have, you have all these teams that are out there and from our perspective, from a finance perspective, it's not very difficult to plan for 'em 'cause you just gotta plan for another 23 bodies, how do you get 'em logistically across, across the United States? Um, the hotels, the airfare, the buses, all those things. They just, it just becomes instead of 4, 4/4, you have 5, 5/6 and 6/6. And so now you have just another, another couple units. So the budget does increase, but it increases from the standpoint of it doesn't increase by 2, increases by 1, because basically what ends up happening is, um, if we had 4 teams, that would be, that would mean we were playing at 2 different places at the same time. Now that we have 6 teams, we're playing at 3 different places at the same time. So our budget actually increases one-third as opposed to like a much, much bigger than it would be.

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Now, something that, um, that is really important when you talk about this brand and shifting this brand from Banana Ball, right? Because I've had people say, well, why don't you just rename the sport to like some other names? Like, no, because the name is Banana Ball. I think that's, that's the genesis of it. So just because Savannah Bananas are there, it's like, you don't— it's not going to call it Party Animal Ball or Coconut Ball. So Banana Ball is the sport. Banana Ball Championship League is the league. And, and the Savannah Bananas are the flagship of, of the, of the entire league. But that doesn't mean they're always gonna win, right? It, it means that they have to compete just like anybody else. But what we found is that as we've kind of transitioned from the Savannah Bananas are gonna be in town to Banana Balls coming to town, we're still selling out stadiums. We're still, we're still selling, the, the merchandise is still flying off the shelves. People are still want the tickets. They still have the big lines. And what we've realized is that we've been able to transition it off of the bananas. Now, when the bananas are in town, everybody's kooky. That one sells out the fastest. But it doesn't mean that when the bananas are in town that people aren't still excited to come watch just a fantastic show. And the bananas aren't even there, right? So at least that carried over and we were able to shift the brand from Savannah Bananas to Banana Ball. And now it's becoming more of like a, more like the, the, This is just what, when Banana Ball comes to town, oh my goodness, you're about to see a great show. What has allowed this to happen is that, you know, you talk to anybody from the Northeast, say Pittsburgh, who's their team? Pirates. The Pirates. If they're from Philly, who's their team? Phillies. Okay, so pick anybody from the Northeast and you basically say it's actually done regionally, right? So you usually, usually identify with the local team because that's the one everybody at the bar is talking about. Everybody at the office is talking about, everybody at the schoolyard is talking about. And so you become a Steelers fan because everybody in Pittsburgh, you just have to be a Steelers fan, right? And if you're that one oddball, you're probably getting beat up on the playground. But the, but the, the thought is, is that because we were, because the original affinity toward a particular team was who is my home team and who does my dad support? Who's my, where my mom go to school, stuff like that. Because of social media, and this is what I think is genius about what the Bananas have been able to really, really grab onto, social media has eradicated all regional barriers. There is no reason that you can't be Oakland Athletics fan having lived in— wait, wait for the— I'll wait for your face. Here it comes. But if I lived in Savannah, if I live in Savannah, I can be an Oakland Athletics fan because maybe I just, maybe it just resonates with me. Maybe I know somebody that went to—

just say Athletics, don't say Oakland.

Just like, come on.

Oakland Athletics, they don't exist anymore.

Well, there you go. Then that's why I'm a fan. So they're moving. I know I was kidding. The, um, but the, but the idea is, is that because, because I can communicate and connect with that team from, you know, from one coast to another coast, social media has enabled that. I'm now, I'm now developing affinities with them, with their fan base, with their players, with different things. I don't have to live in that area in order to support that team anymore. And I think that's what the Savannah Bananas have done, um, and Banana Ball has done. Is that they've taken advantage of the vibe. So again, the kind of the vibes that I gave you about the party animals and the coconuts, like the tailgaters. If you, if you like whiskey, if you like, um, you know, like NASCAR, you like country music, you're a tailgater fan, right? But maybe one night you're just feeling a little edgy and you're like, I don't, I'm done. Those country songs are all starting the same. I'm, I want some punk rock. You could be a party animal fan that night. You, it doesn't really matter. And, and the great thing is it's all an entertainment. It's all show, if you will. So it's not like you're abandoning your team. You're just feeling like, hey, my vibe is this tonight. It's like, yeah, I could, I could be this team. I, I don't really care who wins or loses, but I just want to be part of that crowd tonight. And I think that's the key. I think that's what really has resonated throughout the United States, is that, um, you don't need to be from that area to really jump on this bandwagon. You just need to kind of feel, okay, How do I feel today? I, I feel kind of loose. I feel, feel very 420. I'm gonna be a, I'm gonna be a Coconuts fan today, right? So that's, that's kind of the vibe.

