PickleCon: The World’s Largest Pickleball Event

Introduction with Keri King and Alyssa Morrison

0:00

hi I’m Crystal Brown your host and you may have heard of Triple Crown Sports as one of the largest amateur college and

0:07

youth sport organizer maybe in the areas of volleyball softball or fast pitch baseball but did you know that they’re

0:14

organizing the same fund for pickleball called picklecon CEO Carrie King and

0:19

pickleball director Elisa Morrison join us today to tell us all about picklecon it’s a huge convention in Kansas City

0:26

next year so keep listening to hear all the details now to the show Welcome to

0:31

Simply pickleball the podcast where we discuss all things pickleball the fastest growing sport in America and

0:37

around the world we are interviewing the founders industry leaders athletes lovers of the sport that are driving the

0:45

spectacular growth if you love pickleball as much as we do listen in okay so I’m so excited to be speaking

0:53

today with Carrie King and Elisa Morrison from Triple Crown Sports and we get to hear about all things took a ball

1:00

before we get started on that um Carrie I hope you can give us a little bit of a background on Triple

1:06

Crown Sports and how it came to be I know that it’s a family business and I know that it was started by your father

1:13

but it would be really interesting to hear about you know why this business is in particular interested in pickleball

1:18

when we get there but first why it started to begin with yeah very good I’ll definitely start out so in 1982 so

1:25

roughly 41 years ago my father and mother were playing in a slow pitch softball tournament so this is adults at

1:32

the time not not a youth event and they were disenchanted by the level of organization and the awards the lack of

1:40

officials there was a lot of issues they took that right to the event director and he basically told them if you think

1:46

you can do it better go do it on your own so then that was the challenge to start the very first ever event in 82

1:52

and that event was the idea that my mom Annette King and my father Dave King had

1:58

was to create an event that was very memorable and something that had all of the bells and whistles so it wasn’t just

2:04

the games but it was social activities it was uh great awards ceremony maybe uh

2:12

pro athletes all these different elements that would enhance the game of softball to make for an experience that

2:19

was out of this world and that was the original vision of Triple Crown and then

2:24

in 1987 it became a company and so it was just on the side for the first five years from 83 through 87 and then it

2:33

really focused on expanding the slow pitch softball footprint and zoom all

2:38

the way to today in 2023 we now have no slow pitch softball events and we are in

2:45

youth baseball youth girls fast pitch softball youth volleyball college

2:50

basketball and soon to be pickleball and this will have a pro and amateur element

2:55

and all kinds of different aspects to it and it really encompasses that original Insight that Dave and Annette had at 82

3:03

to create Granger and joy and memories inside of the event itself and the

3:09

format is designed uniquely to where it can bring memories learning Hospitality

3:15

to the Forefront so it meets our purpose of why our Triple Crown Sports

3:20

organization exists it also meets the mission of what we do which is the the creation of high quality events and so

3:28

it’s very exciting that we’re entry pickleball it’s gathered a lot of momentum uh in a very short period of

3:34

time and I think Alyssa’s email inbox warrants that I’ve never seen so much

3:39

activity and that as being an analyst going to pickleball director it’s a lot

3:44

different now because a lot of people want to know more about what exactly are we building what do you think your

3:51

parents felt was missing exactly I mean if you could be specific is it because

3:57

there was that I imagine at the time there’s Major League Sports so we can move that out aside for a minute even

4:02

though we might talk about Major League uh pickleball and then there’s Collegiate pickleball that’s coming

4:09

Collegiate sports but there was and there’s youth sports but somehow you’re it sounds like they had they had a

4:16

division of somewhere in between where maybe it’s amateurs don’t have a place to compete and have fun they felt like

Vision of Triple Crown Sports

4:22

there was is that what they were looking at that was missing yeah you really had a ditch Market that wasn’t being served

4:28

a high quality product and so what was there what were tournaments that were

4:34

very Loosely organized so instead of the schedule being posted a week in advance or a month in advance it was you know

4:41

posted as you walked into the facility instead of having the facility maintained which in the slow pitch

4:48

softball world would look like a infield that has been groomed so it’s flat instead of a bunch of undulations on the

4:55

infield and Hawk lines that are actually painted in an outfield fence actually

5:00

having an official behind the home plate and one of the bases and then when the event

