The Doing Business in Bentonville Podcast

Ep. 144 - Bentonville At A Tipping Point

Doing Business in Bentonville Season 1 Episode 144

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0:00 | 31:43

Bentonville is one of the few places where a “small city” problem set collides with a truly global business footprint. We’re joined by Brandom Gengelbach, President and CEO of the Bentonville Area Chamber of Commerce, to unpack what that collision looks like up close and why Northwest Arkansas is entering a real tipping point.

Brandom explains why the region can’t rely on momentum, corporate gravity, or philanthropy alone anymore. As growth accelerates, Bentonville needs intentional economic development strategy, broader civic participation, and a plan that protects local culture while still welcoming new residents, entrepreneurs, and investment. We talk candidly about what progressive communities do differently: they don’t put all the pressure on their biggest employers, and they get more businesses to the table to fund, shape, and own the future together.

We also explore the quality-of-life drivers that have turned Bentonville into a global brand, from mountain biking trails that weave through daily routines to the creative energy that keeps the city feeling human-scale. Then we go deeper on what’s next: strengthening the Walmart supplier and vendor ecosystem, building an economy around whole health with major new medical investment, and what it means that Walmart’s new headquarters is designed to connect with the community instead of walling itself off. Finally, we look at the headline transition of the old home office site into a four-year STEM university, creating a stronger talent pipeline for high-demand jobs.

If you care about smart growth, talent attraction, and building a resilient regional economy, you’ll take a lot from this conversation. Subscribe, share this with someone thinking about Bentonville, and leave us a review with the question you want us to tackle next.

SPEAKER_01

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Doing Business in Bentonville. My name is Andy Wilson, and I'm the executive director of Doing Business in Bentonville, and I'm so excited today to talk about our guest. Brandom, I want to welcome you to Doing Business in Bentonville.

SPEAKER_00

I noticed how you didn't say Brandom Ginglebach. It's a bit of a mouthful, Andy. I understand. Brandom is easy enough. I was worried about our You were scared. I could tell. Yeah, yeah. It's it's intimidating. Yeah. So my first name is Brandom. Yeah. It's with an M. It's a family name. It's my grandmother's last name. Great name. It's a good one. Yeah. Don't be random, vote. Brandom was my freshman class. Gigglebach is Gangelbach. Yes, German.

SPEAKER_01

Okay. Well, you know, I looked it up. Yeah. And that's how I found it out.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. And then there were seven different pronunciations of it.

SPEAKER_00

There is most likely uh I've pronounced it all seven different ways. It's probably spelled incorrectly from when ancestors came over here, but it's what I have. So I'm sticking with it. Well, let's I think it's a phenomenal name.

Leading A Chamber Next To Walmart

SPEAKER_01

Thanks. You know, it's nothing like a great name. Yes. That's right. And you got it. Are you Andy or Andy? Oh, I'm Andrew. Okay. Yeah, but you got changed through the years. You know, Drew and then Andy and Andy Stuck. Okay. Because there are other Andrews in the room. Right. So they had to separate us. Okay. Yeah. That's right. Andrew One, Andrew Two, just go by Andy. That's right. I prefer Andrew, but well then I'll call you Andrew now. I like it. I love it. Thank you. Of course. Okay. We have so much to talk about. Great. We live in such a great place here in Northwest, Arkansas. And and Brendan is he is the president and CEO of Bentonville Chamber. Wonderful. How long have you been here? Two years. That's awesome. We're so glad you're here. You know, uh, for all of our guests, uh, we met uh about a year or so ago at an event called the uh Wall Street series, and we can talk about that, which is a great event that you host uh as the chamber host. And um, and then uh recently we we we've connected uh again with some things we're doing at doing business in Bentonville, our live events, and I was like, okay, we we gotta get you here. We have to talk about this great city. Yeah. And uh and and yeah, I'm gonna be real partial today because I love the city. So okay, so anyway, no, we are, but I have a question to start us off with.

SPEAKER_00

Great.

SPEAKER_01

Okay, how how is it to be the president CEO of the chamber for a city that has the largest retail in the world in your city? How do you get up every day and balance the other million things you have to do? And you've got Walmart stores, Sam's Club, all of that in an unbelievable new complex over acres and acres. How do you do that every day?