So, you know, when, when just kind of pulling all this back to, to finance a little bit, I mean, what was really interesting is Major League Baseball, the comparison, each individual team is a separate company, they're, they're separate franchise. But what really, what you're doing is you're effectively say is each team is a department within the same company. So whether you're an HR department or you're a, you know, you're a coconuts department, you have personnel, you have travel expenses, you have all those different things, but you are one company, which is a very, you know, different way. I think many people—

different than any major league sports in the US.

Well, again, not, not, not this, like, um, the, um, dissimilar—

might be similar.

Well, no, no, because that's, that was an entertainment thing, right? That, and they only had one, they only had two teams. And they travel both teams, right? So in this case, this is an actual league and you are correct. It is its own department. It's called baseball operations is what it is. And so all of the players are over there. All the, all the coaches are over there. We have baseball operations over there and they have their own budget. Their budget is paid for by ticket sales, right? So from that perspective, as you start looking, kind of give you a little bit more insight, the way that I've carved this place up is that we have what's called the diamond and the dugout. All right. Diamond is the show. It is the live events that we are putting on. It is the— it's not only the team, but it's also the entertainment. It's the, it's the food and beverage. It's the, it's the game operations. You know, it's the full cost for the show, for the event, everything, everything for the show. So Diamond is like what's out there on the stage, right? The dugout is everything that's behind the scenes, stuff that you don't— so, so people would think that like Bananas Television, oh, well, that should be a Diamond. Well, actually, no, it's not. Yes, we do make money off of media contracts and what have you, but they're actually in support of the live events. We know our flywheel starts with the live events. If our— if we don't have a live event, we don't have the content, we don't have the traffic, we don't have the demand, which, which, which then the flywheel will just start slowing down. Right. Our live events is where the energy really pushes. And, and once those live events are there, everything else is captured in that flywheel, just start spinning as fast as it can and also creates enough momentum for other flywheels like youth tournaments to start working. In, you know, camps to start working. And so this whole thing is moving off of live events. So in a sense that like a normal baseball operation where, where they would take the team and go over to, let's say, let's say the Yankees are playing over at the Cape Canaveral rivalry in Boston. They take the team, they go to Boston, and the only people that are there are the Yankees in Boston, right? Boston has all their home crowd. They have their home food and beverage. They have other home merchandise. and, and then the Yankees just show up and they play a game, right? Or a couple. What we do is that when we come into a town, we rent out the venue. Um, there's, you know, venue contracts are there. Um, there's a venue settlement process at the end, but, but certainly in, in some of the bluer states, bluer cities, we, we have to work with unions and things like that and learn, learn how to do all those different things, which is, um, you know, fantastic guys. There's the first time I learned about a union, I was plugging something into a wall and he goes, what you doing? And I was like, um, just plugging this in. He goes, let me do that for you. And so he did it for me. I was like, he's like, He goes, hi, so-and-so, I'm the representative of the union. I was like, oh, this, they take this stuff for real. So, but fantastic. Setting up security, road closures, merchandise, all these different things. We bring it all to the venue and we basically take it over. We bring home team, we bring away team, we bring the merchandise, we bring the ticket scanners, we bring everybody with the exception of the food and beverage, because that's the local venues, that and some ancillary services, that's where they make their money. And then they'll also supply ushers and what have you because they know their park. So, so from that perspective, when we go into a location, we take over the whole location and, and then put on the best show that we can, pack up, leave it, leave it better than we found it, and then put it on a truck and haul ass to the next, to the next city. So, so yeah, when I say traveling circus, we are doing this. But here's the thing, we're doing this in 3 different locations throughout the, throughout the United States. On any given weekend. You think about one show traveling, that's, that's enough of a beast, right? Then last year we had two shows traveling at the same time. It's like, okay, get, get a little bit. We have two broadcasts going at the same time, two BTV broadcasts, which are, which are always showing on YouTube for, for, for free for our fans. But now with the third one, it's like, holy smokes, this is not just a, we just need a couple more trucks. This is, these, these teams come with some panache, right? We got, we have giant sets for the Coconuts and the Clowns, like, How are we going to move all the bands, the entertainment people, all of these things? So, but we're doing it. We're doing it in 3 different locations per weekend. And it's just, it seems that from a finance perspective, like even though this thing is going to grow, grow, grow, grow, grow with human resources and other things that we need to do, the finance function, we're doing this all with 5 people because we don't need to grow exponentially. We just need to make sure our processes are are nailed in that our efficiencies, if we see something a little wonky, we jump on it and we fix it so that we don't have to keep paying for the sins of a bad decision week after week after week. It's like, no, we got to fix that right now. And we do fix it and then we move forward with better efficiency. So it allows us to, to watch this growth come up around us and not have to worry about, oh gosh, do we need another accountant? Do we need another, another CPA? Do we, do we need to go outsource something? We're able to handle it internally and it's awesome. My team is amazing.

