The Pop-A-Shot National Championship

00;00;07;26 - 00;00;49;14
Mark Conrad
Hello and welcome to the Sports Business Podcast with Pro C, the podcast that explores the world of professional, collegiate, amateur, and Olympic sports. I’m Mark Conrad, or Prof. C from Fordham University’s Gabelli School of Business, where I serve as Professor of Law and Ethics and the Director of the Sports Business Initiative. Today's podcast discusses the recreational home arcade game called Pop-A-Shot, and the quest of one of my colleagues to be the national Pop-A-Shot Champion.

00;00;49;17 - 00;01;17;02
Mark Conrad
Recently, that competition took place and was broadcast on ESPN8, a channel for seldom seen unique sports. One of the finalists was my colleague and I've known for many, many years, but not in the capacity of an elite Pop-A-Shot player. After watching him compete, I thought it would be great to devote this podcast to the product and the competition.

00;01;17;05 - 00;01;48;13
Mark Conrad
So I invited my colleague and an executive of the Pop-A-Shot manufacturer to join me for what I hope is a lively and informative hour. Let me introduce our two guests, Professor Luke Kachersky of the Gabelli School of Business and Nick Gonzalez of Pop-A-Shot. Nick is a Vice President of Marketing for Pop-A-Shot since 2023. Before that, he was the Chief Marketing Officer for Spike Ball.

00;01;48;15 - 00;02;23;03
Mark Conrad
In addition, he served as Global Marketing Director at Wilson Sports, and in his position at Pop-A-Shot, Nick is helping revitalize this arcade basketball brand. Nick received his bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of Michigan. Luke Kachersky is Associate Professor of Marketing at Fordham University's Gabelli School of Business. His research focuses on consumer behavior, and he has published in many academic and professional journals.

00;02;23;05 - 00;02;56;08
Mark Conrad
He earned undergraduate and master's degrees at Saint John's University, and his PhD at Baruch College of the City University of New York. Luke is an elite level Pop-A-Shot player, and has played Pop-A-Shot with his children. So welcome, gentlemen. It's a pleasure to have you on the Sports Business Podcast. Let's start with some questions. For Nick: for those of you who don't know, can you describe what Pop-A-Shot is and the short history of the game and the company?

00;02;56;10 - 00;03;17;07
Nick Gonzalez
Sure. So Pop-A-Shot is an arcade basketball game. And what that means, in layman's terms is, you know, if you've been to a Dave and Busters or a Chuck E. Cheese and you see that basketball hoop game, probably in a metal cage. I start with a couple basketballs in front of you. You shoot, try to score as many as you can, and they roll back to you on a ramp.

00;03;17;10 - 00;03;41;14
Nick Gonzalez
That's an arcade basketball game. Pop-A-Shot is the original brand. It was created in 1981 by a college basketball coach named Ken Cochran. And the story goes that, he was in the hospital recuperating from a surgery. He was kind of bored. He had a mini basketball next to him, and he was just trying to think of, ways to kind of pass the time.

00;03;41;14 - 00;04;02;16
Nick Gonzalez
And from that kind of circumstance came up with the game of Pop-A-Shot. So he ran the company for a number of years, and it was primarily a game that you could play at arcades or at bars. They just kind of [...] them. And then within the last 8 or 9 years, the company’s had to reposition to now be focusing on the at-home market.

00;04;02;19 - 00;04;04;23
Mark Conrad
And what is the target audience?

00;04;04;25 - 00;04;26;09
Nick Gonzalez
The target audience at a general level. It's basketball enthusiasts. It's people who are interested in basketball. If we drill that down kind of one level deeper, we have a big consumer segment. That's families, right? People really love playing with their kids. People really like kind of seeing who can set the high score in the household.

00;04;26;12 - 00;04;42;13
Nick Gonzalez
And then kind of along those lines, you know, we also have some some purchasers without kids. And if I'm going to generalize, that's people who are building out the game room who are maybe remodeling their basement, you know, and kind of building the, the basement of their dreams.

00;04;42;15 - 00;04;47;04
Mark Conrad
And that's part of revitalizing the brand, as you say, in your biography.

