Corie Sheppard Podcast
Corie Sheppard Podcast
Episode 225 | Adrian Scoon
This week we sit with Adrian Scoon, CEO of wOw Events, the company behind Spirit Mas, Soaka, Iron Park & Mecka.
Adrian dives into the business of Carnival, creativity, and cultural innovation. From the origins of Soaka to the launch of Travel Haeven, a new travel planning platform designed to help the global Carnival chaser curate their Trinidad Carnival experience.
Adrian walks us through his evolving vision for experiential events. He unpacks the mission behind wOw Events—particularly the intentional inclusion of local artistes—and shares how Spirit Mas is carving its own lane.
The conversation also explores his efforts to spotlight traditional characters through Mecka, challenging the look and feel of mainstream Carnival events.
Whether you’re in it for the fete, the culture, or the strategy, this one’s a masterclass in how to think differently about Trinidad Carnival.
So so, school, how are you going to look? How are you doing brother? Yeah, right, I had to tell people this. Right, the man said he don't do much interviews. No, and he only doing it because I went. Fatima. So it take about 30 years, but the Fatima thing pay off eventually I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:I appreciate that glad to hear come true, man, yeah, man. So how's the year for you, boy? Everybody interested in? Tan from adrian schooner is the hottest commodity in carnival right now. Oh god, that's it you want to know how the season went.
Speaker 2:It was great. I think it was fantastic. I think the cool thing is seeing ideas that were you know once in your mind over COVID, you know during a situation where you know you're locked down, you have enough time to think about, you know when you come back home what you want to do and see that kind of grow like a child, you know the child going to primary school, then the the child go to high school and evolve and grow up and finally go to university. So some of these events like uh, like the iron park and mecca, seeing them actually come to fruition, and just see that work out and be successful and people absorb it for what it's supposed to be, right, and understand it and and appreciate it. I think that's cool.
Speaker 2:I think I you know that was to me one of the most satisfying parts looking at something that was just a thought and actually coming to life and then, like you know, seeing people enjoy themselves and you know you feel like you're doing a good job when you're doing that, because obviously it's like foreigners coming down, of course, coming to foreigners coming though, of course, coming to Trinidad for the first time, walking into this, you know this pan event, yeah, yeah, what's this?
Speaker 1:so both Iron Park and Mecca came after COVID they were there before, but Mecca came after.
Speaker 2:But during COVID they get a chance to kind of tailor what you think needs to go forward and pause stock of you know where were you before and what you want to do when you know this whole thing comes to an end At some point we probably didn't even think it was coming to an end, and so to see that happen in that way, it was cool. Regards to, you know, spirit again, it just became this almost like a huge family of people that believe in this way of playing mass, of presenting mass. You know what I mean. So we grew as a family, um, and you know we were able to deliver to the customers, and I think we have this type of like, uh, you know, this core following of people that you know really believe in it, and I think, for me, one of the great things we're seeing diversity in everything, right, uh, you know, one thing that makes me feel proud in some of the models that we introduce is that it's embraced by all walks of life.
Speaker 1:You know what I?
Speaker 2:mean and not opposed to one particular demographic. And I think, seeing those people converge, believe in something collectively, and then, you know, be able to interact with each other, you know, engage each other, and you know realize that you know we are Trinidadians, we will come together as one race of people, one body of people. I think that for me was you know what was ultimately, you know, very, very satisfying, and it gives you a sense of purpose going forward, that you are able to bring people together in a society that sometimes has its own you know limitations with regards to, like you know, social strata and all these different things. So to see people come together or walks a live party and enjoying what we call, what I call, happy music, you know soca music, to me is just about happiness, right, you know what I mean. And what a great year for music. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this was one of them years right.
Speaker 2:It's just incredible. I feel bad because it's like so much good music got left out. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, and I think people are still picking up on music now.
Speaker 1:Of course.
Speaker 2:You know, cash Traffic Jam something that people now start to really grasp.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, when Teja came out with Higher Power, I was like I know I'm watching it.
Speaker 1:I'm like you saw it in the first Soca. I noticed that in Soca. Where's the name of Soca in the west again? Soca Till Sunrise, yeah, yeah yeah, tesha was the first person to hit the stage. Yes, and I spoke about it here when I recorded after, because he started the fit. I mean you know there's a vibe when you're not reaching.
Speaker 2:Soca, there's an energy, find yourself.
Speaker 1:But, oh man, when he come on the stage he pick it up and the song as you say, it building up to now, yeah, it's still building and I think by summertime people will really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, Because it kind of flew everybody's head. You know people hey, it's too cultural. Why is he singing? He's trying to be like David, but great music that you know that. I think we were totally, totally blessed to be able to have that, Because I think when the music obviously is great, I think the consumers want to come out because they relate to the songs. So, like Kes putting Cocotee out early, the effect it was well here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, you know people will be like okay, I feel in Cannibal because I relate to the song. We've got a massive hit that he could have brought out in January, that he brought out in November, December.
Speaker 1:You know what I?
Speaker 2:mean. So that kind of kickstarted the season and the anticipation for the season. Until you know, I think when people really come to Soka weekend, that's when they really decide okay, well, there's carnival.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a kickoff. It's. That was something was always planned for you to do a mass band yeah yeah, for sure, I had my own ideas from a long, long time.
Speaker 2:I feel like I stopped enjoying playing mass. Okay, you know what I mean, because I what was going on? It was just, we're just in the road, you know, and I feel like we have so much resources that have been underutilized. You, a lot of the art community they were not involved in carnival. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:I think the Lost Tribe was doing a great job all the time at going in that direction and I am a huge fan of what they have done and what they continue to do, because they have their own direction. But I wanted to create something that had its own direction, that we are different to the other products that are being offered and we're going to do things in this particular. We're going to do things in this particular. We're going to break it up into experiences, right, you know what I mean. You know so I think that was something that was always there and I felt that it was time to just kind of disrupt the market with something completely different that, you know, hopefully people would have loved and absorbed on that case. So it's a tough business. Huh, yeah, of course.
Speaker 1:Very tough, very very tough business Toughest baby.
Speaker 2:Very tough, very, very tough business Toughest baby. But definitely very satisfying to know that you know people are oh my God, thank you so much for doing this. And everybody has their house that they go to.
Speaker 1:Of course.
Speaker 2:There are people that go to House of Humor, House of Tribe, House of Bliss. We have our own house that people subscribe to. What our sort of like philosophy on mass is and I think that is what makes us proud is that we have a core community of people that, just you know, want to play mass.
Speaker 1:I want to tap into the idea of community, because you've built a community. I've been going to Soka for the past. It feels like 10, 15 years. It feels like forever. When was the first Soka till sunrise? And Soka till sunrise was the first one yes, yeah, so, yeah.
Speaker 2:so I mean at that point in time, uh, I must have been 20, I'm 40 now I would have been about 24, 25, oh yeah, as young as that, yeah, yeah, yeah, and I, I just want I was doing events already, but I was kind of like playing around with different concepts. So I had like girls night out and I had like we fed in in west morgan's. And I'm just trying to understand myself, right, as a creative, you didn't even, sometimes you don't even know you're possessed in things until later on in life. You like look back, like, oh, this is probably why I did this, because I'm a creative or you know, it's in you, it's like a calling.
Speaker 2:And I saw a festival in Thailand called the Songkran Festival, which is about, basically, it's like, days of just wet down. So when I'm looking at the videos on youtube, I notice their behavior change after they get wet. And why is that? Because obviously, your inhibitions it kind of like washes away your inhibitions as well, right, you're kind of just like no longer posing you only wash away the phones too.
Speaker 2:Yes, wash away the phones yeah, the phones have to stay inside, of course, of course yeah, so you know, you know us millennials, we were kind of like you know more like real sensitive our inhibitions about us when we walk in a party Like we had to be cool, and in a corner, like you know, gender is different to our generation, but for us millennials we needed that at that point in time.