SPEAKER_00

One step at a time. That's a that's a good question to start with, Andrew. That's a good lead in. Uh listen, uh, I've done this um in a lot of markets. Um, Nashville, Indianapolis, Brisbane, Australia, Fort Worth, Texas. Um, and um all those places are amazing. We're we live in a wonderful country with wonderful communities, but but this place here really is a unicorn. Um, there's there's nothing like it. It's hard to compare. Um, and um, for me, it's just been such a privilege and such a blessing to be able to use my professional talents and love and combine that with my personal interest and passions to help lead the organization here um in Bentonville and and in northwest Arkansas. And it's a very unique market. There's a huge juxtaposition between the Fortune one and Walmart and what's going on here, um, located in a town of 60,000 people, which is Bentonville, in a region of 600,000 people. And so for us, it's really a matter of taking the advantages of what Walmart is in our backyard, while at the same time um growing and developing the economy around that, um, and doing so in a very intentional way, uh, but also doing it in a smaller community that really has um been growing only recently. And uh so having someone with some outside experience, I think is what the business community was really interested in when they were looking at uh a new chamber president a few years ago. Right. Wonderful.

Why Bentonville Hit A Tipping Point

SPEAKER_01

You know, I've read uh, you know, I I that that's just really wonderful how you set that up so well. I I read uh recently you talked about this area though, you you talked about being you mentioned Unicorn City, but it as a tipping point. You talked about us there. Yeah. What when you talk about us as a tipping point, what what do you mean by that? What is your thoughts?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, so um we're we've been at this point as a community, we've been very uh blessed largely by market-driven dynamics. Um, Northwest Arkansas, Bentonville has been extremely blessed through large corporations, um, through philanthropic giving that has created a whole bunch of opportunity and has driven our local economy. Um, and we have um really reacted to that growth and been blessed with that growth. There comes a time when the community matures enough and the economy matures enough where the time for reacting um needs to stop and the time to be proactive uh needs to begin. And that's really where we are as a community where um there's so much growth that's happening. The days of just reacting and being thankful really need to come to an end. And we need to be able to have a plan, a purpose for exactly how we want to grow to ensure that when we do grow, it's in a way that honors the community in terms of our culture and our heritage. And it um it's developing the community in a way that is true to true to ourselves, as opposed to just experiencing massive growth and having that overrun and define us as a community. So that's really the tipping point that we're facing. And that's really why I'm here and why I'm excited to be here is to be able to bring um a strategy around that growth to be able to leverage our assets and grow intentionally in a way that honors the community.

Building A Proactive Growth Strategy

SPEAKER_01

So two years now working on that. All right, it took a while, but get your hands around that, I'm sure. Do your conversations, research, thinking a lot. Uh, like we all do, we get we get we've got to go to school in those two years and and do that. So how how are you progressing with your I'm I'm gonna call it a vision? Sure. Okay. How are you progressing with your vision that you just described? Because it's a really powerful vision you just described.

SPEAKER_00

It is. It's it's uh for me, we're on uh year two or year three of a of really a sort of a three-year transformation from an organizational standpoint. Um, it's it's been a challenge. Um, I don't know if you've been like this, Andrew. I know you I'm sure you've had these jobs where um the older I am, the more I feel like I'm not the dumbest person in the room. And you're excited about being able to contribute based on your past experiences. And then you get into an area where, like me and my job, where you suddenly are like, okay, this environment, the challenges that we're dealing with are not like the challenges I saw in Fort Worth or Nashville or Indianapolis or Brisbane. And so to a certain extent, it's like, okay, we're on new ground here because this, as I've told you, this is a unicorn. It is a one-of-one. It's just a very unique, dynamic environment. So um, you know, uh that expression of what got you here is not going to get you there. So for me, it's involved a tremendous amount of um innovative thinking and bringing the community and business leaders together to try to brainstorm some thoughts and ideas of how we can um exercise this vision, um, create it and implement it in a way that maybe um others in my shoes across the country um are not doing. And so it's been very successful when you involve the business community, when you involve elected officials and you bring everyone together. And that's really a huge role of the chamber. We're we're not just driving on our own. We we are an association that represents um the businesses. So the businesses are in the best position to be able to guide and direct us in a way that uh that can move us forward in a in a in a good way. And you feel good about your progress so far? Yeah, I feel really good. Um, this concept is a little new to a lot of the people in Northwest Arkansas and a lot of the businesses. Uh we have been blessed with this amazing community that we see. Um, and in other communities, the business community has been much more engaged in building that community. Um, and here we've really been the beneficiaries of corporations and philanthropic giving. Um, and the idea of the business is getting off the sidelines and sitting around the table, being able to talk about the future of the community, both from a professional and a personal standpoint, um, and being able to help fund that initiative is a little bit of a different concept. Um, and then the other piece is uh being able to build and develop a plan that embraces um the large businesses that are here who contribute so much, but doesn't put undue stress or pressure on them to be able to solve all our problems. And that's what happens in smaller communities where you have large stakeholders. Everyone just looks at those stakeholders and said, they're gonna help us, they're gonna save us. Um, and that's that's not really the way progressive communities work. And so getting the community rallied around and partnering with these folks to move our community forward, that's really what's taken two years to do.