00;04;47;06 - 00;04;48;18
Nick Gonzalez
Which part, Mark?

00;04;48;20 - 00;05;06;19
Mark Conrad
The part about basically trying to expand to bars and try to deal with maybe more recreational use or even starting this competition. So that's, you know, maybe what other ideas you have, or is that really the core ideas and the core audience you’re still looking for?

00;05;06;21 - 00;05;27;04
Nick Gonzalez
Yeah. So like I said, we still have a lot of opportunity to grow with kind of our existing consumer target, if you will. But you know, the brand does have a rich kind of...in the brand’s DNA is this kind of an at-home game. This game you can go and kind of, you know, try to set the high score at the neighborhood bar or restaurant.

00;05;27;06 - 00;05;56;16
Nick Gonzalez
So that is a market that we are pursuing coming into 2025. Right. Trying to track that out-of-home market. And as we're thinking about, you know, ways to make our offering, you know, really interesting in that market along comes this idea of competitions. Which, again, is something that actually is also in the brand's DNA. You know, if you look back over the history books, you see mentions of the 1990 Pop-A-Shot World Championship, which was held, I think, in, in a Marriott near the O'Hare airport.

00;05;56;16 - 00;06;16;13
Nick Gonzalez
Right. But, these competitions have been the thing that we're trying to revitalize. And, you know, as Professor Kachersky’s experienced some of that's at a national level, right? How can we get on ESPN? How can we show, you know, a national audience that Pop-A-Shot is a competitive activity but also a fun activity.

00;06;16;15 - 00;06;40;14
Nick Gonzalez
But we're also really optimistic that it's going to also, have some potential, from a local market perspective. You know, maybe the bar that you go to on Thursday night, starts hosting a Pop-A-Shot league. You know, we've seen that happen with sports like cornhole, trivia, card games. And we're just really optimistic and curious to see what happens if we start, you know, what happens if we start pursuing that, with Pop-A-Shot.

00;06;40;16 - 00;06;49;08
Mark Conrad
Did Covid have any role in some of your plans, or how did Covid affect participation and sales of Pop-A-Shot?

00;06;49;11 - 00;07;15;11
Nick Gonzalez
Yeah, I think, across the industry, I think Covid created a lot of winners and a lot of losers. And Pop-A-Shot was definitely in the winner's camp, right? We saw a lot more interest, and sales on the game during that time period. As you know, we think people were just looking for new things to do, active things to do, and ways to spend time with each other, kind of in that private, safe environment.

00;07;15;13 - 00;07;34;14
Luke Kachersky
If I can chime in from that, on that from the consumer perspective. I turned 40 right at the beginning of the pandemic, and my wife had it planned anyway to get me my Pop-A-Shot for my birthday, for my 40th. And, it was just like during that time, it was so great to have because, you know, working from home.

00;07;34;14 - 00;07;50;08
Luke Kachersky
And I was like, you know, like I'd complete a task and then go shoot a couple of rounds and like, it was just like a refresher and a reset before going on to the next activity. And, yeah, it was definitely, a winner for me as far as, coming in during the pandemic.

00;07;50;11 - 00;07;55;07
Mark Conrad
And then grading papers to be grading papers, then take a break and do some Pop-A-Shot.

00;07;55;10 - 00;08;02;02
Luke Kachersky
Yeah, exactly. I guess, like, put me in a better mood. And then I was a little more lenient on the grading. Right.

00;08;02;05 - 00;08;06;11
Mark Conrad
You know how many models of Pop-A-Shot do you sell?

00;08;06;14 - 00;08;27;01
Nick Gonzalez
We sell about - and please don't quote me on the numbers - but about, 6 or 7 different primary game models. And that's, you know, some are, dual hoop games where you compete against somebody right next to you. Some are single hoop games. And then in addition to that, just last year we we launched into kind of a new segment, which is a mini hoop or an over the door hoop.

00;08;27;03 - 00;08;44;21
Nick Gonzalez
And so I just called the Super Slam, and that is a new kind of a newer product that we're continuing to try to develop the market on in addition to as we as we talked about, you know, next year, we're planning to launch, kind of an out-of-home game tailored for, you know, the bar, the restaurant, the arcade.

