#REDALERT: THE CURRENT STATE OF THE EVENTS INDUSTRY

Hello, this is Les Goldberg, and welcome to The Road Ahead. The Road Ahead podcast is dedicated to the future of the live events business, bringing together industry experts. Hello, production world, this is Les Goldberg and The Road Ahead. Today I have three amazing guests. I have Michael Strickland, who is the chairman and founder of Bandit Lites. I have Brad Nelms, who's the director of We Make Events North America, and I have Ellen Lampert, and she is the creative director for Live Design. Hello, everyone, and welcome to the show. Oh, thanks for having us. Hi, Les. Well, today our show is dedicated to Red Alert. And I want to know if you could just give us an explanation of what Red Alert is. So I'm going to throw this to Brad and Brad. Could you explain as you're the director for We Make Events. What is Red Alert? Sure. So Red Alert is an event that is taking place on September 1st. That is a movement all across the US, and some solidarity participation from Canada and Trinidad, Tobago and Peru and other places as well. That is a a push for awareness for our industry. And it is a a massive undertaking that we are very much hoping we'll get the appropriate attention that it needs by congressional leadership in order to move specific bills and legislation through Congress in the coming days and weeks. So we're pushing really hard, and we're going to do that by lighting up as many structures as we can across the country. So we have 50 regional directors in cities all over the US that are running local teams, plus many participants outside of those cities that are going to have a ton of stuff lit up, very iconic buildings. We're going to make a lot of noise, and we're going to have some local events and things and get a lot of press attention. And we're also doing a Facebook Live stream throughout the event that we can talk about in more detail. But it's a it's a PR move to draw attention to our plight and to give us a bunch of content and ammunition to go take that to Congress to push them to act. That sounds very interesting. And I'm excited that we're participating in #RedAlert, as we're all responsible for our industry. So, Ellen, what do you think is the real good outcome for the Red Alert from that experience that happens on September 1st? What would be the best case scenario as the outcome for that? Well, I'm going to turn this over to Michael Strickland in a minute. But the best case out outcome would be that Congress votes for the RESTART Act, or takes language that Michael will explain from that act and puts it into legislation that will offer help to businesses in our industry, and that the unemployment benefits through Extend PUA will help individuals. And I think Michael can expand a little bit more on that as he has been our man on the Hill. Michael, maybe you could give us some color as to maybe what would be the goal of accomplishing with Red Alert and maybe the outcome which would be desired. Thank you. Les. And thank you, Ellen, for the lead up there. It's gotten fairly narrow and fairly specific at this point. This journey began obviously back in March when the entire industry shut down. And we've I've been engaged and involved on the Hill because of my direct friendship with Lamar Alexander and Marsha Blackburn, who are our two senators from Tennessee. It's expanded to other senators and other Congress people, and I've now got a universe of about 20 legislative leaders that I speak to on a regular basis, as well as their staff. Here's where we've ended up with it. Currently on the table are the Heroes act that the House put forth a while back, the Heals act that the Senate has put forth, restart, which has been dropped and is officially in the basket and has been read on the floor. And then what you now call the skinny bill, which which has been circulated, created and circulated. But but nothing's been done legislatively with what's called the skinny bill. Those are the things that are on the table at the moment. Congress is out, but right now they are working behind the scenes. Nancy Pelosi and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows spent 25 minutes on the phone together yesterday. They're going to work more today. They're going to work next week. And then the following week, the Senate will come forward with a bill. And we are being told, I'm being told that there's going to be a large part of the RESTART language in there. Currently, the what is called the skinny bill, which again has not been floated, but I'm fortunate to have a copy, which I've circulated. It currently just has another ten weeks of PGP written into it. But we put a lot of political pressure on our leaders to take that out and put in elements of Restart. In a nutshell, what's the goal? That's the goal is to get restart inserted into this bill first, and secondly, to get to get the broader bill passed. And what RESTART does for our industry and for all small business in a holistic senses. It allows you to claim 45% of your 2019 earnings as long as you've lost 50% or more of your revenue this year. And once you get that 45%, some portion of it can and will be forgiven based on payroll and payroll related expenses, as well as internet and telephone and interest, own notes and a few other things. And then the balance of it will convert currently into a seven year, 2% loan. And that's being worked on. It may be expanded. So that's where we are. We're trying in the next two weeks between now and the middle of September, to make sure our legislators do insert it. The good news is that it's not just us, it's for small business. This bill is not aimed at entertainment or live events. It's aimed at any small business that is down 50% or more. So that is our real goal. The unique thing about live entertainment, which is what I speak to daily, is the fact that live entertainment, live events as a whole, unlike any other business in America, has been at zero since March 13th and will be at zero until February of next year. So getting that message across to our congressional leaders is very, very important. And that's the play here with with Red Alert is to have this nationwide, very visible event occur. We know that they know. But but we want to to make this statement on September 1st. Wow. You know, there is so much in what you just described. The you know, the fact that it's an election year and we've got to have the the politics of both sides have to agree to get some bill passed. And, you know, a lot of people's