SPEAKER_01

Well, you're describing a healthy community. It's what you're describing. You want to you want it to get done here because we have seen where limited support it it's is it's not the proper way to grow healthy, if you will, to build a healthy, strong community. And so that's what it sounds like you're you and your team are doing here.

SPEAKER_00

Absolutely. Yeah. I think uh people uh look at large communities that have grown and they look at the traffic congestion, they look at the urban planning and the sprawl, they look at cost of living, um, all these types of things that um I think um put a little bit of of a blemish on what made the community special and important in the first place, and they want to be able to avoid that. Well, to avoid that, it involves everyone coming around the table and taking uh responsibility and being engaged in this outside of just the day-to-day of their job and and the business that they work for.

SPEAKER_01

Wonderful. Um, you know, we love our name doing business in Bentville. You know, sometimes people think we're the chamber, though. We're like part of the chamber. Absolutely. We're okay with that. I'm okay with that. I mean, we're like okay, though. No, and it I get emails from people wanting to talk to the chamber and I just put push them on, you know. Uh but you know, one of the things though, I know there's so many things you're proud of here in Northwest Arkansas. And then, you know, when I travel, travel within the U.S. or uh outside the U.S., uh people ask me where I'm from, and and number one, they know from I'm from the South with my uh with Southern accent, so that's easy. Number two, when I say Arkansas, now this has changed for me as I've traveled around the country. When I say Arkansas, they say, are you from Benton then? Now that's different.

SPEAKER_00

We really are a global brand, aren't we? We are. So someone coming from the outside. Um, I I will always say Bentonville, even above Northwest Arkansas. I think I think Northwest Arkansas is a really is a brand here. But uh everyone's heard of Bentonville. Most people um has have heard of Walmart. A lot of people have heard about um, you know, our our uh self-proclaimed mountain bike capital of the world tagline, um, and there's familiarity with it. And uh I probably take that for granted, but yeah, um, someone like you, Andrew, you've actually seen that develop to be part of that over the last 30 years.

Trails And Talent Attraction

SPEAKER_01

Right, right. Um, it is amazing, it's wonderful. Now, the our our viewers and listeners, uh we have a global uh list and and I know we have to talk about some of these things because of our global viewers and listeners because they want to know about some of these things I'm gonna ask you about. Okay. Absolutely. So let's just start talking about mountain biking. No, we ain't gonna talk about those things, but we are really known. I I was in a I was in Mallorca, Spain, okay, and I was at a bike shop and I was renting a bike, and they looked and said, Arkansas. I said, Arkansas. And here was what they asked me. They they said, are you from Bentonville? And and and I went, well, you know, and they they said the mountain bike capital world. And and I mean, it it thrilled me, you know, that they had heard about that. So we do have a great mountain biking here. It's phenomenal. And uh for honorabuse, check it out, right?

SPEAKER_00

Absolutely. Come on.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I'll be in fact, I'll be on some of those shows this week. So uh they're I think they're dry down enough now.