00;08;44;23 - 00;08;58;14
Mark Conrad
And now we're going to go to Luke. So you got Pop-A-Shot on your 40th birthday? [Luke: Yeah.] The time you took to it, did you play it as a kid? I mean, did you know it existed?

00;08;58;16 - 00;09;25;11
Luke Kachersky
I mean, I knew arcade basketball existed. Yeah, I'm from as long as I can remember, and was always something that interested me. And so I always, always played it. And there was one particular time I, I took my nephew to the movies one time, we were really early for the movie, and we had some time to kill. And, there was it there was an arcade basketball in the lobby of the theater, and we almost didn't want to go into the movie because we were just like, where's this going to go in high score?

00;09;25;11 - 00;09;47;06
Luke Kachersky
And it was just it was it was addictive and actually like so from that point forward, I just all in on arcade basketball. I don't know that I was personally aware of the Pop-A-Shot brand until like within a year before the pandemic, when my neighbor and friend had one in his garage. And, I mean, it blew my mind.

00;09;47;06 - 00;09;57;17
Luke Kachersky
I was like, what? You can get this thing at home. And so then that put the...set the gears in motion for my wife to get that for me for the 40th.

00;09;57;19 - 00;10;02;14
Mark Conrad
And how did you get interested in entering the competition?

00;10;02;16 - 00;10;26;23
Luke Kachersky
I think Pop-A-Shot did a really good job at designing the flow for the submission process, because, Yeah, I'm on the email list, and so I get the call for submissions, and it was a pretty easy ask for the initial submission. It was just, report your high score, you know, just self-report high score. And, I think the other form field was: Anything else we should know at this point?

00;10;26;25 - 00;10;54;01
Luke Kachersky
So I thought, okay, I got it. Let me just try to be a little bit interesting here, you know, so I said that, you know, I'm not a social influencer, but I'm a professor of marketing. And this would make a great story for my classes. And, yeah, I don't, I don't know, maybe Nick and speak to what you might have seen in that or but then I got the, the ask to create a video and, and went from there was I think if the initial ask was to make a video, I don't know that I would have done it, but it was it was pretty easy to just like, yeah, let's

00;10;54;01 - 00;10;56;05
Luke Kachersky
let's see what happens.

00;10;56;07 - 00;11;03;04
Mark Conrad
And Nick, how many, responses did you get? Interested responses did you get to the initial email?

00;11;03;06 - 00;11;25;02
Nick Gonzalez
Sure. To the initial email, it was about 200 and just north of 250 responses. And like Luke said, we you know, we...this was a brand new thing for us, right? We didn't know if we were gonna get 2000 or 2. So for that first stage, we did try to make it as kind of low touch as possible just to see, you know, kind of how many fish we could get.

00;11;25;04 - 00;11;37;15
Mark Conrad
And then you get the 250 responses, how many broke through the next round that you either, auditioned, interviewed and the like?

00;11;37;17 - 00;12;06;14
Nick Gonzalez
Sure. We targeted...so it was it was 50. I remember in the criteria kind of the first criteria was their high score. It had to be at least 150 points for us, for you even to get into that consideration set, because we were looking obviously for stronger players. For that second round, you know, whereas the first round we tried to make as low touch as possible for the consumer, for the second round we tried to put a little bit more onus on them.

00;12;06;17 - 00;12;27;04
Nick Gonzalez
And so that's where we asked for some video submissions. We asked for them to submit video of them playing, and it was just so we could as a double check on their high score. Right. And then we also asked for a video that they showed their personality a little bit. And you know, like I said, the score was really the the main criteria that we were evaluating for.

00;12;27;04 - 00;12;51;23
Nick Gonzalez
But, in addition, we're looking for people like Luke said, like who are Interesting. Who maybe had some stories, who maybe would be people that we would be interested in rooting for as consumers. And secondarily, you know, we knew that this ESPN broadcast was going to bring some eyeballs and some awareness and some buzz for us. But we were also optimistic that some of our consumers could help kind of build that buzz.