5:06

um is being played the teams are segmented properly meaning the teams that are good are playing against each

5:12

other the entire time the teams that are in the middle and the teams that are mediocre they’re bunched and segmented

5:18

together nobody was doing those kind of things for the amateur Marketplace and so uh with the event finished there was

5:25

a the awards were there on site there was an awards presentation and it put a

5:31

bow on the event leaving uh great memories along the way whether it was some of the social events that happened

5:37

at night there was a not quite a a runway model show but if you can imagine

5:43

a slow pitch softball uniform okay now now you put that softball player on top of the the bar okay and have them walk

5:51

up and down the bar and auction off for St Jude’s Children Hospital their Jersey

5:56

so the person would come away with the jersey and the money would go to St Jude’s Children’s Hospital that was a

6:02

fun way to celebrate softball raise money for a charity and also create a social environment that left lasting

6:09

memories and so when when we would produce events early on and really throughout the time frame it also the

6:16

events were produced in destinations that were engaging for the family so places like Stevo Springs Colorado is a

6:24

ski resort community and in the summertime it has lots of horseback riding fishing and it’s a beautiful cool

6:31

weather setting those were the initial building blocks is to build those kind of Highly organized events around social

6:38

and high high quality ingredients in settings that generated an expansive

6:44

place for your children to be at or maybe your parents would come watch you even if they were older parents they

6:50

would be with the the grandkids at the time yeah to the river uh you know we did so many different we call them spin

6:58

events and another way to look at that is if you were to go to a typical hamburger joint you have very limited uh

7:06

options at McDonald’s of what you could do you can put the ketchup the mustard maybe some pickles right and cheese but

7:12

if you go to a place like a Smash Burger you could put peanut butter and bacon strawberries jam and and you can layer

7:20

the burger to where you’d like it and so Triple Crown is well known now for being

7:26

that option where you could layer your experience unlike our competitor events that

7:31

typically produce the standard issue hamburger or that hamburger joint that has the layers the special ingredients

7:38

and the atmosphere the high quality service to where you walk away saying I’ll go back there again oh that’s

7:45

awesome so it’s it’s really event planning around Sports and you know combining those two and which is awesome

7:51

because it’s you know healthy I don’t know about the peanut butter on hamburger part but

7:56

um so Elise Alyssa tell me about your inbox so you said off camera you said

Decision to Create Pickleball Event

8:04

that your inbox is completely full um and you know what did Carrie come to

8:11

you and say like start some research like how did this start over at Triple Crown because there’s a lot of other sports you guys could have gone into you

8:17

decided to go into pickleball you know someone must have had a clue yeah so it was Carrie um that came to me in 2018

8:24

and I had done research on a few other sports um a few that I was like yeah we can

8:30

continue research and a few that I said no this doesn’t seem like a good fit for us

8:35

um and so he came to me and it actually as senior pickleball and so that was

8:41

what it was at the time and I went to a few events I did some research I was like it’s a little more than senior pickleball it’s just research pickleball

8:47

as a whole and so I researched it for probably a little less than a year and then got our CEO involved and said

8:54

okay I think there’s some something here there’s good momentum it matches our values I think there’s a niche that we

9:01

can provide something new to the sport something different that there is not already out there and so he got involved

9:07

how we went to carry with it and he’s like yep keep going with it and so I had some resources and we’re planning on

9:13

getting into it I’ve had someone hired and had an event kind of scoped out for 2020 and then as we all know covet hit

9:22

and some as an events company had to navigate that as everyone else did and so kind of

9:29

pickleball to go back burner like didn’t think about it we’re like hey we’re just putting the quash on this we’ll revisit

9:34

it so after we got through covid um stayed alive as a company

9:40

um and then probably about the past year have been researching it again and I’m

9:45

glad that Carrie had the foresight he did to start research in 2018 because it’s very different right if

9:52

anyone has been around for six years Piqua has grown tremendously but it’s also changed tremendously which is like

9:59

the number of players the number of tournaments that we provided the number of tournament providers and people and

10:07

money in the game um is just crazy and so it’s been really great to see it from

10:12

the beginning and then be able to change our vision for what’s now needed um in the sport because it’s very

10:18

different than what we originally thought was needed back in 2020. yeah and I and I want to I want to double

10:24

click on that and and get into that and I think so so Carrie when when she came to you or or the CEO whoever came to you