Speaker 2:And then when I look back at what you know Chinese laundry used to do with watercolors and how Insomnia had that little pocket where they put water in the morning A little short window in the morning, we wanted to kind of just continue to just make that excessive like, make, like, immerse people in this house.
Speaker 2:So we we came up with this idea called um soaka s-o-a-k-a, which is a double entendre, and when you're in there creating these things at 25, you're like yeah you know, just something like a vibe yeah, you know, but you don't know that you're going to go on a journey for so long.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean and um, it's cool, it's real cool. Um, you know, and I think I think what happened is the first time it was in the night, so you're waiting people down any night to these junior sammy trucks, but you're looking at people and people are like experiencing hyper thing. Yeah, in the crowd.
Speaker 1:So the first time it was in the morning. Where year was this? This is 2011. I see yeah in the night time yeah.
Speaker 2:So people were like, oh my god, this fat was amazing, but I nearly died, you know. And I'm like, okay, cool, let me make adjustments. And then I was in a meeting at one of my business partners. I'll never forget. He was like it's Isha Mustafa, you know, shout out Isha. He was like. I was like what are we doing about this hypothermia?
Speaker 2:he was like well's, like you just wet them down and I'm like that is genius, you know. So we kind of followed that model and that's it. It's just been a journey since then.
Speaker 1:Gotcha, so when was?
Speaker 2:because that Fog video shoot was the one that really. That's just Marshall being a perfectionist and also being so intuitive into the marketplace. A lot of people don't give Marshall credit for the business argument that he has and how precise and obsessively he is at the same time about his craft. You know what I mean. So he would have seen the emergence of the FETA and say, well, ok, this is something that's different, coming to the forefront because he performed the year before and he was like, let me make up, let me capture this visually for my video.
Speaker 2:And he came and he actually the first person that brought the powder right, because he had the powder pussy at that point in time so they came in with the powder and they added an element as well, and then they captured it and people, I guess at that point in time was crazy. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:I could imagine what the next year was like, with ticket sales at that point in time Insane insane, insane.
Speaker 2:And I think somebody really warned me about it in advance after the fog and he was like next year is going gonna be crazy. You need to take care of your tickets. In other words, they can go on the black market. You can end up with a bunch of males in the party. You know what I mean. Just back because they will have you know more, of course. Yeah, it's, they want to spend more. You know what I mean. So all that kind of prepared me for to how to structure the rest and increase the sustainability of the event, because if you just put a high demand ticket on the market without structuring how it goes, then you're going to end up in real, real problems.
Speaker 1:But let's talk about that now, because that's one of the complaints people have about Carnival.
Speaker 2:Soka is one of them that people talk about. You see it right? I?
Speaker 1:was talking about you and your guy knows me.
Speaker 2:I was like this man talking about me. I was like this is genius too. I love this. I get to take one time, but it's like, guys, that people feeling you know what I mean. Yes, for sure it's different.
Speaker 1:Yes, for sure I mean we were really in a time where you just pay for the tickets and you go it's bad, it's bad. But I do feel as though Soka has managed. It is difficult to do something for 10, 12 years. Now I'm sure you see many people come up and have big events and they're gone. Oh plenty, yeah, I study.
Speaker 2:I'm a student of the game Gotcha. I'm still studying.
Speaker 1:So part of what you're saying is that if you that high demand event, you have to manage how the tickets are sold 100%.
Speaker 2:Because there are certain factors that have to remain in. Um, the main thing is the male to female ratio, right? Because if you there's a science behind, I always explain it. I don't explain it to younger event producers, right? So that they don't fall by the wayside, because, again, we have a responsibility for the next generation. I don't want to be doing this forever. You know what I mean. So, um, and I can't so. So it's male to female ratio. So you have an event where you have more males than females, right? So just imagine how the human behavior goes with this, right? So you have a girl dancing and it's four men in a circle watching her. Obviously, her inhibition is going to go up because her sensory Of course, yeah, she'll be safe.
Speaker 2:Hold on? What's all these men here not feeling 100% safe? So she doesn't really dance per se, she's more on the guard, trying to enjoy herself, but she's surrounded by sharks, of course. Right, of course. Let's flip the scenario, right, what? What if you are in a scenario where there's more females than males? Right, first of all, the women feel a lot more comfortable because there's a lot more of females around who are not threatening them in any kind of overly you know, approachable, almost like an overly sexual way. Right, and they feel more comfortable to dance and enjoy themselves in that environment. Right Now, the guys who are least in demand, over time, they, to the women, they start realizing wait, they have no men in this fed. So, all of a sudden, they start to focus, they're the sharks.
Speaker 2:Now, right, and the men get better looking over time. Right, so they feel a lot because they feel more comfortable. Right, because from the essence of the event, from the beginning of the event, they go and they engage the men that are there. Right, and they're willing to socialize with them because they don't feel threatened. Right, so they come and they give that guy a little wine, for example. Right, and you know, guys, you know how it is right, you go to a party, you get one wine from a stranger. It's the best fetter all the time yeah, there's five years of tickets yeah, they go boy one wine so your marketing done for you too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, correct they know you're like your evangelist. They go back and they spread the word of mouth and the women have a great time. So we have to maintain that ratio. We don't want it to be that it's more men than women ever anything if you're in a situation like that as an event producer, you need to drastically deal with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the adjust. There is something you would tell to eat.
Speaker 2:Because your sliding down are very, very heavy. The gradient is very, very steep.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I suppose other than that is fight and all them kind of things.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've seen it on the album, master. I've seen it. I've seen it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course, of course so Scorch Wow, Events, Caesar's Army, Private Ryan yes, the complaint is sometimes that class of people. How do you respond to that?
Speaker 2:I, I think. I think it's difficult because, for example, let's just talk about the elephant in the room which would be in this particular scenario it'd be soca street, right. Um, it's difficult because it's people that you know and you grew up with that are asking you for these favors with you, you understand. So you, you and I would have done doing this podcast. You call me x here for two tickets. I'm gonna give it to you because I know you, we documented this.
Speaker 2:Yes, okay, so, yeah, yeah, but so it's difficult, of course it's difficult sometimes to, but by the time you feed your friends, your family, your business associates, your partners, your sponsors, it's very little that goes into the open market, and I think that is that is why, like I created haven because for I realized that the foreigners were getting the short end of the stick. If you are a foreigner and you come into Trinidad and you have no way to navigate, there's no information available to you. You're a group of people from Denmark and you all just decide let's try to just jump into this carnival.
Speaker 2:There's no way for you to navigate. You know what I mean. So I saw I disappointed some people that were from Sweden, about 25 people that came up to Soka Street maybe about 6 years ago and they came to the event asking for tickets and the event was about to start. Obviously we have no tickets. And the disappointment on their face. Walking back to OWP, I was like this is crazy. This is bad customer service on our behalf, because you could go to Mexico and navigate very well for half the price.
Speaker 2:Of course, you know what I mean the product is already overly expensive, right? So you need to create a platform for people to basically understand what Carnival is, but also to purchase immediately on that platform. And that's why I created haven, because it's unfair, for sometimes I only give the people who I grew up with who I know, and then circles and and then some people who come to try.
Speaker 2:I don't get to experience it. So there's we are working on models to basically allow people to navigate and purchase and have the best experience, and so haven is what ticketing platform no, but it's not, it's a travel experience platform, I see.
Speaker 2:so, basically, we put in events that we believe are high quality events and we chronologically, you can chronologically organize that and put that on your band within seconds, I see, and then you could add a costume, you could add a rental car, you understand, you could add an airbnb. So, for, I had some nigerians come down maybe about five years ago and this pushed me to do haven, because I mean, these people have, you know, they travel a lot and they go to festivals and stuff. So when the guy pulled up, he's like I'm trying to get these tickets, adrian, could you help me? And he shows me an Excel spreadsheet with I have four brainwash, I have three of Fosita's army here and I'm like this is crazy that these people have to do all this homework to come to travel to our place when on every other market it's readily available for you.
Speaker 2:You understand it. So I think Haven will be sort of like a remedy and solution for people that actually don't know anybody or you know what I mean want to just be able to just come.