00;12;52;00 - 00;13;12;01
Nick Gonzalez
Right? And maybe that means they have a huge social following. Maybe it means it doesn't. The key thing for us was we were just thinking through if we ask these consumers to help us bring some content, to be interviewed, to kind of help us build the story, do they seem like people who are going to be willing and excited to do that?

00;13;12;03 - 00;13;18;24
Nick Gonzalez
And again, that wasn't the main criteria, but that was that was a nice you know, that was an important one for us to evaluate as well.

00;13;18;27 - 00;13;23;07
Mark Conrad
Were you, Luke, were you surprised when you were selected?

00;13;23;10 - 00;13;52;11
Luke Kachersky
Yes and no. I mean, I was I was elated for sure when I got the final email that I was in, the decibel level in my house was pretty loud with myself, my kids, my wife, like, everybody was just just super excited. I, you know, after I got the, the hook for it to, you know, submit a video and, yeah, I'm, like, workshopping things with my daughters and my wife and trying to come up with different ideas and concepts and, talked about.

00;13;52;14 - 00;14;10;08
Luke Kachersky
And when we came up with this, Professor Pop-A-Shot idea, I just it felt like it came to me like I had a really good feeling about it. And then, like, when it was done, like anybody I showed it to was like, oh, they have to pick you. And I was like. So I was hopeful. I was cautiously hopeful the whole time.

00;14;10;11 - 00;14;30;10
Luke Kachersky
And then I got to, I got to interview with, Pop-A-Shot people before the last round, and, I thought that conversation went great. And so I had a good feeling. So it was I was surprised, but I was also like, I was hopeful, you know?

00;14;30;12 - 00;14;50;12
Mark Conrad
And so let's break it down. So there were 50 people that, Nick, you were interested in. And did you interview all 50 or did you have a further, you know, culling of the numbers for interviewees and then finally for the top, I don't know, was it eight people that competed or ten people that competed on television?

00;14;50;14 - 00;15;22;18
Nick Gonzalez
Yeah. So so Round 2 was basically the request for the video submission, which culled it down to approximately 20 people got interviewed. Of those 20, we ultimately selected seven to compete in the national championship. And then one, actually qualified from an in-person event that we also kind of executed as a test. So in Chicago, at a bar named Barstool River North, we held a qualifying tournament that anybody could come to.

00;15;22;20 - 00;15;38;12
Nick Gonzalez
It was a it was a weeknight in July. And from that, you know, we selected kind of the the best contestant based on scores, to join the seven candidates who qualified from the online submission process.

00;15;38;14 - 00;16;07;27
Mark Conrad
We're here with Nick Gonzalez, Vice President of Marketing for Pop-A-Shot, and Luke Kachersky, Associate Professor of Marketing at Fordham's Gabelli School of Business. So ultimately, we get this, you get the call, you come on down, and, before you did, how much? How many weeks did you have before appearing at the championship? How many weeks to practice, let's say?

00;16;08;03 - 00;16;20;21
Luke Kachersky
Yeah. I mean, well, hey, look, I've been practicing my whole life, Mark, you know? But from the time that the notification came through that I was in, until the tournament, it was about four weeks.

00;16;20;23 - 00;16;24;08
Mark Conrad
How many hours a day did you practice during that time?

00;16;24;10 - 00;16;41;17
Luke Kachersky
Oh, I definitely played more than usual. It definitely went from less of just, like, a strictly casual thing to a, like, all right, kind of make sure I get some time into that. But, I mean, it varied. I tried to make sure to get some play time in every day just to keep up the the rhythm and the consistency.

00;16;41;17 - 00;16;48;18
Luke Kachersky
But, you know, some days that meant 20 minutes, other days, you know, maybe I could play for an hour or so.

00;16;48;21 - 00;17;11;03
Mark Conrad
And then you come on down and you know, you are on television. [Luke Kachersky: Yeah.] What effect does that have in terms of your focus, your concentration, your ability, as opposed to your earlier practices? Do you think that the television aspect added to the intrigue, added to the pressure, added to the fun?