Let me ask you one other quick follow-up question. I'll turn it over to Paul. But one of the misconceptions that I've met a few people who work, you know, I've met someone who, you know, for example, works in, uh, runs finance for the Boston Red Sox. And he was telling me, he's like, look, everyone comes over and they want to talk about the player contracts, right? Because that's what's in the news. But he said the finance department, the FP&A team, they're more about working with the vendors, getting the merchandising, you know, looking at You know, the security and those types of things that go to how do you actually manage the organization and the other ancillary things because the contracts are what's in the news. But he's like, yeah, we don't really do that. And it was one of those things that I was like, you know what? I never even thought about it, but yeah, that makes total sense. So I'm assuming similar thing for you. You guys, you know, yeah, you have a TV contract that probably gets negotiated once every 2, 3 years. But then, but you guys were thinking about merchandising sales. How do you go over and, you know, market, you know, differently? What vendors are going to come in? What are the ticket prices that you're going to be charging in different locations? Because maybe if you're going to be in a more expensive area, like in New York City versus Savannah, you might go over and charge higher prices because the cost of Yankee Stadium might be more expensive. So those are the things I'm guessing that your finance team is kind of thinking about. Solving, not involved in the stuff that people are like, hey, what does it cost to go and pay that player?

Okay, so that's, that's good insight from a traditional baseball operation. Our, our, there's nothing traditional about what we're doing. We, we are probably akin to like a Broadway show moving around the country because when we, when we come to town, we have to generate our own marketing. We have to generate our own, our own following. And when people come to a Broadway show, they come because someone, you know, someone said, hey, I got a couple of tickets. Hey, you got to do this. It's like the local marketing in that area. We just happen to have an extremely big microphone to get this out there to everybody. And we've done a really good job over the years of amassing a nice, nice big audience so that when we do put it out there, it gets out far and wide that, hey, bananas are coming to town. One of the really cool things, just kind of give you an idea, when we were in Texas A&M a couple of weeks ago, we were there for Texas A&M, the real, you know, the home of the 12th Man, you know, College Station. It's going to be amazing. 100,000 people, right? Well, that's our biggest show that we've ever done. But it was a, it was a brainchild of, of, of Jesse to say, hey, since we're gonna do the biggest show we've ever done, why don't we do the smallest show we've ever done? So what they did is they decided to go ahead and do, um, a pop-up game at a local high school on the Thursday before the game. And it was the first 1,000 people. They basically announced it that morning. First 1,000 people in, get in, get a, get a show. And, um, and, and it was a full-on show. It was fully produced. They all dances, everything. And those 1,000 people were treated to an impromptu show by two amazing sets of athletes who had all entertainment and everything right there at a high school venue. And, and, you know, and the pull was immediate. Like, the way it was described was, you know, have you ever seen Field of Dreams when you see at the end, they have all the cars with their headlights all strung out, right? It was very similar to that. The bus was driving by cars along roads that were all parked along the side of a road. And this is like in the, you know, and, and was it Navasota, Texas, right? So this was a really big deal. And, and, and what it showed is that we, we do have the ability if we wanted to, to generate a really quick fury of fans. But also, can we put on a show even at 1,000 people? Can we put on a show with the same amount of energy that we would for in 2 days? We're about to do it in front of 100,000 people, right? And the answer is yes, we can. And so, so that's, that's one of the things that we try to look at. It's from our perspective, our biggest things from an FP&A perspective are trying to look at like the venue contracts, right? The making sure that we're agreeing to things that allow us to them to make money as the venue, but also for us to, to take what we need out of it. You mentioned that like regionally the ticket prices should should change. We actually charge the same price across. So, so our, our normal ticket is $35 at home, right across the street here at Gracie Stadium. And the, the tickets for Major League Baseball, I would say, let's start, let's go up. Tickets for like AAA or MILB would be at $35. So $35, right? So now there are some tickets out there for like the backstage pass or the back, little things that give you a little bit more insight, give you, give you time in front of the players to get signatures and things like that and pictures. And people will pay for those. It's an elevated experience. But the, for everybody else, it's the, it's, it's the same. It's a $35 ticket. Now you go to the MLB, right? So pick, pick any Major League Baseball, or in this case, any NFL or NCAA. You're looking at tickets anywhere between $40 for the upper bowl and $60 for the lower bowl. $60 is the highest level of ticket that you're gonna see. If you're out there looking for tickets and they're any, and they're north of north of $60, unless it's a special ticket, which you can only get from us. You can't get any of those special tickets from any scalpers. They, they, they, we just don't give them. We have to come from us. Anything north of $60 is a fake ticket. It's a scalper, it's a scalp ticket and, and, or it's a speculative ticket, right? So you'd be extremely careful if you're out on StubHub or all these different places trying to, trying to get some information or trying to get some tickets, because I can tell you that you're not going to get them. You're going to overpay. They're going to send you your money back. You're going to think you have them. You're going to, you're going to really Your kids are going to love you and they're going to hate you because you don't actually have the tickets. But that's, that's pretty much the gist of what we do.