livelihood is at stake. Brad, maybe can you reflect on the industry as a whole, kind of like, you know, where, you know, Michael kind of touched on that. You know, it's been kind of quiet or very dormant since in March for live entertainment, maybe you can share your own thoughts or experiences about, you know, where we were and where we're at now. Yeah, that's you know, it's a really powerful thing, I think, and something that I've been fortunate enough to see and hear in the position that I'm in with this event specifically, is a lot of really personal stories from people. We have an email address that comes from our website for people that want to volunteer, and we have people constantly pouring in, but a lot of them include their story of, you know, why this is so important to them and why they're hurting, and it's across the board. But it is very much the case right now that the people in the industry, our backs are up against the wall and the numbers of the people that it affect and and that have lost their jobs or any income whatsoever, they're pretty astounding. They're really, really big numbers that are well outside of what anybody would expect. And I think the individual stories of each of those people is something that's really powerful and that we need to make sure that we're communicating. You know, the industry stopped basically. I believe the date was March 13th, but, you know, mid-March, it just shut down, as we all know. And the biggest challenges that we have now for getting back are things that are so outside of our control and so outside of what is good for the industry in the country to be able to get back sooner than we should, that we have to be patient, and we have to ride this out in the way that we can, but we need some help to do that. You know, I was at the Venetian Hotel doing a show. I had three shows in Las Vegas the last week of, of February, first week of March. And when I saw how empty it was, it was just the precursor to, you know, the dominoes falling. And I think it affected everyone, whether it was a corporate show, whether it was an exhibition show or whether it's a musical touring, you know, typically bands tours over the summer. It's such the high point of the season and the impact on so many companies and so many people's lives. I mean, there's a lot of touring engineers that they work, you know, so many weeks a year and they're on the road. And effectively all those shows just didn't happen. So, Ellen, I would like you to take me a little bit of the future and say, how do you think the world will look six months from now? Well, it's an interesting question lesson. I hope we're all hoping that there will be a way for testing for vaccines, for the the COVID-19 to be, you know, sort of calmed down a little bit so that events, live events can come back, whether they'll ever come back within the next year to 10,000 people, festivals and things like that. It's hard to tell right now, but definitely we're hoping that within the next six months, theaters will begin to be open festivals, concerts, and that the industry will be able to get back on its feet because it's a huge domino effect. It's not simply the people who make the events. It's not just the performers. It's a huge, you know, group of people all the way down to the manufacturers or up to the manufacturers, the rental houses. Michael can address that as well. Brad, you know who has been unemployed throughout all this? It's been tough for a lot of people, and we're just hoping that it gets better. Well, I completely, completely I'm on board with it getting better. Michael, when do you think the concert music business will actually start to deploy? And, you know, obviously there's economics to doing shows and the cost of production is relative to the audience size and, and what a band can afford to put together. When do you see the future? Do you see bands happening? What time of next year? Do you see this happening in 2021? That's a great question, Lars. And you've wondered squarely into the world of opinion for all of us. In my role on the medical, on the board at the UBT Medical Center, I take three calls a day dealing with the medical situation. So I'm probably is up to date on that as anybody. There are three vaccines being dropped in October the Moderna, the Pfizer and the AstraZeneca. They've all got greater than 97% efficacy in the stage two trials. They're finishing stage three this week and next. They'll go under peer review next month and then be dropped in October. There's also a number of of treatments that are being dropped in October. And I emailed out yesterday. There's the five minute, $5 test that just came out, which will be a real game changer. But having said all that, that's the medical condition. So let's assume the best possible case, which is these things do come to fruition and they do work. And let's make the broad assumption we move into January with the medical hurdle jumped. There's the political hurdle and there's the social hurdle, the political hurdle being the one of sort of the political of of the COVID virus. There are people that that want to use it. There are people that politically want the country shut down for a long, long time, and there are people that politically want the company open today, and there are people all in between. But let's let's assume that we even jump the political hurdle by early January. The last piece and the one that's going to be toughest to figure out what I call the social piece, because I think we all know people that even if you jump to those two hurdles, will they be willing to go sit in an arena? Will they have the desire to go see a concert or a live event of any nature? And right now, the estimation is that about 20% of the public in America won't have that desire until June or July of next year. So what do I think? Jumping squarely into opinion, I think we're going to see February. March, as you said, I think it was you last. Yeah. Theaters and smaller events will begin to happen. But I think that you're bigger, more robust events, which will really trigger the income that the industry needs may not come about until April, May or June. And what I just described as the best case scenario, making two big assumptions. One is the medical situations cleared, and two is that the political situation has cleared. You know, it's interesting to do a big tour. It usually takes so many months of planning and organizing and getting venues. Now, while we know venues are probably available, you know, the