00;17;11;05 - 00;17;34;17
Luke Kachersky
Definitely added to the fun. It did not, it had absolutely no effect on me come game time. And I feel like the rest of the competitors would probably say this too. Nick, you probably know this from from playing as well. Like when you're when you're playing, the only thing that exists in the world is the balls and that hoop, and it's just you're just locked in and focused.

00;17;34;17 - 00;17;42;13
Luke Kachersky
So, you know, while playing it just it didn't feel any different than than playing any other time.

00;17;42;15 - 00;17;51;17
Mark Conrad
But was the equipment different? Was the, interaction with the other contestants different than you expected?

00;17;51;19 - 00;18;12;26
Luke Kachersky
It was. So the interaction with the, the other contestants was, extremely pleasant. I mean, everybody was just so nice and, like, just good, positive vibes. You know, it wasn't, you know, a competition where somebody, like, trying to trip you when you're walking up to the, to the basket. So everybody was was super nice and everything.

00;18;12;29 - 00;18;28;20
Luke Kachersky
Equipment wise, it was a new machine. I think there was a little bit of a learning curve too, at least for me and maybe for everybody except for Josh, I don't know. But, so was it was it a new machine, it was a little bit of a learning curve on that.

00;18;28;22 - 00;18;40;22
Mark Conrad
And just for the record, Josh was the winner. [Luke Kachersky: Yes.] Okay. And did you have time to practice in the facility before the competition, and if so, how much time?

00;18;40;25 - 00;18;58;06
Luke Kachersky
Yeah, we had, probably a total of almost two hours to, to practice. And so there, you know, there were the two hoops set up that you saw on the broadcast. And so between the eight of us, we just kept rotating, rotating and taking turns, practicing.

00;18;58;08 - 00;19;04;08
Mark Conrad
Did you feel the pressure when you started competing on television for the championship?

00;19;04;11 - 00;19;26;12
Luke Kachersky
No. I can be 100% like I, I didn't feel the [...] Nothing about, about TV. It was just for me trying to get the rhythm of of that machine. Like every arcade basketball has its own its own rhythm, its own tempo, its own peculiarities. And, so for me, it was just the process of, of trying to figure out that one.

00;19;26;14 - 00;19;34;24
Mark Conrad
So, back to Nick, in terms of the broadcast, what kind of broadcast agreement did you create with ESPN8?

00;19;34;26 - 00;20;00;13
Nick Gonzalez
Yeah. So, you know, ESPN8 has, it's come a long way in the last couple of years, and they're now at a point where they have a pretty standard, template that, that different sports, different brands can kind of just kind of easily fall into. And that's what happened with Pop-A-Shot in this case. So Ocho Day is always the first Friday in August.

00;20;00;16 - 00;20;29;13
Nick Gonzalez
ESPN sets up two production teams on location, and this year it was in Rock Hill, South Carolina. One production team covers the outdoor events. One production team covers the indoor events. If you want to participate, you pay $15,000 for ESPN to essentially produce the show. You as a brand have to pay the fee. You have to provide the talent, which in our case, were the competitors, as well as the color commentary.

00;20;29;15 - 00;20;58;09
Nick Gonzalez
Color commentator. ESPN provides the play-by-play guy. And so that's what we did. The other parts of the deal are Pop-A-Shot, in exchange for that fee, is entitled to four minutes of commercial time during the broadcast, ESPN gets the remainder, and once the broadcast has aired, Pop-A-Shot has the right to kind of redistribute, edit, post, pretty much do whatever we want with it outside of aired on TV.

00;20;58;11 - 00;21;02;18
Mark Conrad
So basically it's an ad split arrangement, correct? You just get some...

00;21;02;18 - 00;21;05;22
Nick Gonzalez
Ad split arrangement with a production fee.

00;21;05;24 - 00;21;16;21
Mark Conrad
Okay. So in other words, there was a split of the ads, but you paid the production fee, but you have the rights to distribute it in any medium except for broadcaster cable television.

00;21;16;23 - 00;21;34;04
Nick Gonzalez
That's right. And usually, in years past I've seen ESPN issue kind of like a lockout period. Like you have to wait 90 days or six months before you can redistribute. And it looks like that's changed. Because this year we just had to wait until the day after the broadcast for those rights to kind of be active.