The—

there's no reason to keep jacking up the rates on tickets because we still, we still have— I mean, we're selling out places and it really comes down to if we're paying our bills and we're able to take care of all these new things that we're trying to pull in place, then what's the point in jacking up the ticket prices just to make a little bit more money? That's, not a very fans-first approach. Now, if there was an initiative where, say, we're saving money because we want to go build the next, you know, the Banana Land, like a physical Banana Land, and we need the money to put in for construction and things like that, then okay, that money's going towards something. But if it's just to, just to pad our coffers, could we do it? Yeah, we could. But at the end of the day, what's the point? Why, why would we want to just increase, increase prices just for the sake of because we can. That's what everybody else does. And one of our core principles is that what everybody else is doing, do the exact opposite. And our long game is to, is to gather fans, not dollars. Because if we gather a billion fans, Jesse's, Jesse's big dream is to have a, is to be a billion fan brand. If you have a billion fans and they all bring $1, that's a billion dollars, guys. So that's, yeah.

Are you sure that's how the math works?

Yeah. That, you know, it's, it's a little, let me get my calculator.

It's a little math.

Little math. Yeah.

One times the bigger number.

I'm not, I'm not an FP&A guy. You guys can put that in your models.

I mean, that, that's accounting math right there.

Few questions. Just kind of curiosity. Do you guys own the stadium then?

We do not. It's owned by the city of Savannah.

It's owned by the city. So you have no— there's no stadiums you guys own? Like, there's like, not like most professional sports, not always, but typically nowadays franchise often owns the sports, whether it's a separate entity or not, right? They often own the sports arena. You're completely renting, so it's totally different capital expenditure. I mean, there's cap expenses here, obviously, just a different model from that side of the operating versus capital expenditure. So you don't have that huge, uh, huge depreciation expense every year.

I would love to have some depreciation expense, man. Anything to take off some of these taxes, it'd be great.

Yeah, I mean, I'm sure because you own that, there's still Yeah, trucks. There's still equipment, just not the huge arena cost.

That's right. That's right.

And you don't have to negotiate with the cities for how much money they're going to put in.

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That's correct. The, um, where it comes down with the partnership with the city is that, so they obviously take care of everything around the stadium. Since we're inside the stadium and we're pretty much the tenant of the stadium, if they want to have events there, certainly you can have events there. But we have to have people sign waivers because even though the city actually owns it, we're still liable if someone gets injured.