Speaker 1:In able to just come in five minutes. Your carnival is organized. That's nice.
Speaker 2:You're solving two problems, you know, because the other problem is solving is the people who's walking around with six, seven, eight band by carnivals, and they help me solve that too. You know, like I never understand it, because these, these bands, they come from all kind of different environments.
Speaker 1:I don't know why yeah, it's time for people to cut off their bands and lose it at that time. So, so, while events get synonymous with soaker, yeah, in your early years. Yes, how difficult is it to launch another fed brand at our point in terms of like a, like a company no, in other words, you have to go to mecca, you have to do other brand names, oh yeah wow was never a event company that wanted to push its name wow forward right wow was always like more of a corporate stance you know what I I mean.
Speaker 2:Like we are event producers. I don't like to refer to us as promoters. We produce experiences and I think that we never pushed Wow, until the latter years, to be the parent brand. You know what I mean so that these brands have their own identity and there are people that will come to Soca Branch that don't go to a soccer street festival yeah, they may not connect, they don't want to do it because it's wet and they're here and they're going to play mass the next day.
Speaker 2:It might be too high intent for them, too many people around them, so what we do is try to create experiences that different people can really hang on to. And then some people are like all, and there's some people that you know that will only go Soca in O2 Park but don't want to go to Soca Street because they're playing juvie the next day.
Speaker 1:Of course.
Speaker 2:Or they find it's too hard to get a ticket. You know what I mean. So it's just different. As I said before, it's about diversity in everything that we do and to be able to also have a purpose, about the events, right? We don't just create, create events to just to make money, right? You know, it's not about money at the end of the day, gotcha yeah, so your soaker is taking off in o2 park.
Speaker 1:Fog is done. Yes, you fast forward to pre or post covid or in those times it'll be difficult times for anybody who's doing events right. Yeah, your whole revenue model is built around events.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, yes, I, I. I had a cake company that called twin and that tanked because it was in the airport and we closed down the airport. So that was 90% of our sales. That was a young company that was about to do very well. And then obviously, you know, while I was growing, at that point in time I had interest in the Habermaster. All those things were packed up, you know what I mean. So I had no revenue coming, you coming in, but luckily I just finished a carnival so I was able to kind of hold on to my savings and kind of battle it out from there. But I, that was a real dark period because I, I, I just feel like creatives were not taken care of. I, I feel, I feel like the, the, we were not seen as a important at that point in time.
Speaker 1:We kind of left the fence for ourselves yeah, sometimes I wonder if we see it as an industry in, in genuinity, you know, from the standpoint of policy. I don't know if we do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think now maybe you know that you're talking about potentially a new, uh, prime minister. Um, there's one right now. We have a new prime minister and he's speaking about the things like that. I think hopefully he is able to follow through with that, and I believe he will, I think. I think I think we have to look at the the industry a little differently, because I think one of the resources that we have that you know, our competitors of the islands don't have, is the amount of creatives we have. We have the most amount of creatives per capita, I think, in the world.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You go to Belmont, you go to Cascade. There's tons of great people that can do things that you can't get in the Caribbean. You have to go to North America. You know what I mean? I just came from Disney. The things that I saw there, right in terms of you know, you're talking about the artwork and the architecture and things.
Speaker 2:These are things that people are doing right here, Right here, Right here that can take materials and mold it. If you look at CIC stage, what Ben is doing. If you look at CIC stage, what Ben is doing. If you look at what Lullaby is doing, they are producers here. If you look at the floats in spirit, they are doing things that you see in Orlando, some of these prime markets. We just need to capitalize on that and differentiate our products you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:And they create wealth for us, our country, because as long as Carnivalidad's carnival is competitive and we are different to the other because we know we have competition right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course Jamaica, and Jamaica especially. People worried about it. It seems that Jamaica carnival could take over Trinidad carnival and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:That will never happen.
Speaker 1:I'm glad you say it, Anami.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that will never happen. And I say why? It's a nummy? Yeah, that will never happen. And I I say why? It's because it's that you can't be the original, right, this is our heritage. Yeah, this is where we are from. What they have is a great product, in the sense that they have the beaches and the hotel inventory.
Speaker 2:And so they're competitive, but to say that they will replace the mecca. We have some. We have so much, in fact, the thing about this carnival, and if you really take a look at it, I was speaking to a journalist the other day and she said something that was very profound to me. She said I can come down here every year and I could still enjoy carnival for free.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's my plan for next year. Oh really, yeah, I want to prove to people now planned for next year? Oh really, yeah, I want to prove to people now. My problem is I don't want to miss so far, but I tried to prove to people that you could get to see any artists and hear any music and experience the whole of Carnival Pan included yes, for free, for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because Pan was one of those things that they say the tickets and all the things you cooperate even better if you're going to drag you know what I mean, and, and, and.
Speaker 2:Then you have these video stations doing these street parties, of course yeah, right, you see all the biggest artists, correct?
Speaker 1:so?
Speaker 2:you have, you have a fantastic um product and you can go on your own money on tuesday and let me be of course at one point.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course, that's where we come from. Yeah, correct, we can understand.
Speaker 2:So yeah, you can really enjoy. And Juve, nobody check in the library.
Speaker 1:No, nobody in check-in.
Speaker 2:So you can really enjoy it. So I think, in terms of that, that's where we have the advantage. I think what we need to do as well is we need to really look at the cost of playing mass. You know what I mean and playing carnival coming down for the tourists. You know the average cost right now. I mean, let's be real, you need about between $6,000 to $10,000 US to come down here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know. Yeah, by the time you cover events, hotel, all them things here, yeah, it's madness, it's expensive. Yeah, and when you look at compare that to like other markets not just carnival, just like, yeah, it's vacation markets.
Speaker 2:You could spend your money and go somewhere else. You go to london, I mean not anymore, but, but no, but. But you know what? I mean for a lot less, a lot less, and have a great time and still save money. Yeah yeah so.
Speaker 2:So we have to get together and look at the cost of carnival as a product, and we have to. We have to have a sort of a public private partnership to be able to do that. Government will have a role to play. We don't necessarily need funding directly. We need to to speak to the stakeholders, like the hotels, for example, I think are a major culprit. You know what I mean. Like I, I say this you can't be charging 800 US and a thousand US a night. You, I say this you can't be charging 800 US and 1,000 US a night. You know what I mean. Like, how are we supposed to be competitive? You know if one entity is overcharging these prices? You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:But it's difficult because the amount of flights, the amount of room, when those things limit it.
Speaker 2:You have Airbnbs, yeah.
Speaker 1:The demand will. Well, hopefully that picks up. Yeah, but Airbnbs charging the same.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we have to have some type of price gap, price limit.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's difficult. When you say public-private partnership, I always wonder there's a promoters association now? Yes, Are you a member?
Speaker 2:of it no.
Speaker 1:So you're not sure about what their mandate is or what their goal is.
Speaker 2:No, no.
Speaker 1:I always wonder about that because I feel as though you're right. The public-private partnership, like the role of governance for me, should always be about infrastructure yes not necessarily to invest directly, correct, but if you could help build the infrastructure, because once they have abundance, yes, the price of good is the amount of supply, yes. So once you have a hire and and you had a book not just the 800 us, sometimes you have to book that the year- when you leave or you could only book it for five days that's right, it's been a mom's day, it's five.
Speaker 2:Of course, course, of course, of course that's 4,000 us between two people 2,000 apiece 2,000 usd and this is not your flight.
Speaker 1:Yeah so, but you ain't do nothing for carnival you ain't do nothing, you ain't buy clothes, yeah.
Speaker 2:So when you really check the money, it's, it's a you. Really you have to be very affluent to come down here, and I think that that's kind of that's where the other markets will catch up and that's where the grenada will catch up, and the barbados will bounce back and the consumer will watch you spend.
Speaker 2:So in the meanwhile, why we haven't fixed that it's important for us event producers to be very different. Yeah, to bring in our resources like the art community. Sure that nobody else has to create a product that's different so that people can say, all right, well, I'm spending six thousand,000, 7,000 US, but I can't get this anywhere else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the value of the experience is worth it, correct so?