00;21;34;07 - 00;21;37;04
Mark Conrad
Would you do something like this again next year?

00;21;37;06 - 00;22;08;12
Nick Gonzalez
I would definitely do something like this again next year. I actually have a little bit of experience doing kind of Ocho and ESPN broadcasts from my spike ball days as well, and each one is a little bit different, but my kind of mentality is that it can be well worth the investment if you're thinking about how to create the surround sound around the broadcast, how you are able to think about, you know, getting more from the content and from the Championship than just that 60 minute broadcast.

00;22;08;14 - 00;22;12;28
Nick Gonzalez
Whether it's social media posts, whether it's teasers, you know, that sort of thing.

00;22;13;00 - 00;22;22;19
Mark Conrad
Yeah. Speaking of social media, did you, post clips of highlights on Instagram and other social media or even YouTube?

00;22;22;21 - 00;22;46;15
Nick Gonzalez
We did. Yeah, we posted clips, highlights in the full broadcast across various social channels kind of after it aired. And we also actually got a lot of content from the lead up to the championship as well, whether it was giving consumers the opportunity to meet a little, to learn a little bit more about the competitors, creating some content from the qualifying event.

00;22;46;17 - 00;23;05;07
Mark Conrad
Would think of doing local competitions, given, the interest in Pop-A-Shot and given the fact that you had something in Chicago to get, possibly a contestant or two from the kind of live local events? So would you continue doing that or expanding that to other markets?

00;23;05;09 - 00;23;31;09
Nick Gonzalez
Yeah, we're thinking about local competitions in two ways and hopefully going to get started in 2025. So one is local markets as kind of our road to the national championship. So that might be, you know, five qualifiers, one in each region. The winner from each qualifiers advances to the national championship. And you can see how that can be a, you know, something that we kind of talk about in market nationally.

00;23;31;12 - 00;23;54;16
Nick Gonzalez
And then at the same time, you know, we are really interested in trying to facilitate bar owners, particularly, and hosting their own Pop-A-Shot leagues, their own Pop-A-Shot competitions, using, you know, our soon to come to market, kind of out-of-home game. So I think two very interesting paths. We're planning to test a lot of things.

00;23;54;16 - 00;23;58;24
Nick Gonzalez
We're hopeful that both will work out and that's that's what we're thinking about.

00;23;58;27 - 00;24;02;08
Mark Conrad
What about colleges and universities as a market?

00;24;02;10 - 00;24;25;28
Nick Gonzalez
Colleges and universities, I think, is another interesting market. I think we've had some success to date, selling to some of the facilities around campus, like the intramural sports building, places where students might they might want students to kind of hang out, sit down in the lobby. We have more challenges if we try to think about the college student as the end consumer or the end purchaser, you just think about disposable income.

00;24;25;28 - 00;24;37;12
Nick Gonzalez
You think about where are they going to put the game. You know that that's all well, in not in the dorm room or maybe in a home that you're renting. Might not want to make a $300 investment to put it in there. But always opportunities.

00;24;37;14 - 00;24;43;00
Luke Kachersky
And Nick, I mean, they they find space for beer pong, right? [Nick Gonzalez: It's true.]

00;24;43;02 - 00;24;46;09
Nick Gonzalez
It's true. Maybe we need to give it a second look.

00;24;46;12 - 00;24;58;17
Mark Conrad
Could be the faculty advisor for our team, then, if there is a Pop-A-Shot team at all. Right. We need advisors so I could see that. But Luke, would you try to...would you think of competing in future events?

00;24;58;20 - 00;25;08;02
Luke Kachersky
Oh, absolutely. I mean, you know, I hearing Nick talk about me. Yeah. Gearing up for, maybe another competition, like, “All right, what do I got to do? How do I how do I get in there?”

00;25;08;04 - 00;25;32;02
Mark Conrad
So we see you again on television. We we may see you in the New York metropolitan area, for various competitions. And you become, you know, obviously a fan of the product. Enjoy the product. And, do you ever talk, you know, Nick, with the contestants, like how to make changes in the product, think about other uses of the product because you had, you know, a number of elite contestants at location.