If you're—

so a lot of times they want to do like a 5K in the— because it's nestled at the end of a pretty big park in in Savannah. And so they'll do 5Ks and they'll, they'll like, maybe they'll run around that, the outfield, the, the warning track or something like that. And now it's all turf, so we don't have to worry about, you know, stuff getting padded down. But because of that, we do have to have their, you know, people sign waivers saying, hey, look, if you, if you trip and get like a turf burn, that's not on us, that's on, you know, the organizer. So little things like that just from risk management perspective. But yeah, the, we, we, we rent out the facility and we've taken on some of the responsibility for the utilities because naturally, I mean, we're the only ones there, so it makes sense. But certainly the upkeep, anything, anything north of a, of a certain threshold, the city is obligated to come in and, and fix it because it's either a safety issue or it's something that, that they need to keep their asset in workable condition for their tenant to be able to use it. Right. Other than that, we've, we've taken a lot of the, a lot of the brunt off of them because there's been certain things that we need to do. For example, when we added the 2 new teams, actually now with 4, 4 new teams, we only have 2 locker rooms, right? The, the Bananas are in one locker room, the Party Animals in the other locker room. Those are the first 2 teams. Well, where are you going to put the other 4 teams? Well, we had a temporary structure out in left field and decided that's probably not where it needs to go because when we got the next, the next 2 teams, now we have 4 teams. That's 60 dudes. No, I'm sorry, close to 100 guys with coaches. And, and so we decided, you know what, let's go ahead and build a center field operations center that has the locker rooms and dwelt, has showers, everything. And then you move over. Now we have a workout facility in there, really nice one that Sorinex helped Sorenex outta South Carolina helped us put together. And then we have a, a, a really nice athletic training facility right next to some batting cages and things like that. So it certainly, it was, it an investment for us to put it on city property. Absolutely. That, that, that is a permanent building for the city now. And, and you know, it's only, it can only be used as what it's intended to be used as. So, so certainly it's one of those things where from a capital expenditure piece, yeah, it's, it's ours. We have to, we have to, you know, insure it and all that stuff, but it's sitting on city property. So it's one of those where you go, you look and you go, oh man, that stinks. I wish we would have put that on wheels, right? Just in case if we, if we were, if we needed to go anywhere, we could take that thing with us because it's a beautiful building. Sure.

If things turn out that you have to move elsewhere, you have this big huge asset that yes, you own the building, you don't own the land.

It's not correct.

Just pick it up and easily move it.

Correct. Correct. Yeah. So but, but that's, that's part of the partnership with the city is that we want to make sure that we maintain their facility. Because for as long as we are, we are here in Savannah, it's, it's good for them and it's also good for us because we want this facility to be as first class as we can get it. Now, it's an, it's an old stadium, right? I think this year is actually the 100th year of Grayson Stadium. So when you walk around, if you walk around the concourse, there are, there are large pictures of like Hank Aaron. And I mean, pick a handful of guys that, you know, they have played here in the past. So from a, from a baseball history perspective, This is, this is one of the, this is one of the places where a lot of really, really neat people have played. So we don't wanna lose that with, with the fervor of the banana ball because our, our root is from baseball, right? But it's also, we need to be able to extend out and show, hey, this is where we're going with this. So we, we're still holding on to the traditions of the past, but bringing a show for the future.

Do one more and then we'll shift to, I know Glenn has a few questions on baseball. Okay, so the goal here long term is, you said, at least for her right now, is 8 teams. How many games a year would you ultimately like to have? Like, how big of an operation are we thinking here? And I know it can always subject to change and all that, but with 8 teams, what would the schedule kind of look like?

Well, so right now we play from February to October, um, our playoffs in October. And then, so, um, all the teams play 60, 60 interleague games, right? So, um, everybody has to have 60 games 30 home, 30 away, right? Well, even if we would— right now we're sitting at about 197 games, which is— and that's all in, right? That's not— I know in Major League Baseball, what is it, 182 games you have to play?

162, not counting preseason or postseason.

162 without preseason and without postseason.