markets have to be open. So city government or county government, they have to support doing events. That's the political piece. Yes. And so it's interesting to do a large arena sized concert or a stadium concert. It just takes a lot of planning and with unknowns. I don't necessarily know if people go down that journey and plan for such a large show. But, you know, it's also interesting that, you know, the economics of what it cost and how many people will show up. I think a younger generation might be more apt to go visit a concert tour and have a higher risk tolerance versus an older generation. And I think that that that is just something that comes with this, and not everybody's going to feel good about taking that vaccine. There's going to be a subset of people that are going to be either anti-vaccine, or they're going to be suspect because it's such a new thing, and they're going to want to wait a month or two. And, you know, well, will we have QR codes on our phones that we go to a place you have to show that you have been vaccinated or something, something to that effect. But it's very interesting. So back to Brad. Brad, if you were listening to this podcast and you want to support our industry, what can you do? Where can you go? Whether it's donating your time or your money or your ideas or effort? Thanks less. That is perhaps the most important out of any of this stuff today. So glad we're touching on this. So the first resource that we have for anybody, if you want more information is Facebook. So you can go like our Facebook page which is We Make Events North America. We're putting out a ton of content on that. Every day. We have some really cool celebrity spot videos that have been recorded that we're releasing regularly. So that's a really good source for just cool content and information and to see a little bit about what's happening. The second source is our website, which is We Make Events and that is got a lot of information about the happenings. It's got downloads with our call to action documents and a press kit. It's got lots of photos and the celebrity videos. Most importantly though, that has a one click link where you can go and write your congressional leadership by just putting in your name and your address and your email, and it will send an email to those people. You can customize it if you want to, or it's got a canned message that has a very specific ask that Michael and the people that he's working with have crafted to be the most effective and pointed to what we're working towards. So do that. Do it multiple times. Do it. You know, once a day we're going to change that letter as we get closer and as the goal moves around and the target changes, we're going to shift the language. So, you know, go do that over and over again. The more that we can get the message out and to Congress, the better. What I've said to a lot of people is making noise is great, but noise without a target and ask and a goal is just noise. So that's what we're looking at here is congressional action. So please write your representative, call them, do something to to get that word out. And then the last thing to participate in the event. If you're not in the industry, in industry, people can sign up on the website. And they can they can come partake and help set up lights or whatever. You're not in the industry day of take photos, take videos of what's going on, share those on social media, and then use our hashtags. So we have three primary hashtags. The first one is #WeMakeEvents. The second one is #RedAlertRESTART and the third one is #ExtendPUA. So use those hashtags. There's also some things circulating around with #SaveOurStages. You use that one as well, but the top three are the most important. Use those hashtags, get them out, get the content, and we're going to be releasing some more stuff that's related to viral campaigns and things as we go. So keep an eye on what social media is doing. So. So this sounds like a really a grassroots movement. It's the people from the industry are coming together to try to make some change and, and make a big splash with our Congress and our representatives. So they really hear our plight. And that's kind of the feeling I get. And, you know, it sounds like, Michael, your connections and the efforts you've made have really kind of gotten across the line. So we're in the discussion. And, you know, I think that's an interesting thing. So I want to throw this question to Ellen. Ellen, what do you think is the long term outlook for the live events business as far as that including entertainment? What do you think, Ellen. That is a $64,000 question. But I think that a lot of things have shifted over the past six months. There's a lot of virtual entertainment that's coming down the road. I don't think it will ever replace live events. I think we all want to go back to concerts. We all want to go back to theater. We all want to see Broadway up and running so that New York City is thriving again. But I do think there's going to be a virtual component to a lot of things that we do do. A lot of people have built virtual stages, which are really interesting new technologies, and I think that that's going to be part of the long term picture, especially as people are tending to move out of big cities and move further out of town, staying online and being able to see a lot of things when they can't go to a live concert, I think is an interesting new paradigm for all of us. Michael, what are your thoughts on that? The the the the long term outlook for the entertainment live event business long term, it's a phenomenally positive outlook. It's just, you know, when do we start? Which is the question I get every day. There's a huge pin up demand right now for live entertainment. It will never go away. The artists are all dying to go. The limiting factor is going to be venues. What we're going to see in the future when we do get cranked up is look at your city or town, and old venues that haven't had a show in a while will be booked. I talked to the people at Live Nation and AG regularly, and they're sort of mouth balling the places you used to play that you're going to be playing in the future, because there is a huge pent up demand, it will far outstrip the supply of people and resources to have these events. And that goes from trade shows to rock concerts to political conventions and everything in between. And I'd like to point out, going back sort of to the previous question and what, Brad, you said about the grassroots, what we're