Adam McCauley That's a nice little nugget to leave out of there, isn't it? So the SBDC, we had worked with, you know, part of growing our businesses, kind of reaching out to different organizations and looking at leadership roles and things like that. And the SBDC, we, we teamed up with them and they kind of helped us get on track and work towards building our company culture. And, with that, they had seen the growth that we were making the last few years. And, we didn't even know they put our name in this, application for that award. And there were 12 different recipients, in the state of Michigan divided up by different regions. And, so we had one in our region. And then what we had found out a few months later is that we were the overall winner for the state of Michigan as the best small business in the state of Michigan. So that was a significant, fun thing for us to kind of put a nice little feather in our cap. And, we got the toot our own horns for a little bit. Yeah, real fancy galas down in Lansing and, around some, some pretty significant businesses. So it was kind of neat to rub shoulders and elbows with those types of people, which was, which was kind of fun. Marshall Atkinson And after that award, did you see, “Oh, you're the best small business I need to send you my work”
Did that happen? Adam McCauley
Sadly not as much as we would've liked. But I mean, it did open some doors when you had those conversations. When your name is Sandlot Sports, everyone thinks sports, sports, sports. But when we were down there and networking with the people that we had met, you know, when we told them what we do, they were like, "Oh wait, maybe this is something we can partner up or get together and do some work with you guys." So it did open some doors for us a little bit, and it continues to open doors. I mean, it's always kind of a topic of conversation. When, people kind of say like, "Wait, my business has nothing to do with sports. How can you help us?" And then we explain, "Hey, this is exactly what Sandlot Sports does." It does open those doors for us to touch. Marshall Atkinson So Adam, after the pandemic hit, you decided that obviously, you had to make some changes. Walk everyone through the process and the steps that you took. Cause that's what this episode is focused on. Adam McCauley Yeah, so Ryan and I early on realized that we need to invest in our business. So in 2019, we spent a few months kind of looking for the best kind of consulting firm that we could find. And we put together a leadership team of staff members on here. And so at the end of 2019, we were geared up for a big push of Sandlot Sports. And in January and February, we were rocking and rolling, and then the pandemic hit. So, what we did is, as a team, it's kind of broken down and said, "What does our business look like?" If we lose 10% of our orders, or 20% of our orders, or 50% of our orders... like what are the scenarios that could happen to Sandlot Sports that can put us out of business or it could, or we could excel and jump forward? So that was a big focus for us early on is to say, what are all these scenarios that could happen?
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