SPEAKER_00

Well, I I tell people all the time, even if you're not a mountain biker, yeah, um, get an e-bike and and just ride the trails at a very slow pace. It's pretty um, it can be a little daunting for people, especially from a cardio standpoint or from a technical standpoint. But yeah, it's um there's such joy in being able to be in nature, especially when the proximity is so close. Um I got called yesterday, my wife called and she's like, honey, um, you know, we're make I'm making this meal for someone um who's under the weather. Can you pick up our son? Needs to be picked up. So I'm like, okay. So I'm like, how can I, how can I enjoy? It was 75 yesterday. So I took my car, I parked it in the um Bentonville School's administrative parking lot, um, went inside the Bentonville School's, you know, building, waved to the um to the woman at the front desk, changed into my bicycle kit, and then rode my bike all through the trails and in around this my son's school. And I said, Text me when you're on your way out, because at any point I'm probably five minutes away, depending on that. And I just was struck with how easy and accessible having those trails. Um, and you can run on those trails, you can walk on those trails, you can ride your bike. It's just um there is a um that there's just sort of a life here that um embraces the outdoors and has played a huge role in being able to attract and retain talent to our community. So come on and ride your bike. Right.

SPEAKER_01

That's great. Okay, there's some other significant things in our community that's taken place. And I think that we should share some of these things again for our our viewers that that don't live here, and we want you to come and check them out, sure. But talk about some of the other things, top of mind that's happening in our city that you'd like to share.

SPEAKER_00

Well, um, I think of top of mind is what we just talked about earlier. So um we introduced an economic development strategic plan at the end of last year. Um, and that was really an opportunity to look forward over the next five years and decide um how we want to grow and how we can be very specific and intentional about um growing the community as opposed to sitting back and waiting. And I think that's a real um, again, tipping point to to our community moving forward. And I I call it really taking the reins of um becoming who we were born to be as a community um and not sitting back. So I think I think that's really exciting being able to um to undertake that as a community and for all of us to be around the table and and to be a part of this, um, which I think is really important. Um I'm really excited about um the growth and the development of the supplier and vendor base that's here around Walmart. It is such an untapped part of our local economy. And I just don't feel like um there's enough being done to help those businesses ensure they're successful, get them ingrained into the community. And so that's that's a big part of our partnership of doing business in Bentonville and the Bentonville area chamber, I think is to be much more intentional around that. Um, there's such smart, talented people here. You know this. We go anywhere and you just sit next to somebody who's from Hong Kong in a 60,000-person town who is an expert in cybersecurity. And you know, it's just it's unbelievable. We we really want to be able to axe those, access those individuals, get them part of the community and and and help them with um with the growth of what that looks like moving forward. Um, and then I think the whole health piece, um, if you don't know, um, you know, the um Alice Walton Foundation has been very engaged in promoting and growing whole health and that sector. So mental, physical, emotional health. Um, and uh they've um opened up a new school of medicine, they've opened a whole health institute, um, they're building a new hospital. Um, and listen, anytime you have um a woman of that caliber and a group of that caliber investing in something like this, um, it creates a new vertical for your community. Yes. Uh you just have to uh enjoy it and embrace it. And so I think the whole health journey, I think I'm really excited about what that looks like and how we as a business community can build an economy around that. I also love it because it helps diversify us, right? Any community, you want to be a community where you can be able to be diversified to where you don't have all your eggs in one basket. So I think the whole health piece is important. And it works with us as being sort of an outdoor recreational um arts community that's so much part of the whole health journey. So those are the couple of things that I think get me really excited and and feel so blessed to be here.

SPEAKER_01

Right, absolutely. I think you're right. And and people may have already may have heard about the museum. Uh, we've had it for several years. We don't take it for granted, but again, another centerpiece for us to have uh uh for education, it's amazing. It is. It it's Crystal Bridges is amazing.

SPEAKER_00

Well, everyone um in our world, having a museum and having culture that we almost we call it permission to play, right? If you see any video of any community, you're gonna see uh a skyline of the community, you're gonna see a guy tattooed pouring beer, you're gonna see the chemist with a beaker university system. It's very, very similar. What we have here in this scale of what we have is phenomenal, all part of this small boutique, um non-cookie cutter community. And I think that's what has been so successful. Um, you go to so many other communities, they're amazing and wonderful. They can feel a bit sterile, they can feel um, you know, just your your average big city where this has got this cool, fun, unique vibe. Um, despite being a huge corporate community, the actual feel is really non-corporate. It's very creative, very entrepreneurial, um, supporting local businesses. Um, it's just um I've again I've never seen anything like it.