Okay. Okay. So, so all in, if a team makes it, then, then you're probably playing about 180 games, give or take. So each team, the way we do it is about— is about 60 games each. So all that means though is that, you know, when you add, when, if you were to add 2 more teams and it had to put another 60 games on those guys, it doesn't mean that you're playing another 60 games. It just means that you have to filter, filter in those games across 8 teams as opposed to, as opposed to 6. Right now it's, it's kind of hard to say because 197 games, that's a lot of games. That, that means that we're putting on 3 shows per weekend throughout the entire summer months, right? From February to October. It gets pretty daunting from the standpoint of stretching, not just— not the players and the coaches, they're fine. It's like it's the internal stretching that needs to happen. When we— if we add 2 more teams, the increase in the entertainment team, the increase in the logistics, the increase— again, I don't think in the finance world we need to make any changes, but the rest of the show needs to pop up human resource-wise and financially so that we can actually support another show on the road at the same time, 4 shows every weekend. Because again, one of the things that people miss on this is that we travel both teams. And so it's not like just the team is going in and they're the visitors at this location and the home team's already there. It's the home, the venue's already taken care of, the food and beverage is already taken care of. We, and you just, you just drop a team in there and play a game and leave. We bring everything and we, we do everything on the road except food and beverage, right? So That means all the merch, all the ticketing, everything goes out. But we're doing that here, here, here, and now here. How in the world do you do that? Right. So, so we're learning a lot in this year from that third game of how, how much can we really stretch the internal components of this organization before— and God forbid there's no snapping. But I think that we're, you know, we're about to go into some pretty dog days of summer. And this is where you start really testing the mettle of the team. to see, okay, how, how hard and fast can we run this team without, without burning anybody out, right? That it's a, it's a very serious thing that we look at, mental, mental fitness, physical fitness, spiritual fitness at times, right? Making sure that people are ready to, to be on the road at sometimes we try to, we try not to do back to back to back, but sometimes it's back to back to back to back to back, right? Because there is just nobody else to do that job. So that's one of the struggles that we have right now is as we grow is what kind of human resources can we put in place? It's funny, people say, well, you know, working at the Bananas, it must be crazy. It must be bananas, right? Yeah, it is. It comes with this goofiness, but also it comes with a lot of seriousness because wherever we go, we need to bring that same type of energy and influence and everything. Anybody that's ever seen a show in the past, they've all told their friends, this is what you should, you should expect. And now we have to not only meet those expectations, but blow them out of the water. And that takes a certain je ne sais quoi that you don't just get from normal people. If someone were to come in and say, yeah, I'm looking for an 8 to 5 job, you're like, get out of here. Like, this is not, this is not for you. You are going to work weekends. You are going to work late nights. You are going to work the most craziest schedule. But I can tell you, at the end of the day, you are going to love what you have just accomplished. We have interns coming through here and I was kind of joking with them the other day. They all laughed at my joke. I was like, yeah, this place is a meat grinder. And they're like, hahaha. I was like, no, it really is a meat grinder. But if you survive this thing, you can go anywhere with this banana tattoo on your chest saying, I did that. I did that for 3 months. I know how to do this. And now it's becoming, from a nerdy accounting metaphor or simile, is that You, you go to the Big Four so that you could, so you could take your step and go to the next place, right? The Bananas is, is our, our interns are coming in and then they're moving on to other places that maybe they weren't able to get to before, but now they got a giant foot in the door because the Bananas are preparing them for, for greatness.

Yeah, I think that's great. Let's, so I know, um, before we run outta time, I wanna talk a little bit about the product itself that you have, the show that you guys put on. Because for baseball traditionalists, you might think, wait, what? What's going on? One of my favorite rules that the Bananas have, because I would, whenever I would go to a ballgame and I've gone to hundreds of Major League games, I bring my glove. And I love the fact that if a player hits a foul ball into the stands and the fan catches the ball, the batter's out. I love that idea. I'm talking about fan interaction, right? So for the audience here, tell everybody a little bit about some of the, the big rules that kind of what differentiates Banana Ball from Major League Baseball.