Speaker 2:private sector's been left to basically carry the mantle. You know what I'm saying? So we just need to sit down I mean private sector's doing their own thing, ncc's doing their own thing, putting need to get together as stakeholders and really decide okay, guys, it's better for everybody if this price comes down. So what can we do? If we're telling the hotels okay, you need to put a little gap on your price, a ceiling on your price, then maybe give them a tax break for that quarter, let them know that they will see back the money somewhere else if they forfeit it. But there needs to be that type of discussion because it's becoming too expensive.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah I think when you say I heard you talk about the Blue Ocean Strategy as part of what you do, I love it, and the art is how you're tapping into that. One of the ways you're tapping into it, yes, the art is how to get away from everybody else.
Speaker 2:So we have no. You know, we see other entities copying our model right. I like that Because what it does it makes Trinidad Carnival different. Of course you understand what I'm saying Because at the end of the day, the consumer only has disposable income and there's a limit on the consumers that are willing to come. So if they come and they spend our money in Trinidad, I have no issue with that, because it goes through the cycle. It goes through the cycle.
Speaker 2:it goes through the ecosystem yeah yeah, you understand, and we compete amongst ourselves. Great no problem, uh, but we keep keep ourselves better. I noticed a lot of bands improved this year. You understand which is great for the customer and great for the carnival.
Speaker 1:We will all do better if the market cap increases because the consumers want to come to chernobyl as opposed to any other island yeah, I had conrad beard you know affordable inputs on last episode and he was talking about how Dubai was able to create a diamond district or a goal.
Speaker 2:You know it's like that we have here.
Speaker 1:Yes, you have several different people competing, but if we create this sort of a food court or carnival, you must come here to get, whatever the experience is.
Speaker 2:We had to continue being the leader. You know what I mean, and I'm proud. I'm proud to be Chinese, I'm proud to be from a place that we have a unique product and we create all the music too.
Speaker 1:Yeah you know Self-sufficient?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we are a whole ecosystem of people that are just absolutely talented and creative. It's just some of the young people I talk to. Now I keep meeting new creatives too as I continue my journey as and and it's they're so amazing. I mean, yeah, usually the coroner it's a sculptor designer. She designed the spirit stage for band launch, she designed the soccer stage, she, she designed our carts and all the artists sharing the cart and the seashells on, on, on the, on the arfall. I mean just stuff that they bring into life, that people just taking pictures of it and all. Yeah, you know what I mean. So, and these are people that just need a platform. Of course you understand what I'm saying. So that's where we need to continue continue engendering the art the art community is where the gold is.
Speaker 1:I saw something change over the years in Soka, where again I used to see a lot of people flying for Carnival Carnival Wednesday, tuesday and then, little by little, all my friends who I know from school and from UWE I started to see them in Soka Street, not Soka Street in Soka, sunrise, big Soka I was like holy hair already. So we come for Soka.
Speaker 2:That's something we all were planning like to have summer visitors coming in that time for sure, and that's why we don't do it on the outside. We want people to come to Trinidad, oh, you don't do it anywhere else, no no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 2:It's a philosophy binding this thing together. Where Trinidad is a product, you have to fly into Trinidad and Tobago, right. Less is more. We don't need to do it in every other country or anything like that, because eventually, what I think will happen is that they'll be like oh well, I saw it, I did this in Miami and I did this in New York and I did this in wherever, whatever country, and I'd already want to I need to come down to Trinidad again. So our whole thing is because we have papers we think that's the key to our sustainability With you and but they do come down, and it's specifically because it's a festival weekend.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, got it, got it, got it.
Speaker 1:So what was the seed behind Iron Park? Where did that come from?
Speaker 2:I was a snub fan by Tamir Shah's house in OWP and I was here in phase two and phase two was just playing this is beautiful. And then they continued to play and after 15 minutes I got bored Like me with my ADHD got bored, you know what I mean and I was like, wow, what would make this more exciting is if you put a DJ with this, so, like when I'm bored, I can play some music, catch back, cleanse my palate and then more pan again.
Speaker 2:You know, and another director was like oh, that's a good idea. You know, why don't you try that? So then we developed this, this, this um, this model after Soca Street and we tested it. So when you left Soca Street that year, you went into a box and it was called the Iron Pack. Oh, really, yeah. So we, I wanted to see it play out in real life. So we, they played when you walk in out of the fit. And one guy who is a brand manager at a prominent distribution company I'm not calling his name he walked up to me crying and he was like Adrian, you don't understand, there's so much mean to me, and he was drunk, but you know, he's still here, he's in a business, and he started crying and when I saw those tears I was like this is serious, you know what I mean. And then we took it to market and obviously it did very well, yeah.
Speaker 1:I went to it for the first time this year.
Speaker 2:Oh, you're lying, you went to it this year.
Speaker 1:It was impressive. It was impressive. I always end up with the ticket for the weekend Right.
Speaker 2:But to all I said boy, now boy.
Speaker 1:I don't want to do nothing that will make me miss soccer, but I find it was impressive. And I'll tell you where I was really, really impressed, because Pan is special to people, pan is special to us. But to see them, youths, get a chance to play their music, music from their era or even different music that they would be practicing with Silver Stars, and may not play that kind of music for the whole carnival because Silver Stars playing the XYZ you know, and they had an energy boy.
Speaker 1:The energy of the youthutes was something else. That's crazy.
Speaker 2:The young people that basically dedicate their lives to a craft out of passion. Yeah, let's be real, they're not being paid a significant amount of money. And when you go to practice and you obviously, when you go to these panniers, these young, these Panyards, these young, these youths basically are up till 12, 1 o'clock every night, every night. Then they have to go to school, yeah, and do well there and then dedicate the rest of their evening to pan. It's a phenomenon when you think about it, because it's not like somebody's bribing them and say, hey, you take this 5,000. No, these guys doing it because they love pan is in their culture. So I really appreciate the younger people that are in part of these pan bands, pan sides and young groups like Silver Stars, like Supernovas. It's just amazing to see them just come to the forefront and add to the landscape.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Supernovas was amazing in that show, didn't I? First time I heard them I was like what are they? And we up in the lope, you know. Yeah, we up in the lope, you know, in the bush. I didn't even know. Y'all are up on site here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, Kitchener talk about that, you know. Then he's talking about Toko band. That's what you're talking about. Bands in every little crevice in the country coming down.
Speaker 2:Right experience of you know all stars you know, what I mean coming to the forefront, you know, so it's good.
Speaker 1:So, for people who might not go on yeah, despise silver stars, supernovas and then all stars holding on the center, they transition and they lead people out something else, our experience, what where the idea came from to make that competitive like a clash?
Speaker 2:oh, I think, just from, I think, just from. I think competition creates interest for the consumer and I think what we wanted to do was make it like WWE in a way, or like how football is packaged Right, right, where you know you back this pan side. Oh true, you know what I mean. So that's where the marketing kind of comes in. It's like it's entertainment.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:So you want to have some sort of drama in it.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean, and that's Panorama. You have that competition, but this is a lot more cute and it's a little bit more contemporary in terms of what you're allowed to play and whatnot. So they play different songs and they just try to show the diversity and our people love that. We did a noise meter this year. It didn't work well for Silver Stars and I think they were upset about it, but you know, Travis played the drum during the noise while the noise was recording, so obviously their score went off and we could not record that score. But we're going to go back and use that noise meter because that's before I used to decide who was the winner and that was unfair.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean. There's some crowd response, so we're putting the science in place and I think all that is drama People have seen that before.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course, Listen people like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they get robbed. I mean yes, but I know that I have the commitment because you're emotionally involved.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, attached to it. Yeah, I want to talk about that brand building part, but you know that when I saw the noise meter, because what I saw was Silver Stars have a huge score, yes, and then I see other scores- I was a little confused.
Speaker 2:It was because Travis pressed the snares, I see.