10:32

and said we want to look into pickleball what were your first thoughts have you have you had you played pickleball had

10:37

you heard of pickleball yeah I dabbled at playing pickleball at the time and I

10:42

realized that um different age individuals could compete against each other at the same

10:48

time and some of the the what’s called youthful abilities in sport where as you

10:54

you know age over time you can’t do as much they were somewhat eliminated out there um there were people that were

11:01

older to be that were way faster somehow and they were able to get around the court with no issues and I I saw that

11:08

the sport could be expanded into you know multiple different ages and like Alyssa noted it wasn’t really just for

11:15

seniors in fact it was a lot of fun for somebody that uh likes to downhill mountain bike and snowmobile uh I’m a

11:21

civil Bill Hill Climb Racer as well and I like high-speed things and this right

11:27

there is is one of these sports that you know satisfies the connection with others uh but you still have this

11:34

opportunity and this is something that I talk about a lot but you still have an opportunity to create losing and I think

11:41

if you could create maybe for loss it builds the character for when real loss

11:47

happens in life and so it’s a practice ground in a game setting to learn how to

11:52

lose and pick yourself back up again and so any kind of way we can create competition so that we can learn to be

11:59

resilient in the face of adversity because our life is chock full of adversity and it’s not losing a

12:05

pickleball Magic’s losing our mother or our father or God forbid a young child

12:11

and these are the things that really help to build character help to build resilience in people and so if we can

12:18

create fun memories around Sport and segment people to where they’re playing the right opponents or the fun opponents

12:25

or the best opponents and we can create this atmosphere where people can walk away and say I can’t wait to come back

12:31

yeah that’s so interesting um was that part of your mission by the way just around resiliency and and

12:38

around it’s interesting the way you just gave perspective on lost I think it’s

12:44

absolutely true uh to to help throughout life I think Sports has has a lot of

12:50

threads a lot of them it’s not just about winning it’s about losing it’s about training it’s motivation discipline you know there’s so many

12:56

elements that you learn that you can apply to different parts of your life but curious if that was part of triple Crown’s Mission from the beginning or or

13:03

maybe you’ve added that no I probably added more of that I love to see losers

Lessons Learned from Losing

13:09

kind of attitude and I mean it’s just this straight up truth there’s room for one winner and everybody else loses and

13:15

so how do you keep attracting people to come back when they don’t ever win well there’s a lot of ways to do that and so

13:22

um you know at the end of the day I probably was that athlete that did not

13:27

achieve the greatest results whether I played college baseball I’ve been at

13:33

snowmobile Hill Climb Racer and I’ve always been quite mediocre I I lose often and I still keep coming back and I

13:40

I get that hit feeling in my stomach of I let myself down or I’ve let my teammates down and for that I get to

13:48

generate the resilient moment so I can manufacture the ability to handle bigger

13:54

issues that come up later and I and I know this to be true when looking at different kinds of you know very

14:00

difficult suicide rates with teenagers and young adults those that play sport

14:05

worked in to be less likely to commit suicide and so I just know our what we

14:12

naturally create which is these tournaments they generate a ton of opportunity for failure adversity making

14:19

mistakes and losing and for that we give lifelong blessed cities young players

14:25

usually but a senior can have the same kind of lesson late in life too and and

14:30

still face difficulty pick themselves back up or outperform their expectations

14:36

and those those things were great about sport yeah one of the best things about it and so we’ll keep coming back to

14:42

different sports over the course of time I think you’ll see us enter uh more Sports in the future and really try to

14:50

create the number one number two or number three event in the country so that Triple Crowns known for the best of

14:57

the best events when they come to produce the event in the sport that I love we know it’s going to be an amazing

15:04

experience well that’s different we’re exciting I want to get to the the event you are planning already and at

15:09

picklecon I definitely want to talk about that and when you guys thought about like how do we put together an event maybe let’s say you can share some

PickleCon 2024

15:16

of the the ideas you wanted to make sure happen during this event so like I said it kind of evolved over the years of

15:22

researching it so um starters just like computer research behind the scenes of who are the top players with sanctioning

15:29

bodies what does it look like what are price entry barriers things like that

15:35

um Geographic places like hotbeds and then went to events and talked with

15:41

players talked to that everyday players talked with Pro a lot of pro players and so at the time they weren’t making a