00;25;32;04 - 00;25;39;23
Mark Conrad
So did you, try to, you know, pick their brains about maybe some ideas for the future?

00;25;39;25 - 00;26;04;16
Nick Gonzalez
We did. And it's actually a regular part of kind of our, this marketing practice is to regularly interview consumers who have purchased. And those can go, you know, and those can now, those are fairly open ended conversations sometimes get into specific product recommendations. You know, people are looking for ways to make it look nicer or they want to cover up the steel bars, right?

00;26;04;16 - 00;26;20;00
Nick Gonzalez
They want to be longer. They want wanted to be shorter. But also can even just cover kind of getting at the root of why people purchase, you know, how they're looking for something to do with their, their kids that they enjoy just as much as the kids do. And Pop-A-Shot is the answer. So it's a regular part of our process.

00;26;20;00 - 00;26;24;29
Nick Gonzalez
It always gleans kind of interesting insights. Across kinda the whole spectrum.

00;26;25;01 - 00;26;44;05
Luke Kachersky
You know, Mark, if I can, if I could chime in, I mean, when, when, I had my interview right in that last round, to, to be selected, one of the questions I, I just was so heartened to be asked was, Nick asked me like, I, my, my kids were in the room with me when, when we were having this interview.

00;26;44;07 - 00;27;06;16
Luke Kachersky
“What other games do you spend time on?” You know, and, other than than Pop-A-Shot and it just it just struck me as like, okay, this is why this brand has already started this, this great turnaround and is on a great trajectory because, like, they're they listen to their customers and like, they're genuinely interested in, like what's going on in their lives and where Pop-A-Shot fits.

00;27;06;16 - 00;27;10;06
Luke Kachersky
And you know, that's that's how you identify opportunities and build relationships.

00;27;10;06 - 00;27;19;08
Mark Conrad
So [Nick Gonzalez: Yeah], [...] ball is such an international game now. Have you thought about marketing the product internationally?

00;27;19;10 - 00;27;35;21
Nick Gonzalez
We have, right? And we think about places, you know, where where basketball is popular or getting more popular as maybe the first place that we would, we would start. It just kind of big picture just kind of comes down to priorities and which things are we going to do first?

00;27;35;24 - 00;27;51;16
Mark Conrad
Have you thought about possibly creating a similar kind of game for other kind of sports like, you know, pop-a-goal for hockey or pop-a-homerun, pop-a-touchdown? Has anything come to your mind, along those lines for arcade games?

00;27;51;16 - 00;28;21;17
Nick Gonzalez
We have definitely looked at other sports, which has led to some pretty interesting conversations around what makes a Pop-A-Shot, a Pop-A-Shot. Does the ball have to roll back to you? Does there have to be an electronic scoreboard? Does there have to be an announcer? Does there have to be any of those things? So the short answer to your question is yes, we have. We don't have anything currently planned to come to the market today, but we're working on it.

00;28;21;19 - 00;28;48;29
Mark Conrad
And it strikes me this is a quite a wholesome game and a family game. And, you know, Luke has played the game and played with your daughters or children and do you think there's a form of happy innocence in that kind of family activity, when so much today is devoted to social media, and they talk about some of the issues regarding social media, the loneliness, other potential issues, the, threats, the fears, etc..

00;28;49;01 - 00;29;03;02
Mark Conrad
So do you think this is almost looking back to the future and a different time, and that customers and families may say, hey, this is really outdoor time, this is indoor time, but not computer time. So Luke, what do you think about that?

00;29;03;04 - 00;29;06;17
Luke Kachersky
Oh, that's that's 100% true. I mean, it's,

00;29;06;19 - 00;29;08;07
Mark Conrad

00;29;08;10 - 00;29;30;09
Luke Kachersky
I and actually I think and correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure you messaged a little bit on that about getting physical and being active. So, yeah, I totally, totally agree with that. And it's it's accessible. I mean, I, I when I was getting ready for the tournament, one of the things that I wanted to do is like, just make sure I got to play against, different variety of people.