Speaker 1:Boom, boom, boom, boom boom.
Speaker 2:yeah, you know what I mean, and he was like well, you didn't tell me nothing, but I was like it annoys me too so the other DJs didn't play it, you know so, but that kind of messed up their score so obviously for their brand, it affected their brand yeah. I don't know. I still have to talk to them.
Speaker 1:I don't know what their position is, but okay, yeah, well, we can just have that conversation because, the. It just creates a different element of drama. So now they thought that when VAR came in it would eliminate the argument, but it just heightened it it just heightened it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, for sure, and again it's just evolving into its own product yeah, of course, of course.
Speaker 1:So I want to talk about wow events for a minute before I get to Soca Street, because that is a special thing. Yeah, sure, feel to be building a brand. You say you're 24 years old, this is just an idea, and now it's one of the brands that you see outside of carnival time. You're bound to see somebody in a world event jersey somewhere.
Speaker 2:Love that and and that's that's that's key, because I think, um, for soaker the jerseys that we give away, it really I love to see all walks of life in it. Sometimes I buy doubles. Man and a Vigran will pull up right In a soccer jersey. We've all seen it before. Right I cool. I like it because it shows that, because you will see people from again all walks of life wearing it. You might see some girls wearing it and going to the mall.
Speaker 1:You might see in it and go to the mall. Yeah, people exercising, people exercising.
Speaker 2:And it just shows that we there's this one thing that we do have, that we all like and we subscribe to, and it's cool and even for the people that are homeless and being, at least we get something out there by, you know, we providing some something you know some relief somewhere, you? Know, so one of those household brands. You know, when you put out 10,000 Jay-Z's over 15 years, that's 150,000 Jay-Z's that are out into a country with 1.5 million people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, come in 10%, so it's obviously, theoretically, there's some overlap there, but it's 10% you know what I mean. So we're going to keep pushing that out. And sponsor could they pay for that?
Speaker 1:We don't pay for that they sponsor for their branding. Right.
Speaker 2:Because it's like a magazine your ad is given out through or distributed. Yeah, yeah. So in that way that particular thing works very well, but the intention was to just drive people, obviously.
Speaker 1:Oh, it still is when you go in your car you could put on your face mask and you change. Yeah, it makes sense. And when I see it I wonder like the biggest brands in the world pride themselves on that. I read a book where harley davidson was looking at. Their measure of brand loyalty was how much people tattooed harley on their skin.
Speaker 2:right well, yeah, you know.
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah it's a big mark of how committed people are to it, like, yeah, we have shoes homies call me soaker shoes. Yes, so we get dirty and get a painter, and it's one of the things I like seeing when I leave in Soka watch and see how much souls people so left because they must be wearing that every year for many, many years, for sure, and it's crazy because it's still going on.
Speaker 1:I remember my first year going to Soka Street. A good friend of mine, damien Rose, at Graphic House he was doing some work with you earlier.
Speaker 1:He does all the work, a lot of and we go in Soka every year, me and his wife and everybody. And he said, boy, I just come, Soka Street, boy, Carnival Sunday morning, Same thing you're saying. I said, Damien, they think they're going to get me sick Carnival Monday morning. But the first time I went it was amazing, the vibe in it. I mean Soka is already hard to copy in terms of the energy and the feel. But so in the street this year I went, it was a whole different ballgame. It's as big as Big Soca.
Speaker 2:How big is it? It's between five and six.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and Big Soca is what kind of number?
Speaker 2:Like eight around there.
Speaker 1:Oh really.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but we could go more. We just can't fit more in O2 Park. Right and we don't want to move from O2 Park.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I Savannah was something to do with the O2 Park.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we didn't see eye to eye with the way things were at that point, but we're now business partners, oh nice. So that has done well and I think it was good for us to go to the Savannah to see the difference of the energy. Savannah was great in terms of logistics.
Speaker 2:Way better, but energy was different yeah energy is not the same as the hill and the sea. All those things create atoms, create energy. The sea is a big part of the energy. The sun seeing the sun and the sea combined is a big part of the energy. You know how you feel you know at that time. So the savannah has its mountains, its area. It does create energy, but different type of energy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's different, you're right.
Speaker 2:It felt good reaching home, yeah, yeah, rather than the traffic coming out. I mean a lot of people, they get creative, they use boats and I think there are people who it's an adventure for them.
Speaker 2:So they they join up in the bus and and they go with their friends and they don't mind the the traffic bad, because they party. And whoever knock out, whoever you block out, that time to know that this is, um, you know, it's like a again a ride in Disney. If you can't afford a fast pass, you're going to wait for about an hour.
Speaker 1:Of course, in every line, yeah, in every line.
Speaker 2:So there's just things that you do to sacrifice, to go to experience. I think the customer has grown accustomed to that. You know it's worth it for me. Hopefully it continues being worth it for them.
Speaker 1:Of course, it shows that you did well to develop what people feel to be a festival, because people put aside the weekend for it. Now, yes, so during that period there was the fog, and then we didn't see marshall for several years, and then this year, all of a sudden marshall come out. I didn't know he was going to be there.
Speaker 2:I was, I was in the dark or people didn't know we didn't, we didn't know that was a real late call because he wasn't scheduled to perform, right, uh and um he. I guess when I heard this song I knew that it was going to be a big song, right, right, um, but that was a real great last minute call. Again, it's like drama too, because I think it was an night to the iron back. We were like, okay, we're do it, okay, right, and he comes to the show or whatever. And then you know, at that point in time, bungie is, you know, the character is still the ground song.
Speaker 2:He's making waves to the ground, and I mean just the intro alone is just pory. Is it right what he's singing about?
Speaker 1:to his voice, yeah, everything.
Speaker 2:He has my energy. Everything is perfect, you know. But then Pardee is coming up as well, and I think the magic that morning was seeing them perform back to back.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, the audience Bungie comes with this huge intro that we pre-recorded for him, right? You hear the lady talking about the Viking of Soka giving him this big, big intro and it's fireworks. And then, right after that, people are like, well, it's a great performance, let's go back to. But then Marshall comes after five years. Yeah, you know of him performing in a FET other than his own and I think it was the whole like them performing back to back without an intermission and people not knowing he was coming.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh my God, and that's something people wouldn't have seen in any FET for a long, long time, even longer than the five years to see Bungie hand off and Marshall come on yeah. And Bungie had that FET in a grip this year.
Speaker 2:Yes, he had it in a grip With that carry it and a thousand and then he had songs. That again I'm very upset that Celebration was not absorbed because or Fet we Like.
Speaker 1:Or Fet, we Like yeah he had a hell of a year. He had a hell of a year awesome, awesome person yeah, but I'm telling, I'm telling people like this year in Soka it was the first time I felt like the old Brass Festival vibe where you're just going a frenzy Because by the time Bungee come off the stage and I look around I'm like a complete stranger.
Speaker 2:I'm like where the hell?
Speaker 1:am I from my cooler I say what the hell is going on? I had to go and find people back and then Marshall come and top it off. So it's something that you feel is going to happen, going forward Energy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think everything is a cycle in Carnival. You know everything is a cycle in life. You know fashion from 70, 30 years ago is coming back. People are the baggy clothes now you know from the 90s. So you see that, and I think we are now on the advent of a cycle, that where people want that energy, brass festival. You see, hard fat. When I look at the images from the hard fet I call him. I was just like. I cannot believe it.
Speaker 1:I didn't think that could have happened again. No, I didn't think it would have come back. No, I called.
Speaker 2:I was like, bro, are you, do you all know what you all just did there? Because it's people just leaving all everything at home and they coming out to express that's like a much better yeah, yeah, yeah. This is what you see at the travis scott concerts of course, right this is what you see now coming in. That's that's being big in america, but it's coming.
Speaker 1:It translates into our genre we're going back to yeah, that's what we used to see in psa and spectrum and them places man woman, we don't care we know, done it and it it's I thought he's the same with sherman chester.