15:47

living doing it they were subsidizing their living doing some camps and Clinics so we were like hey how can we

15:53

help you guys make um a living well now they a lot of them are making more money with tournaments

15:58

and so kind of lost that and then talked to tournament providers and a lot of Brands and like what are you guys seeing

16:04

and so we’ve still continued that so although our vision has changed because like you said there’s a tournament every

16:10

weekend now so if you want to go play you have opportunities to play Pros they have opportunities to get money brands

16:16

are popping up a lot more brands are coming but like I said there’s just a lot of different companies in pickleball

16:23

right now and not one person bringing them all together and so our CEO Sean Hardy he

16:31

started our volleyball division kind of the same way a very collaborative approach of asking what’s missing asking

16:37

what has worked in the past um what they want to see what they don’t want to see and so that’s really what

16:43

we’ve done is just talked with a ton of people from Pros the brands to Everyday players and tournament providers and

16:49

seeing what’s in the sport is working and why change what’s already working

16:55

but what also what’s missing and so I’ve noticed a lot of Brands aren’t allowed at specific tournaments because they

17:01

only have their four paddle brands that are allowed there and Pros can only play

17:06

in certain events because it’s on their pro circuit but there’s also a need for like people to just Network and talk

17:13

talk with people and there’s a bit large community in so the local communities are really strong but how can that

17:18

Community meet a community from across the country and be able to play and be a

17:23

mixer and be like oh we like obviously the same thing in pickleball but we also have these other initiatives and how can

17:30

we line up club or tournament providers with different facilities from across the

17:36

country and so just finding that need of what we’ve seen in our other sports has has worked

17:41

what felt we felt like was missing in pickleball and then just the idea of

17:47

just bringing everyone together like that’s the point of pickleball like that’s why it was started it’s just that community that left for the game being

17:52

close to someone and so that’s really where Vision kind of grew sounds like kind of tying a bow around the whole

17:59

thing because it it has a lot of different tentacles right now and I think you’re right there’s a ton of new

18:05

brands we interviewed um a Paddle Company that right now

18:10

um doesn’t even sell on Amazon I mean just direct a great Paddle Company and we we’re taught I mean I feel like

18:16

there’s more and more Brands and there there needs to be right like we want the cream to rise to the the top and people

18:22

you know you might buy one tennis racket every 10 years but in pickleball it seems like if we’re open this black one

18:28

every other month so Carrie what I don’t know how involved you are in planning pickle con but um how have you sort of

18:34

seen this sport influence what you guys are doing day to day at Triple Crown is it starting to grow in terms of

18:41

attention and time yeah it’s making all of our you know company-wide goals it’s

Triple Crown’s Increasing Focus on Pickleball

18:47

you know got attention with human resources outside of Alyssa which in

18:52

this case is in the in the operation side we’re talking to you about pickleball but we also have a marketing

18:58

department find finance department and technology and each of our main departments are you know building

19:04

various aspects to fit the needs of what is being created and really like Alyssa

19:10

said what’s being created is a product of what the marketplace has told us to

19:16

create and for that we didn’t have and we currently do not have all of the aspects created that the market wants

19:24

and so we have to design our e-commerce solution to do different things the way the website

19:30

showcases tournaments versus camps and Clinics social activities and so our

19:36

marketing department has launched several different teaser campaigns in in

19:42

collaboration with uh different uh suppliers of pickleball equipment to

19:48

event coordination uh companies and we’ve really networked this event it’s

19:54

like a Triple Crown 5.0 I’ve never seen us come together as a company to infuse

20:01

the markets insights and create an event that’s entirely built by the market not

20:07

simply by the smart Personnel that work at Triple Crown but really

20:12

um like the railroad car coming from a great distance away if you get your ear on the track you can hear it or before

20:20

it even makes a sound and so Alyssa has done really good research too uh and

20:25

Sean Hardy to really listen for what’s supposed to be built well before its

20:32

time and so I’m very excited to see what they’ve done from an internal perspective to get people that work

20:39

there excited about pickleball and then you know the local market in Kansas City

20:44

the millions of Impressions that were happen on news outlets and radio

20:49

stations uh you may be talking to us generated from some of these more activity uh you know it’s it’s just