SPEAKER_01

Right. Okay, um, something uh all else is taking place. You know, I mentioned in uh in at the top of the show, we talked about Walmart's new corporate office now, which is a phenomenal space. Yes. And I worked at the old one for almost 30 years. I will tell you, I'm excited. Uh I've been to the new one several times. What a great space.

Walmart Campus Built For The Community

SPEAKER_00

Unbelievable. It's um which by the way, they're demoing that now. They're they're demoing. Talk about what's coming. Well, that's excited. But I'm I'm I've got this theory. You tell me, Andrew, if this if you're interested in this. Um, I I know the the group that's doing the demo, and I'm like, can you save some small debris? And then I can hand out some debris and be like, Andrew, you gave 30 years. Here's here's some debris in a jar of the old corporate home office. Yeah. I thought I thought it's a good idea, but a lot of people are like, listen, we're just excited about the new home office. We don't want to dwell on the past. I had a whole Berlin Wall moment, but anyway, no. Okay, yeah, okay. Fair enough. Fair enough. Okay. Um, you know what's interesting coming from DFW in that market. So many corporate headquarters that I have been to are walling themselves off. Um they want it to be a secure environment. They want um employees to stay on campus, use the facilities, provide all the needs they have, and you know, one way in and one way out. And Walmart, this home office, had a complete different um side of things. They wanted to embrace the community. Um, they wanted to be um uh a corporate citizen that really embeds um their associates with the residents and visitors of the community. So rather than having walls and fences, you have bike paths running through, you have retail that the community can access. Um and I the community really hadn't recognized this yet because you still go by this and it's like, do you see all this retail that's here for us? And I think people don't, it's they're still so used to like, oh, well, this is the home office campus. I it's not for us. It's like, no, they've designed it for that. And and it just shows you the type of caliber of the company and the leadership that they they're so global, but they they scale all the way down to the one.

SPEAKER_01

They care about the one. Yeah, global and think local. And Sam taught us that. You know, when we were opening stores in a massive uh of 120 stores a year, we would we yeah, we were becoming pretty large at the time, but we but we talk local. And you know, Sam would he when we go into a community, and if you were traveling with Sam or whoever, you you would go in there and it was all about that community. You know, how do we serve the community? The associates are from the community, the customers are from the community.

SPEAKER_00

That same philosophy is in the home office that you home office as you can scrap so well. It's it's it's unbelievable, but the culture of that organization. I've I've really enjoyed getting to know the journey of the and the great news about the old building coming down campus. Yes.

SPEAKER_01

Talk about what's happening there because that's exciting.

SPEAKER_00

It's amazing. Um only in Bentonville, folks, right? Uh they announced um a four-year STEM university um that's going to be built on the old home office. So science, technology, engineering, math. Um you know, this community, uh, you know, and the the the um the families, the corporations, the philanthropic dollars are about making this a place, a destination so that people want to live, work, and play, which which fuels the local businesses that are here and attracts new businesses here. And if you think about some of the um most in-demand occupations there around science, technology, engineering, and math. So this this will be a four-year university. It's uh gonna be about 2,000 students, um, and they'll they'll have a host of things on this campus from retail and multifamily to um actual academic buildings and um all those types of things. So that just brings um a pipeline of um wonderful students when you combine that with the wonderful University of Arkansas, John Brown. So I mean, the list goes on and on. Suddenly, again, it's another feather in our cap to be able to um help attract and retain talent and and allow the companies here to be successful.

SPEAKER_01

It is um I'm so glad you're here. Thanks. I'm glad you're here. Uh well, I I think uh just listening you share your vision and and and where you want to take our community with all of us go going there. I I really like your vision. I really like what you're talking about and about how you're wanting to engage everyone into that, into that vision and then and and and and take us down this path. I I think you've got to, I think you've just really have worked really hard for the last two years, and now in your third year, you as you sort of laying this out and beginning to execute these things.