Speaker 2:It's to see that happen. It's the start of, I think, another cycle right of people. Just we're not in this kind of groovy thing. I love my groovy, of course, of course right, but but it's people want the energy they want to jump up with a stranger.
Speaker 1:Of course, yeah, yeah, yeah, you saw it. You saw it. I had doubts. I tell myself, soca is that way because people wet and they can't take out their phone. When I see hard fetters I say now, boy, is this something? Yeah?
Speaker 2:And I'm asking is this a result of COVID that we've been suppressed? So we kind of now like reach our comfort level where we want to, totally express ourselves break away and so I don't know if if it's because of that, or but what if they build on that and they have a responsibility with that event? And I keep telling them, like you have to be very careful that you don't just spoil it and just try to do too much. You need to keep the essence and scale properly because, it's.
Speaker 2:It's so pivotal. It can change the way in which we party for the next 10 years. So I think they have a great responsibility on their hands with that event in terms of where our because we're no longer on the of course with that event, in terms of where our, because we're no longer on the wearing.
Speaker 1:And, yes, I never thought I'd come back to them but it would be nice to see the next 10 years, because I feel like younger people need to experience that. Yes, and they did that outfit. It was young people. It's not my age, but Gen Z is like that Gen.
Speaker 2:Z doesn't care about the frills. You know I not into all the debauchery and luxury and things. They dress, how they want to dress. They are their own selves. You know, they may have maybe a couple limitations here and there in different, different millennials, but they are very much rooted in themselves yeah, and being true to themselves and, yeah, the, the kutain followers, you know they, they have their own essence and I think they, they will be the ones to push that energy, because they get along very well with each other.
Speaker 1:Of course.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they don't watch each other.
Speaker 1:No, yeah, yeah, Like we times in school who, where and what? Who's you? Where you come from, where?
Speaker 2:you think from when you live in, they don't care about that no, no, no. They're for that and I'm proud of them, right um for being that way and I think um that that hard, the hard fact, would be the genesis of this whole new movement of people just enjoying themselves, of course.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it would be nice to see it I hope it would be nice to see it I hope for it so, in terms of artists, you brought up kutin right.
Speaker 1:One of the things that I wonder sometimes with with people who do events, yes, is that choice of what your lineup looks like on a night. Two reasons I'm asking that because, one, I might have the biggest set of songs last year and then nobody will see it the year after. Yeah, it's difficult. And then you have people who, like Kooten, who I mean them fellas and them controlling a certain audience and you wonder okay, how do you decide as an event manager?
Speaker 1:I just go with the hits, so you go in with the biggest hits of the year.
Speaker 2:It's tough for me because I have a lot of good relationships, of course. Right, a lot of these guys are people who I would talk to because I'm generally interested in the music. Right, I will go into each studio. I will go by Anson, I will go by Teja.
Speaker 2:Right, I will beg to hear these songs before like a fan, right, and they know I come in right, but they give me the time because obviously I guess to them they respect me as a creative and they want to kind of show me where they're coming from, to prepare events, like, remember, I have volumes, right, you know, it's a good platform for each of them and I think, with regards to the lineup, it's tough because I've seen people who I have good relationships with that I have to leave off the cast because the audience doesn't feel the music.
Speaker 1:You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:So it's very disappointing for some artists when you have a genuine relationship with them and you say, nah, I can't run on and then someone else will do it for free. They'll come let me run on and I'll be like bro nah, man, yeah and serious. So even if they're doing, it for free?
Speaker 2:no, I can't because it's about the audience, it's not about our relationship. It's really and that's tough for me because that's when you kind of like get business like on you have to remember you can't be a. If there was one promoter that used to do that, a lot right, and everybody started running up on the stage because if you can let this one do it and that one do it, you can't let me do it. And then all of a sudden this person comes up with a new song that nobody knows and everybody's standing up on it or some men want to sing the whole.
Speaker 2:You know just out there, you know confused, and it kills the energy level and when you are at 100 or like 98, to bring you back down to zero, and then come back again that come back again is hard for a DJ, so you need to.
Speaker 2:If you're coming down, come down at 70 and then go back up at 90 and stay at 70 and go back. But anytime I realize your song is going to bring you down to like a 10 or a zero, the relationship gets a little weird because I literally just do what I think is good for the customer, which is, you know, in this case, for Soca, we came on. We know Teja had energy yeah, boy, we know that. We heard it a million times by the time it came. But there are people who know again, mainstream, mainstream person time it came. But there are people who know again to mean sheen, mean sheen person, a person who nothing to callable knows the song.
Speaker 2:So you have to, you have to bring in integer. You have young brother who has a fan base and a popular song. You bring him in and then you start to deal with the and then you have a man like voice, who, who I, you know his music was. I told him yeah, I said your music, your music this year was, was fantastic. Yeah, but he can always give you a show. Yeah, you can't go wrong with him. You spend your money as an event producer voice is going to deliver a certain level of performance. That is very dependable.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's not going to dip below that 70. Nah, he's dipping, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Not every time you're going to get 100, but I sure guarantee he's not going to dip and that's because he's worked very hard on his catalogue yeah, I was impressed this year because when I see Bungee and Marshall and then I hear voice, I say oh god, I'm sorry for voice but boy nah, because he knows he has confidence yeah, yeah, yeah no, a lot of artists do not want to call some names but they refuse to perform.
Speaker 2:I want to call some names but they refuse to perform. You know what I mean and it's tough going on after them. But he's at a point now where I think he is, he has enough catalogue and I think you know people say, oh, you know, they find his song same way and whatever Right, but this is his style, yep, right, adele songs almost the same way on every song.
Speaker 1:I hear that about David Rudder. It's about time they say Kitchener singing the same thing every year, that's normal. Yeah, that's normal. People say that about it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I love Tuonwe, I love the Sparrow, I love Haya too. Anyway, it was up there for the top top three.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I guess because with Kyrie and Paddy had a little war, everything else could get forgotten. But too. Anyway, folks are feeling in you that you can and I feel like it's one of those songs too that, like you said, like by summer, yeah, it's starting to get bigger and bigger and bigger crazy. So that's not the carnival. You do events as well. No, I don't want to, you know no, it's about carnival.
Speaker 2:We're a carnival company, right? So in this period of time we would rest. We are now regrouping. All the creators will come together and say, okay, so what are we doing? You know, for Soka I'm looking at maybe like doing something more of the Aztecs, or maybe like a time machine.
Speaker 2:I might want to create a carnival, a character, you know, because I don't want to take ip from anybody else of course so I might create a like a mr barnabas and the time machine and we go back in time in trinidad, you know what I mean and then we go to the future in part two, you know. So I would want to kind of create that. So I I have a fantastic team of people that will just come together and we will sit and eat chinese food and just figure out something some things.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a hot seat too, because if you come up with a lame idea, we're going to let you know, yo, what's going on with you today. You're off, you're going off.
Speaker 1:It's like it's an unkind. Yeah, you know what I'm saying. Yeah, it's a little bit, you know and I get to, but I've created an environment, so it's it's training. Yeah, yeah, you have some picong.
Speaker 2:The little picong is part of you. Won't be training if you don't have a little picong, if you're a carnival company.
Speaker 1:You need that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you need that if somebody have a bad idea if I have a bad idea they roast they must be waiting for you, they're waiting for me and that other ways to do things. I think it's a very healthy open environment, you can be transparent about how you feel.
Speaker 1:Of course. Yeah, it allows you to innovate. Yeah, so, being a carnival company, is it sustainable from a business standpoint?
Speaker 2:For sure, for sure, yeah.
Speaker 1:And, just deciding, you make a philosophical decision, that is Trinidad carnival, yes, trinidad, okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's sustainable. The market cop is much bigger. You have a lot more people willing to spend money. When I used to do events in the summer, it was always like, well, you know, I have a wedding to go to or I'm in my family flying out, so people are just all over the place. In the summer, I feel like in Carnival, there's new music which guides the entire season as far as I'm concerned, and people are willing to come out and really, you see, you have to hear people also when they want to party. So, because it is easy, because everybody comes there, they're not. Yeah, there's no party, there's nothing else to do that morning.