20:56

amazing how quickly uh this event picklecon has gained attention from you

21:02

know local media sources to to National media sources and then it’ll be probably

21:08

one of the largest most diverse Statewide event ever created at Triple

21:14

Crown in its immediacy and it may be the the most diverse pickleball event in 2024 that they’re eat that there is so

21:21

it’s very exciting it’s getting a ton of attention on our three-year plan one-year plans who’s doing this job that

21:28

job when do we hire this person all this stuff is happening right now that’s awesome I mean I think you you

21:33

highlighted a couple things that I just want to underline you know which is it is an incredibly incredibly diverse

21:39

group of people that play from age to socioeconomic background to location

21:45

geography and I think that’s what’s really exciting about it and what I personally like about it also I I was a

21:53

competitive athlete in college and since then have not really wanted to compete I’m I have tons of friends that say you

21:59

should do a triathlon you can swim you can run and I don’t care about it and now that I play play Pickleball all I

22:05

want to do is compete every day and so and and part of that is because it’s so much fun to compete and it’s you know

22:12

short games you can compete in in all different formats um and I also just and again kind of

22:19

underlining that it’s one of the only Sports where men and women compete against each other pretty fairly I mean

22:26

there there are a few other sports like that but not a lot so I think that diversity you are expecting at picklecon

22:34

you will get we’re sure based on what I’ve seen so you know just sort of

22:39

diving into picklecon a little bit um what you know maybe we can talk about what what we should expect and and who’s

What to Expect at PickleCon

22:46

gonna go and and you know what’s your vision so far right people console has all the convention aspects

22:52

um so it’s 400 000 square feet of Convention Center space wide open we’ll put down right now it’s backed out to

22:59

hold a hundred courts um that’ll change as we get going with multiple tournament providers so that

23:04

we’ll have a lot of different people running their own tournaments inside our event so again give that diversity of

23:10

opportunities and options for type of product that you want to be seen there um multiple camps and Clinics so having

23:16

pros come in teaching clinics having destination camps doing a mini camp there having other provider Camp

23:23

providers come in and showcase their product and then a ton of vendor space available with courts inside vendor

23:31

Village to do demo so you can demo paddles and you can do pro-ams and

23:36

different like activations at the booths um and then just the inside of panel

23:43

discussions and educational breakout sessions so there’s new technology popping up everywhere so how can we

23:51

um advertise and explain those and get people in front of a wider audience and

23:56

then a lot of people are wanting to get into refereeing and figure out it was a whole process he learned that there’s an

24:01

entire process I was like oh we can just get referee certified at our event um no

24:06

it’s not that simple a lengthy lengthy process so how can we educate people on

24:12

what is that process and then maybe start the um process of getting certified and

24:17

we’ll have tons of games going on and so they need practice games so go upstairs and practice all weekend and get all

24:24

your games in and have someone watch you while you’re doing that um and so it really is just kind of

24:32

bringing together that convention side of the education and community and networking but also pickleballers they

24:39

want to play they want to play so providing a ton of Courts just opportunity to play in tournaments playing camps and Clinics and then also

24:45

there’ll be just a lot of open Play courts that you can reserve or just go drop in like couple Brown robins have a

24:52

mixer meet some new people some activities outside of it partner with a local group that

24:59

um I do a tour bus type situation of picking people up and taking people around Kansas City and seeing all the

25:06

pickleball places along with maybe some barbecue places and things like that that make Kansas City Kansas City and so

25:11

really just creating an event that has something for everyone but also pulling

25:17

in Kansas City and saying come to the city as a whole make a family vacation

25:22

out of it make a girls trip guys trip whatever you want out of it where our event is awesome but you also have some

25:29

really cool memories and experiences outside of the event as well oh wow I’m so excited already you you know you both

Pickleball Technology

25:36

mentioned technology and Carrie maybe you know you said that there’s been some technology changes within and I I I

25:43

don’t know if if you’re planning on building anything that’s specific to pickleball I know there’s a lot of

25:48

missing pieces right so there’s what duper is putting together and some of the other rating system technology

25:55

that’s kind of missing there’s you know where to to play and and you know not

26:01

just on a map but like more specifically it changes there’s technology around building courts and so I’m just curious

26:09

Carrie if you guys are jumping into any part of that or maybe you already have no I think those organizations that you

26:15

just discussed are more equipped to do that kind of uh technology development the technology that we’re talking about