Visit Bentonville And Get Involved

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, it's it's it's a turning point for sure. I told my family that um that we're we're really starting to step into our own. And listen, it's it's not my vision, you know, it's our vision. Yeah, that's that's the way this has to work. Um is there someone that can come in that has experience, can provide some guidance and directions and lessons learned? Absolutely. But this has to be Andrew's vision, this has to be Eric's vision, and this has to be all of us coming together so that um not only are we true to who we are because you all are involved in it, but you're also um you're you're um you're at the table, you're incentivized, you have buy-in because this is this is your plan too, this is your vision, and we need you as part of the process. So that that um that's the most rewarding piece is getting those folks to the table and and being able to to be a part of the process. Wonderful.

SPEAKER_01

This has been such a great conversation. It's a blast. As we as we wrap, what would you like our viewers, uh, a few things you'd like to leave our viewers with?

SPEAKER_00

Well, um, I think for those that uh have not been to Bentonville, I'd love to have the viewers uh uh look us up and and come visit us. Um it's it's a fascinating place. It's a great place to come and to um to learn, to grow, um, to build a business. Um I certainly think that's a big piece is being able to to attract people to the area. Um and I think it's important to know that you know, we don't have it figured out. You know, I mean I think people in my position want to be, you know, just we've we're perfect and there's nothing wrong. That's not true. Um, but I think we're a community that's open about it and trying to figure out how to be the best version of ourselves. Um, and I think that's um that's something that that I'm really proud of. So um I think those would be the main two points um that uh you don't understand it until you're here. You just don't understand it. It's just you can't, I don't, you know, you can try to recruit somebody all you want or talk to them on through a podcast, but the moment they step foot, they're like, okay, I get it. I get it. And that's um for us, that's probably the biggest um hurdle that we encounter is okay, we we gotta get somebody here because it's not unlike anything we've seen.

SPEAKER_01

So so if people want to check us out, what's their website?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, so Bentonvillearea.com. You come and check us out. Okay. Um we've got an amazing um convention and visitors bureau called Visit Bentonville, and we're right next to them. And they can come on that website and um uh check it out and see the attractions and things to do around here. Um, but give us a call, come visit our office, send us uh at email at info at bentonvillearea.com and we'll help answer questions, promote the area, um, help your business, whatever we need to do.

SPEAKER_01

Good, good. And and you know, we said at the top of the show that doing business in Bentonville, we're we're committed, we're with you. Uh, we we're gonna we we love doing this journey together and the things that we're gonna get to work on in the future. And I think we need to come back at some point and talk about uh some of the things that we're gonna be working on and and and our progress uh on the things we're working on together.

SPEAKER_00

I I absolutely agree. And let's do that. You all are an example of an organization that is taking ownership of this community, of our local economy, and and want to play a role in keeping what's special about this place special um and not losing that edge. And you're jumping in with that. And and uh we couldn't be more pleased to be partnering with you on that effort.

SPEAKER_01

Well, thank you. I want to give a shout out to before we before we end this. Do it. Sarah uh works with with you and your team. She's been fantastic making this happen. She's amazing. She has we're here because of Sarah. Yeah, okay, together. And and and and and uh I will tell you, she's doing a great job. She's committed. Uh, and we I just want to give her a shout out and tell her how much we appreciate her and all of her hard work to make this happen today for us. And um, and I I know that uh maybe we'll get her on here one of these days.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, she's much more engaging. Uh she she so uh Sarah Beth Henderson, and uh she's now our vice president for obvious reasons at the chamber. Um and it's just indicative of what we have. We have really talented, amazing folks who love community, and uh um you're one of them, and Sarah Beth's one of them. So Brendan, what a pleasure.

SPEAKER_01

Absolutely. Thanks. Thanks. It's been so great. Me too. I've enjoyed it. We'll do it again to all of our viewers. Say that I want to say thank you very much because of you. Uh you have you have moved us now to over 100 countries we're reviewed in. We're viewed over 2,000 times a day. So thank you. Continue to share us. And you you can check us out on all of our social media platforms, you know, from Apple to Spotify to LinkedIn and everything in between. So check us out, share it. Continue to send me your those comments on LinkedIn. I answer those. We're I really uh again, I appreciate uh all of your engagement. Thank you. Thank you again. Have a wonderful day, everyone. Goodbye.