Well, I think the, the one first and foremost is the 2-hour time clock. Baseball has suffered over the years, um, as, as attention spans have grown, have grown shorter. The YouTube culture, it's, I, I need, yeah, I need the serotonin, um, jabs. I need, I need these things, um, in 90 seconds or less, right? Uh, I need speed. I need, I need something moving. Baseball has suffered because it, it's a long game, right? You have to really love baseball to, to want to watch an entire game of baseball. And, and again, this is not something where you think about every time you think about baseball, you think about you and your dad having, you know, pouring peanuts into a Coke and, and drinking it in a, in a, in a fancy way that you used to do it. It's just, this is something where the, the new, the new generations that are coming up, they're looking at all of this stuff that's happening around them in baseball. Is just not meeting that need. Now, what has baseball done? Added a pitch clock, right? Okay. So that's sped up the game a little bit, which is great. In fact, I don't think it's hindered the game at all. Now, now you don't have a guy just kind of just dancing on the mound, but you say, move the game along, guys. Come on, let's get the offense going, right? Well, the 2-hour time clock allows us to move through the game and in a way that people, people know that, hey, there's, there's a, there's a finite time. This game is going to start at 7. It's going to end at 9. If it goes into showdown, might end at 9:15, maybe 9:30. Right. But, you know, if you're going to bring your kids in there, most, most of the— I would say most of our demo is, is a family of 4, 3 and a half, right, with 2 kids who are probably in the ages of anywhere between like maybe 6 to maybe 13. Okay. Those kids, when you as parents, you want to make sure that you go in and you leave at a nice time so you can get them home and get them to bed. You know, after they go off into into banana land dreaming about backflips and, you know, funny things. So, so from a family perspective, it really does keep the game nice and tight. And I think that's one thing that fans really do enjoy. And by the way, some people would say, well, how do you get 9 innings in? Actually, if we, if we only get 8 innings in, we go back and look at some of where do we stumble? What were things that we did? Because we're trying to always get 9 innings in in that 2-hour time clock. The great thing is, is that because, because of the way the banana ball is based on a point system, which is one of the other things that are different, let's say the bananas get up or the bananas be home team. Let's say the party animals get up and they drill 13 runs in the first inning and the bananas come up, they get 1 run, right? Well, it's not that this game's not over. In normal baseball, it would be, it'd be 13 to 1 after the first inning, right? And you're looking at the going. Okay, the Party Animals are going to win this one. Like, it's like 90% of it, it's— they're going to win unless the Bananas go on a tear, right? But Banana's just not on tonight, whatever. Um, so, but the Party Animals get 1 point. Okay, so now flip the script. Party Animals are up, they score 0 points, right? And then the first guy for the Bananas hits a home run and gets that 1 run. The inning's over. So, so the only time it took was for the Party Animals to go through 3 outs and the Bananas to hit 1 home run. Because the, the, the under the point system, it doesn't matter how many points, how many runs you have. Whoever has the most runs gets a point for that inning. In fact, it's created such an issue that we had to put on a new rule that allowed the, the, the visiting team again doesn't have as much time on the field. It gave, it gave them if they do more trick plays than the home team, then come to the last inning, they get a point, which, by the way, so, so it could be a, it could be a 3-3 game. But at the end of the last inning, when the last inning comes up, they now have a 1-point lead, a 4-3 lead, because they've done more trick plays. So it was a way to kind of equalize things because of the, because of the lack of the lack of the amount of time that the visitor team actually has on the field. Due to that very simple thing. If you score 0 and they get up, they score 1 run, that inning's over. Like they don't have to play 3 outs, right? So that, that makes another one. More fun ones is that, is that foul ball into the stands certainly has to be a clean catch, right? Interestingly, you know, we're talking about how competition is now starting to come out. It's the red ocean, blue ocean theory, right? You're blue ocean for a little while. You have about 8 to 10 years before the— before that becomes purple. And then all of a sudden there's so many competitors in the water, it's red, right? Everybody's trying to vie for this. There are copycat leagues that are now coming into play. And in fact, just up the road here of I-16, they're called the Tri-City Chili Peppers. And the Tri-City Chili Peppers have— they actually made a rule to where any foul ball that's hit, anything that's hit off the bat into foul territory is actually playable. So, so now all of the fans become defensemen. So if you catch it, that's one thing. If it bounces, you can actually go get the ball and throw it back into the field so that now you are part of the play. That is a really cool rule, you know, like there was one that was on, I think it was on ESPN.

I'm thinking of some liability issues coming up with that.

NIL, NIL all over the place. You're always thinking, thinking the good way, Paul. But, but yeah. So what you're seeing there is you're seeing people take advantage of, hey, we have all these people who are in this room How do we keep them all glued to the, to the product on the field? That's a great one. 'Cause that ball comes off and it's near you, an 8-year-old kid, you're gonna chase that thing down. You're gonna grab it. You're gonna throw it back on the field because that ball is in play. That is cool.