26:21

is just more how to like generate ease of use to get into the event to find

26:27

your schedule to understand what camps and Clinics fit your needs to filter and

26:32

search there there is you know maybe 50 different offerings and it’s not our typical event where everybody goes

26:39

through the same conduit sides up and then it’s it’s cut and dry there’s like a one point of entry and and that’s all

26:46

you have to do well this is like an A La Carte you know purchase where not any

26:51

person is going to buy the same one two seven things and so that is a different

26:57

way to to Showcase whatever our offering is and so that’s the technology that we

27:03

have to design just to make ease of use now a Triple Crown did start a uh

27:09

business during the pandemic it was poor timing uh we didn’t know about the pandemic but we started a data and

27:15

analytics company called CSE and that is a technology company that measures the

27:21

objective measurements surrounding athletes movements or speed in which they travel through time the way the

27:30

speed that the ball exits the bat or their hand or the you know this is done

27:36

in baseball and softball right now the CSE brand measures athletes as they perform their

27:43

Sport and then gives them those objective measurements back combined with the subjective human evaluation

27:50

unlike swimming where 100 meters done in a specific time period is good bad or

27:57

ugly baseball has a lot of subjective eye tests they call where a athlete you

28:03

know uses their hands appropriately to feel the ground ball or to come through

28:09

the zone and those things are uh somebody that knows the sport can can

28:16

offer a decent rating of how they’re doing to would they move their feet round or their attitude is you know a

28:24

characteristic of you know performance if things get tough are they going to be

28:29

resilient enough and so a lot of coaches still want that in baseball and softball and I’m imagining that pickleball may be

28:36

a great source for some of these objective criteria especially for the Pros to know how fast did that shot just

28:43

come through you know or what you know angle is the um is the ball coming uh at to for the

28:50

most ideal Precision shot and who’s doing that the most consistently on the pro level those kind of things CSE could

28:58

play a role in as it evaluates that would not be something this will be happy we’re not going to do that this

29:03

coming year we’ve already got enough on our plate to start this event right however there’s

29:10

an opportunity here for an amateur athlete to see how fast if they want to get better you you’ve got to be able to

29:16

move from this side of the court to that side of the court in this amount of time and that’s consider getting better or

29:22

good and if I can hit it this fast or react to a ball within this amount of

29:28

time frame those are all things that CSE could inject into the technology side in

29:34

the future um and so that would be some of the technology play that triple crown could provide down the road vote for the sport

29:41

as it continues to grow that’s really interesting I’m glad you brought that up I I’ve often thought I have a tech

29:47

background and I’m in San Francisco so forgive me but that is where my brain goes and I’ve often thought that you

29:54

know from a rating standpoint why couldn’t we have you know our phone record us and then it feeds into some

30:01

database that gives information back so that at least again like when you’re asked are you a 3-0 player a 3-5 a 4-0

30:07

that you have something more specific than guessing which is happening for a

30:13

lot of amateur players um and so I think there’s definitely room for that and and I also think that

30:19

most pickleball players always are striving to get better they it not just

30:25

like maybe if you’re a runner you want to get faster but with with pickleball they want to to be more strategic and

30:30

they want to know which shots and shot construction and they’re constantly learning such an appetite and I think by

30:36

giving some feedback like this program probably could it would really help a

30:42

lot of players so I think there’s definitely a need in pickleball and even the change to Rally scoring

30:50

um I know I know the pros are now using rally scoring more the um but amateurs

30:55

have are still using the traditional scoring and so you know every Point matters it’s not

31:01

you know and so even like you said I’m I’m I’m not okay with losing but I it’s

31:08

okay I know that I’m not the best pickleball player yet but I do always want to win every point so if so as soon

31:15

as I lose a point I’m back how can I win the next point and I think again like if you get feedback around how you how you

31:22

play or what you’re striving to do it’s really important so I think your insights there are very good

31:28

um I guess but let’s say you’ll have your work cut out for you next year

31:33

well uh so when is maybe you can just give specifics so anyone who’s listening can

31:40

make sure that they check out the event um and and I’ll have some links in the show notes but

31:46

um so make sure everybody subscribes to this so they can hear more because we’ll probably talk closer to the event again but uh where can they find out more

31:53

about the event yeah so the event will be August 8th through 11th 2024 at the Kansas City Convention Center barter

When is PickleCon?