Speaker 1:You're not coming to waste time.
Speaker 2:You're actually not coming to even feel all things, you're just going to party.
Speaker 1:No, you're going. And they now come from a party and they headed to a party after.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think carnival is that's where you know the spirit is different around that time, right?
Speaker 1:Now everybody wants me to get to spirit, right, but before I get a little bit about Mecca, yes, sir, in terms of bringing the arts in and the uniqueness that you've created with the Soka brand, yes, what is the art so?
Speaker 2:so what we do with mecca is that we take all the train art art, like all our folklore, all our characters, and we redraw them, right, so they're artists that we engage and we say, okay, can you redraw the damn marine? What would the damn marine look like in 2030? So marvel has a series called what if? And it's exactly what if? Of all our characters. What if the the job was not a man? What if the job was a woman, right and? And so, because I don't, it's like what if of all our characters? What if the Jab was not a man? What if the Jab was a woman, right?
Speaker 2:And so because I don't, it's very easy for us to just hire a company and say bring five Jab-Jabs, bring two Mokro Jumbies, bring things. Yeah, then we will not be swimming in a blue ocean. So the whole thing is to take our characters, redesign them, reproduce them, right, and we will kind of own those designs as well. And basically, when the customer comes into the event, those characters, you are immersed in this town or this area or this event of all these characters. So it gives the foreigner a chance to engage them. You understand, engage the baby doll. You know what I mean, so that they can take their pictures and their content and understand it, because you have to remember, these foreigners are not going to the match ground.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they may not know about the characters at all if you don't give them the opportunity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're not going to Kings and Queens because that format is already antiquated at this point for the younger generation.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:So it's difficult for them. They're not buying tickets. Nobody's going to say not say hey, we're going, kings and queens, and we're going yeah, they may not know it exists they don't know it isn't kind of all his pets on the street.
Speaker 2:So it's best you bring that in into it and create a hybrid between a fet and also this kind of broadway version of of our characters being exposed. And why I say broadway is that the these are also dancers, so the characters are constantly moving right, and then they join the artists on stage. So you might see Ola Tunji performing, but then we have four sailors there dancing out with him. He doesn't know what the routine is, but we already know what songs they're playing. So we support your performance with dances from the Dam Marine and then on the backdrop of that, we have a Kings and Queens winner every year. Right, so we use Leo Lacan for the last two years, right, so we and queens winner every year. Okay, right, so we use leo lacan for the last two years.
Speaker 2:Okay, right, so we build a stage based on the kings and queens winner from the year before. Yeah, from the year before, yeah. So then we look at the costume and say, oh, what is it? Okay, this this year is about zeus. Okay, we're gonna build, like this castle in the sky to represent zeus, the gods. So what we do is we just extend your costume as the stage itself and then we add the characters on the stage and in the crowd to really. And Mecca's just become its own thing, and every year we make a new characters.
Speaker 2:So, that in year seven or eight you're going to be totally immersed in this town of characters.
Speaker 1:Oh, so you bring back the characters that you've already created and keep adding.
Speaker 2:I got it, so we're going to have like 50.
Speaker 1:I hear this talk sometimes and people sometimes feel like to be very cultural and traditional. You got to give up the profit motive.
Speaker 2:No, you see, for me, my personal view is that money always chases quality and I don't think I think consumers will spend where they believe they get the best value proposition right. But you have to create that quality. Once you create quality, people will find you. You know people talk about overlaid. You need to go here and network and you need to go there and join this and play golf and do all those things right. But but for me it's joining lodge, join a lot of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean differential for the run folks, right, because I I honestly believe it's it's joining Lodge, joining Lodge. And yeah, I mean differential for different folks, right, but I honestly believe it's once you have something of the utmost quality and you give people value, they will always come back. They will always spend their money, because people just want to feel free, people want to have a great experience, because life is tough. Life is hard, especially in general the quality of life we need.
Speaker 2:That it's always bad news. It's a lot of crime, you know. So people are willing to say, okay, it might be more expensive than another event, but I know I'm sure I spent my $600. Yeah, I'm sure I'm going to have the time of my life you know what I? Mean, and that's because the event, what you produce and what you give them, has a lot of quality, so we don't cut cost. When it comes to quality to the consumer, there's no cutting of cost.
Speaker 1:I have an accountant.
Speaker 2:She's always like Adrian, you don't need that. And I'm like yes, yes, more, more, more, more floats, more design. Just give them this, give them that, give them that. You know what I mean? Because we still make money, but we could make, we can make more money, Right, but I think we could eat little and live longer, and we are living longer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Like people talking about this customer lifetime value, you're looking at a fetter over 20 years not necessarily Not five years.
Speaker 2:You don't want to make it now, not today. No, I don't need to make it now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and this is not stuff that I knew. I learned this as I go Because I think involving that art community in Trinidad and Tobago is so important. As I saw recently, the dragon from Kilimanjaro, the man who was teaching so many children to learn to walk Mokujambi and stilts, passed away recently. And a lot of times you find that the people who are at the core of the tradition, of what made us have a carnival, they seem to get left behind because of the commercialization of carnivals. So people are always criticizing the beads and the feathers, destroying the culture. But it seems that, though it's spirits, you want to still merge those things. One is not as expensive as the other.
Speaker 2:No, why can't we have both? And there are masqueraders that like different things and we even started to have a lot more covered options. Now you know what I mean for masqueraders a lot more monokinis and stuff because they are there. As I said before, there are people who are young and fit that want to be covered. They may be a mom, they might, they might have a job where you know they don't want to be exposed, a teacher in a school right so you need to kind of you think about everybody and what they would like, and I think it doesn't necessarily need to go down.
Speaker 2:You know that that mincial, just pure art, mcfarlane, pure art we can still have a lot of the elements that currently it can be contemporary, but we can contemporary as well and I think that's our blue ocean, that's our niche, that we are carving on for ourselves.
Speaker 1:Right, well, I remember year one, the thing that stood out to me the most, because I didn't know you were behind spirits. This happens a lot, right, okay, that I find out is what we vent after.
Speaker 2:I don't like to push myself on anything. Yeah, it's clear, it's not?
Speaker 1:about me. That's good yeah and when I heard about it, I say a brunch for most of the day, monday. Yeah boy, it sounded like a great idea, because here's something in an interview recently where you said the sun getting hotter. I've been saying this for years I don't know if people could sustain or there's some people who sustain in on two days on the road like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's difficult, it's very tough and we invest a lot in hydration, a lot in water. This year people complain that we enough shade in our spots. So best believe that we will have everybody covered next year Because, again, the sun is just something that you can't account for. You know what I mean and with climate change, you're seeing the effects of it, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I think it's good and I think, with regards to things like the brunch and these things, those things work very well because masqueraders are now able to find them, find the ban yeah, so the brunch?
Speaker 1:the idea behind the brunch was really to to limit the amount of time you're spending on your no the idea behind the brunch was.
Speaker 2:I think we need to people. I found that masqueraders already come out late on a monday, right, and when they come out late the balance already left. So you always find yourself as a masquerader. See that masquerade and be like, hey, where's x-ban where? Where they going where? Where? Where y is? Oh, they up the road too, but you park so far that you have to walk. Why don't we just meet at a central location right and gather there and then leave together?
Speaker 1:that way we can park where we, where we think we know where the ban is you know, it's something that when you talk about the blue ocean strategy and it, it's a book that I have to read now because, I saw where Juvie at one point in time was starting right after the mash grass. So sometime one o'clock in the morning Juvie started crime hunting and violence. They move it to four yes so now what happens? Is Juve finishing later?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And the bands never seem to change their start time at 10 on a Monday, correct? So you kind of adjust into that.