The 8-year-old who takes the ball, throws it, and hits the back of the head of the person that's in front of them.

Now you gotta put, you know, I'm sure it's on the ticket that anything, anything that flies out, you're gonna get hit by something, right?

So I'm sure, yeah, all the disclaimers sit on the table. We know how that works. Well, any more questions from you, Glenn? I think we're kind of coming up on about an hour. So I'll let you see if you have any others.

I mean, I could, I could go on for, for multiple hours just talking about baseball, as you know, but no, I guess once, you know, Tim, it's always great. And I love, you know, one of the big things is, is that I think Banana Ball, it's sometimes it's a little harder to watch for a baseball traditionalist and growing on me. It is, it is growing. But what I love is that. There are a bunch of people who had no interest in baseball before who are now like, oh, I love watching the Bananas on TV when they're on ESPN or whatever. And I think it just brings more people to the sport and gets more fans engaged in baseball all around. So, which I think it's a fantastic thing. So absolutely loved what you guys are doing. And it's just, hey, you know, that's the idea that the XFL did the same thing to the NFL. It wasn't that they're saying the NFL was a bad product. You're just saying, hey, you know what, we're going to do things a little different. I mean, right, the guy on the back of the jersey was, he hate me or whatever. Still, you got to remember that.

But I still remember that one.

Yes. Is that the NFL changed, started changing some of their rules to adapt to the XFL, especially when the XFL went away. And you're seeing Major League Baseball do so. I think, you know, what you guys are doing, it's great. Challenge the norms and it's just a lot of fun. And so I think, you know, fantastic job.

Well, coming from a baseball traditionalist, I appreciate those sentiments. Thank you.

It's fun to watch. I think it's— competition is always good when you challenge the norms, change sports. We've seen it in football. We see different things in all kinds of sports that change things and love what you're doing there. Love the kind of the entertainment, the baseball. It's a fun episode, you know, and I hope everybody enjoyed getting to see insight beyond just the financials, but how a league operates that is so different than our traditional US sports leagues, right? It's, it's a whole different model. So really appreciate you walking us through that and sharing a lot of those intricacies with us, Tim. And before we end, any last words, last thoughts you want to give us? Any advice for the FP&A people out there or any good wisdom? You can take it wherever you want.

I just want you guys to pick a side. Are you accountants or are you finance people? What is it?

I'm a finance person. There's no accounting.

I'm here. No question. It's like sharks and jets out there, guys.

I just want us all to get along, but it's like, all right, well, real quick, Tim, I have to say one thing now that you brought it up. Do you know what the difference is between an accountant and an FP&A professional?

Oh, here it comes. Charisma?

No. When an accountant gets creative, they go to jail. When an FP&A professional gets creative, they get promoted. That's why I work in FP&A.

Okay. It's time for me to move to the FP&A world. No, I've appreciated being on with you guys. Obviously it's always a good time talking about not just Banana Ball, but just talking with my people in the finance world. I appreciate you guys allowing me to come into your world and share a little bit about what I'm excited about. And certainly if you do, if you really do want a page turner, it's soon to be movie rights. You guys, I'll start the bidding at like $3. We'll get Chris Noble of Odyssey fame and Interstellar to come and do the, it's going to be great. We'll get Ben Affleck to come back in for account 3.

I'll do $279. Where are you at?

Yeah, $230.

I'm a discount guy.

Yeah, it sounds like it. Sounds like you're, uh, let's take the FP&A out on it. On, let's, we'll just scrap that there. Hey, I really appreciate you guys. Thank you so much for having me on.

Yeah, thank you for joining us. That's it for today's episode of FP&A Unlocked. If you enjoy FP&A Unlocked, please take a moment to leave a 5-star rating and review. Review. It's the best way to support the FP&A Guy and help more FP&A professionals discover the show. Remember, you can earn CPE credit for this episode by visiting earmarkcpe.com, downloading the app, and completing the quiz. If you need continuing education credits for the FPAC certification, complete the quiz and reach out to me directly. Thanks for listening. I'm Paul Barnhurst, the FP&A Guy, and I'll see you next time.