31:59

Hall and we have a websites you can see it via triplecrownsports.com or just go

32:05

straight to it at picklecon.com so we’ll have all the information up there as we release it all of our partners that

32:11

we’re talking to inside the pickleball world as well as ways to get involved like we said we have a very collaborative approach so there’s a get

32:18

involved tab of do you want to be a vendor do you want to run a tournament or just do you have brands that you want

32:24

to see there that maybe we haven’t talked to yet so um gives us an idea of what to who to reach out to and continue building that

32:31

event with with the public and with people so Carrie do you think that your dad would be is is he interested in

32:37

pickleball himself would he be excited that you’re going into pickleball and see like look any event is fun what’s

32:43

busy you know he’s very excited he’s still like is in the office oh listen to

32:49

this I mean we walk by his room every day we go to the office and he’s still

32:54

in there with like grease boards and he’s coming up with different ideas he’s the one that generated the CSE company

33:01

with data and analytics um and that was born after he uh passed the CEO transition from himself to me in

33:09

2017 with that space he you know had time to think and he thought well I’ve

33:14

been developing players my whole life he’s been a coach for over 45 years and he transitions them from the amateur

33:21

field into Collegiate and all the athletes the girls softball players end up playing college somewhere it’s just

33:28

will they say that at that uh College will they be happy will they get playing time will they exceed will they be a

33:35

role player will they sit the bench that’s where you know his head goes is how can you get the development for the

33:42

athlete and so I’m very treat when you said pickleball players are always wanting to get better and I love that

33:47

because I think that it gives a lot of opportunity for Triple Crown because we are good at giving feedback whether it’s

33:54

through the segmentation uh hey if you get better you’ll be in the we call them power pools or you know you you can earn

34:01

your way to play with the elite customers and so my dad is very in Innovative he’s inventive and you know

34:09

he has heard the way in which we put all the the disparate tournament providers

34:15

together and all the brands and he’s like super excited how we know he looks

34:21

at this as like a brand new way to enter a market and he’s very excited with the

34:27

the talent that we have on it Alyssa and Sean as well as where it’s pointed so it looks like he’s very delighted with

34:33

what’s happened when you were growing up did you see yourself becoming the CEO of

Culture of Triple Crown Sports

34:38

the company or no sort of what he’s going to do and you’re gonna yeah

34:43

snowmobiles yeah I was not going to work at the family company I was you know I

34:50

didn’t know where I would be but it was not at triple crown and really what got me to stay in 2003 four and five was

34:58

being in the office and being around the culture and it’s a culture of respect

35:04

Family First and work ethic and so if we know that those Associates that Excel

35:12

the most at Triple Crown prioritize their families before work and the work

35:19

will get done and so we have this culture where we’re respectful of each other we can have our families come into

35:26

the office we can leave the office to go to um weddings funerals school plays

35:34

sporting events it’s encouraged to be a coach in the community and give back to

35:41

Young athletes and I think it’s it’s actually speaks to what most people

35:46

when they leave work if they work around people who have similar values and and priorities they are happy and if they

35:53

feel celebrated and you know they’re because we’re human we’re not just robots although sometimes when you’re

36:00

driving around San Francisco and you see self-driving cars you’re like wow this is really going in a different direction

36:05

but you know for the rest of us that are still going to work um in in the traditional sense I think

36:11

that means a lot I’m really excited I would love to to plan to check back in before picklecon is is happening so we

Conclusion

36:19

can learn more about the specifics and I’m so glad to hear and learn more about Triple Crown as a company and and your

36:26

mission and so I really appreciate your time today and again I’ll put everything in the show notes but I hope everyone

36:32

can you register already or is there just information now hopefully at the beginning of the year we’ll start

36:37

putting some gate passes on sale and then a little later in the spring we’ll

36:42

get some of the camps and tournaments up and going awesome so hopefully people listening can reach out and make your

36:49

inbox even more full [Laughter] awesome well you guys both thank you so

36:54

much good luck to both of you and really really interesting um conversation about triple crown and

37:00

picklecon so thanks okay hey guys thanks for listening to

37:06

Simply pick a ball we will be back very soon with great interviews discussions and more all about pickleball don’t

37:12

forget to subscribe to our channels on YouTube Twitter Instagram or any of your favorite podcasting Outlet until next

37:18

time happy thinking