Speaker 2:That's one of the things that make you different. We leave at 1. And I saw some other bands this year as well.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And so I think that now Carnival will start later as a result of that, because it never really was a thing where you go out early on a Monday. They really was a thing where you go out early on a Monday. They have some mass payers both of them but I ain't from the beginning.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's me If they start telling me like I'm going to work and I wouldn't first drink off that truck.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah yeah, but when we gather in the brunch, obviously it's very exuberant. There's a great, I think. When we looked at the math, it's very easy to provide a better quality and still be profitable?
Speaker 1:Yes, of course, got you. Yes, so it's scaling. Now we can talk about scaling at events. What was your numbers last year compared to this year?
Speaker 2:for Spirit, Also, we went up to 3,800 masqueraders and we had 2,700. We went up by 1,000.
Speaker 1:We left 100. Okay, okay, yeah, I'm going to stay.
Speaker 2:Stay in there, never cross in there oh yeah, never, never, never.
Speaker 1:Oh right, so people make your calls, now make your calls, find out who you know now. Never move it up, you feel that's a sweet spot.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't wanna. That allows us to produce more, more quality for them, but without it being completely, because I've played in bands that were 7,000 people yeah, of course you remember them, and it's like you lose your friend, you're done. You're done for the day. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:You're on your own and you have your VEX money because you don't know how you're going back.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean, so I like that, I think, where it's still the smallest of the big bands and you intend to keep it.
Speaker 1:So how are you going to deal with the excess demand? Because everybody I know people playing Lost Tribe this year, people playing Mass I haven't played Mass for the last few years, but the numbers high, it was what people say are going to spread next year but it's always saying if I could get it, yeah, so how are you addressing that part?
Speaker 2:It's just it's just to compromise the experience at all. You know what I mean and we even realized, okay, when you jump up to this number, you have to have these amount of resources in place and stuff. And this is our second year, we're still learning things that ways that we could improve on stuff, but we believe that this number is perfect for us, for our model. Perfect, and if it's a possibility of that excessive demand, then we create another model that will be completely different.
Speaker 1:But I understand because, as a business owner myself, right, it is extremely difficult to sit for the types of hours we sit on. Yes, try like, as you say, I come up with a bad idea. I get ridiculed in meetings. We feel like we have the right thing. Yes, and the intention is always there. Yes, but the reality is, when rubber hit the road, to fix the tyre while the car drives, yes, and I wonder if you feel like you're still in that phase where Spurs is, because, I mean, soka is a well-oiled machine at this point yes.
Speaker 1:From the time you hear the announcements walking into a Soka venue, you know the energy starts to build.
Speaker 2:Yes, Until you can't remember how you reach home.
Speaker 1:It's easier to show like that yes, it's still but you're sticking with it. You feel you fix any things as you go along and every band has to go through that yeah, of course I I.
Speaker 1:We know that there have been a lot of problems with other bands before in the past and you watch them bounce back yeah, yeah you watch them make the adjustments yeah, well, you see, my assumption was that you're gonna continue to scale, but this is, this is a hell of a lot of news. No, no, I'm not people gonna be disappointed People are going to be disappointed in you, Adrian.
Speaker 2:No, I'm not. I don't want it to be too big.
Speaker 1:Your philosophy is right in that, if you keep it where it is, but that demand. But you're willing to explore another offering.
Speaker 2:Maybe. Maybe it has to have a purpose. It can't be the same thing as spirit.
Speaker 1:It may be something else. Front meaning I wouldn't do it if it doesn't have meaning. Yeah, I like the idea of purpose. Another tell all we close the wrapping up because this man say he had to go in the mass camp. We in what one month he told me he had to go in the mass camp you have a hard out, so we're doing any mass camp.
Speaker 2:No, remember, we in design phase now for all the events for next year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it starts so early. Yeah, because if you don't, we have so many things to manage. If you don't start now, it just becomes a problem in the last quarter. So, yeah, in terms of like, uh, for spirit, for example, remember, we're designing and we have a marketing campaign coming up. We want to announce our theme and what we're doing. And even our theme and what we're doing always has to have meaning and purpose in it. It's not just like a galactic team or we call it a dissonance. It's about all things shit or that right, and we want to continue to be very how to say cohesive in our approach and impactful. So we have to be very, very careful and put in the hours now to create a great campaign and a band launch that is ultimately going to end up being a musical, you understand. So you should come to the band launch.
Speaker 1:It's different, yeah, yeah yeah, I'll definitely be there. Something that now we have me going to these events with different eyes, adrian, because I go in, I go into blackouts and I don't have time, me and my wife. You know how much of your Rubbermaid tables my wife sleep on, leaving so many years, so we come in with that. But now I see it very, very differently that the purpose behind it is there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and it has to have meaning for even the people like my staff, like the great thing about it is they take full responsibility for everything. They love this more than I love it Like like it seems to me they're in it. They own it, you know. And so they can't own something that they don't have, doesn't have meaning.
Speaker 1:You know, and so that's why.
Speaker 2:I say we can't do something just like that. It had to have something special about it. It has to be disruptive in its own way. Yeah, you know. So that's. It doesn't make sense to make the band bigger than it is right now.
Speaker 1:Okay, how are we doing you in a little less early? I leave him in a list about 20.
Speaker 2:Out of that 3,800,.
Speaker 1:We are 20 secure. You know my problem now, adrian. Everybody's going to say so you sit down with Adrian and know your thing and we can't get.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's yours, it's not going to happen. If I get it, it's not going to happen.
Speaker 1:I'm going to say boy Adrian, come eating.
Speaker 2:I've got good excuse but it's been good and I feel very blessed to be a part of this thing, you know well, good, good.
Speaker 1:It's a pleasure, glad you came through. I feel proud as a Fatima man as well. Let me begin, and I thought Adrian was a year after me in Fatima. Apparently I'm much older than I thought. You know what I mean. I'm watching me and Adrian the same year I. I saw you for sure. The first time I said they school, school and Fatima.
Speaker 2:Fatima is just. I would not be who I am today without Fatima yeah, fatima is a special place.
Speaker 1:Fatima is a special place. At some point you will get Father Gregory in this seat to talk about some of that.
Speaker 2:You have to.
Speaker 1:They've just the grounding of course, of course, of course, of course. So thanks for coming through, not just for coming through today, but for everything that you're doing for the culture. I'm glad you were able to talk about some of the purpose behind it. Yes, because I think it's important for people to see People. Sometimes, a lot of times in my conversations, people see commercial as replacing culture. Yes, and I'm glad to see that you're doing the work too much.
Speaker 2:We're going to do more. We and the bridge that we built and we want, if you're seeing this as a creative, come to us If you're creative and you feel that you can add value and what I call the timeline. If you could add value in the timeline, then our doors are open. You know what I mean? We literally just working with people who are great.
Speaker 1:No, that's good, that's good. You're one of the greats. You know what I mean. The greats, you know I mean and yeah, I'd leave you there, go to the mass camp. I tell myself if this carnival thing's sustainable, because I feel like it's two months a year.
Speaker 2:You're working, but you're working right through everybody and and shout out to everybody that that is working on carnival and a lot of people feel that we, we just pop up make a money right out people. People put so much time and effort into. You know mass right, you know, remember, it's purchasing, it's manufacturing, it's finance, it's admin, it's marketing. And then you go into logistics and food and beverage and distribution and road management. When you look at it, it's a tough tough, tough, tough business.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like a nightmare to me. Yeah, yeah, yeah it's a nightmare.
Speaker 2:It has its pluses and I want to shout out everybody who's done their thing before the Wayne Barclays, the Barbarossa, the Big Mike's Day. Literally, it set a foundation. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:As you bring them up. Let me ask you one more question before you go. Competition meaningful to you Like you're very proud we won second in design yeah, you all look different on the road. Yeah, yeah, we're proud.
Speaker 2:We want to win band of the year. Oh serious, yes, for sure we want to win alright, so you have my commitment.
Speaker 1:Any band launch, I will soak as always and I will spur it next year, okay amazing, so I come in to do a review. Yes, but I want you to sit in here for the review next year.
Speaker 2:I appreciate it. Thanks a million. Yeah, I appreciate it, man.
Speaker 1:I appreciate that. Yeah, Thank you.