00;29;30;09 - 00;29;46;01
Luke Kachersky
So, like, I live near a lake. And so I hauled my Pop-A-Shot down to to one of the lake beaches, and just whoever was there was playing like, like a grandmother and her grandson came up and we were all playing together and then needed to go, like, you know, to, like a, you know, 30ish year old guys that were just hanging out.

00;29;46;01 - 00;29;51;23
Luke Kachersky
They came and played and, just like everybody wants to get into it. It's it's very accessible.

00;29;51;25 - 00;29;58;04
Mark Conrad
And, Nick, what do you think about that idea like kind of an anti social media component to Pop-A-Shot?

00;29;58;07 - 00;30;24;28
Nick Gonzalez
Yeah it resonates. And you know we were talking earlier about you know some of the customer interviews that we that we have. And at the surface level we commonly will have conversations around. It gets my kids off of the couch. It gets them away from their screens. Right? One level deeper, we'll start to touch on how it's something that the whole family can enjoy, which in some households is kind of rare, right?

00;30;25;00 - 00;30;49;07
Nick Gonzalez
Mom likes it, dad likes it, the kids like it. And then on the third level, it kind of the thing that that usually isn't overtly stated is, is accessibility, like Luke mentioned. But a lot of times that accessibility comes in the form of, “I can play for two minutes, I'm walking by with my kid. It's like two minutes, but if we want to play for two hours” [Luke Kachersky: yeah], right?

00;30;49;07 - 00;31;09;02
Nick Gonzalez
So there's there's not a time constraint like there can be with a lot of family activities. Right? If I'm sitting down and playing Monopoly, that's a, that's an hour easy. Right? And at the same time, it doesn't have to be a planned activity. We can be walking by and just shoot, right, versus family movie night. What are we picking?

00;31;09;07 - 00;31;21;00
Nick Gonzalez
Right? What time does it start? I don't want to watch this. I don't want to watch that. So accessibility I think is one of the, core benefits of the product. But but accessibility in a couple different ways.

00;31;21;03 - 00;31;31;09
Mark Conrad
And Luke, you know, you teach marketing and we've been colleagues for many, many years. What do you think of your experience as a case study for your classes?

00;31;31;11 - 00;31;59;14
Luke Kachersky
My experience as a case study for my classes. I think it could I mean, in terms of, again, you know, Pop-A-Shot is a is a brand that's like on the, on the come up again. And, you know, creating an event, building buzz, kind of going grassroots like, like Nick had mentioned about, you know, being cognizant of, what competitors they chose that could maybe help in that process or at least now facilitate.

00;31;59;16 - 00;32;05;14
Luke Kachersky
Yeah, totally. This does make a great case for, for, my class. I got I got to write that one up.

00;32;05;16 - 00;32;23;11
Mark Conrad
Okay. If you need any help from me, I'd be happy to, to join you, because it's been fascinating. And I do want to make one announcement, you know, for your students or your friends, of anybody that listens to the podcast. This is an audio only podcast. And of course, many of you are thinking, wow, what does this look like?

00;32;23;11 - 00;32;54;03
Mark Conrad
What what was it like to compete? Well, we want to post video clips of Luke's skills in this competition. On the introductory page on our Podbean page and on our forum website. So if you take a look at the summary of the podcast, you can click to those videos. You know, to see your professor or you know, colleague, friend, watch and compete at this national championship and get a feel of what it's like and to view it.

00;32;54;06 - 00;33;26;03
Mark Conrad
But unfortunately, we do have to close. And on behalf of Fordham University, the Gabelli School of Business and the Sports Business Initiative, thanks so much to Nick Gonzalez of Pop-A-Shot and Professor Luke Kachersky of Fordham's Gabelli School for an engaging, informative and downright fun discussion of a very different type of sports product, and the experience of participating in a national championship by becoming an expert competitor in that product.

00;33;26;05 - 00;33;42;20
Mark Conrad
A shout out to my producer, Victoria Ilano for her great work, and thanks to all of you for listening in. For the Sports Business Podcast at Fordham's Gabelli School of Business, I’m Mark Conrad or Prof. C, have a great day.