doing is entirely grassroots there. I have an email chain that touches 1.2 million people. It's completely grassroots. And what happens is we send out information and then individually in different locales, not just for Red Alert RESTART, but for a lot of initiatives. The people on the ground start doing things and start acting, and we have looped together a whole bunch of great organizations, like a Live Events Coalition and Save Our Stages and NATO and Niva and the fair people and the pyro people and the catering people and the Screen Actors Guild and the Directors Guild and the Producers Guild, and it's the laser people. It's all forms of live entertainment are folks that I chat with regularly, live events and, and all of these efforts matter because whether it's a touch that comes through Red alert restart or whether it's a touch that comes through one of these other phenomenally great websites and organizations and groups that have been stood up. It is the collective weight of all of the touches to our congresspeople and our senators that have have made us known. And let me close by saying that that sort of two weeks into doing this through our good friends at Nam, because we've wrapped up under Nam and they are our lobbyists, thank them very much. But through the good folks at Nam and then all of the phenomenal media platforms within live event and Ellen's part of that, the media people have all come together and supported this through all of this phenomenal outreach and touch. Sort of two weeks into this concerted effort, my political friends started calling me and saying, stop, stop. Tell your people to stop because we actually distributed the cell phone information of the Chief of staff and the legislative directors to all 100 senators, and we've been emailing those folks on that, and they're getting hundreds of thousands of entertainment reach outs. So, yes, they've gotten our message. But the big point is we can't stop. You know, ultimately, we're all in a business that we love. Because if you didn't love it, you wouldn't do it right. And, you know, this is my 37th year as a business owner, and it's kind of in our blood, so to speak. It's kind of, you know, and I went out with my wife about two weeks ago to a restaurant on a weekend, and they had live entertainment. And I said I didn't mind whatever the genre was. I was so happy to be experiencing live entertainment. I told her, can we go back to that restaurant tomorrow? Because people are starving for live entertainment? And and I think, Michael, you were describing was this rocketship of demand. And our industry has been so impacted with so many employees, you know, where people have been, you know, let go out of companies that that when we try to ramp back up, there's going to be a mad dash to who can get ready to deploy as quickly as possible. So I want to ask my last question, and I'm going to throw this to Ellen first. And everyone can answer this. Ellen, what do you love about our industry and what is something that jazz's you about the entertainment technology, the the music live event industry and something that is is the reason you're doing what you do? Well, let's start with the people. I've been in this business for probably 50 years and the people are just incredible. No matter what you do and the sense of collaboration, of working with people to produce something in the theater, you start with a script in an empty room, and you get the actors in the director and the designers, and you just come together and you've created something extraordinary. Same on a on a tour. If you've ever gone to, you know, someplace like Rock Lititz and watched a band come together with the sets and the it's just incredible. And as I mentioned before, all these new technologies that are coming out every year, it's different and it's very, very exciting. And it's interesting watching the rock and roll industry and how that stuff filters down to theater and the the R&D on behalf of the big companies. And, you know, like Bandit Lites and all those companies that support everything from the ground up or from the sky down, however, that trust is hung, and it's just a very, very organic way of doing things. That's very, very exciting. It's not kept into an office and it's it's really just very exciting. I will ask the same question to Brad. I'm going to mimic a little bit of what Ellen said. It's, you know, the creative energy and the people are a huge aspect of it. And I think an example of that is shown in what we've done with this event. You know, I didn't mention when you asked me about the details. This whole thing started on Tuesday, August 11th when the UK did their We Make Events thing on a Zoom call the next day with a bunch of lighting people. Mostly we kind of all said, why don't we do that and then buy two days later that Friday, we had a small committee together that was kind of kicking this off. That was 14 days ago. That's pretty quick. This whole thing started in 14 days and we now have over 50 cities. And I'm guessing that we have north of 5000 volunteers that are involved with this thing. So it's grown amazingly, and everybody that's involved is excited, and they're super empowered, and they're passionate about it because they've been doing nothing. So they want something to be able to hold on to and to be able to get back to what they love doing. So I think this is a great example of showing the unique nature of everyone in this business, and how much we just love doing what we do. Michael, your thoughts on our industry and why you love this industry? You've been doing it a little while, I think 52 years last. Thank you again. I think Ellen scooped both Brad and I one answer to the people. I got into it because of people. And you know, you come into this world alone and you leave this world alone. But the only thing that's permanent is the relationships that you have. And while I felt blessed and had a phenomenal number of relationships prior to this happening, because of the role I have taken on now, I knew Brad before, I knew Ellen before, but we're really good friends now because we talk every day. Bless you. And I never met until before this podcast. Guess what? We're friends now. You know what? And I rented lots of stuff from you. You know, we tend to sit in our silos, don't we? And do what we do. But I've now picked up thousands of new friends. So it's people. And people make the business. There is no LMG without the people. There is no Quest Communications. Without the people you know, there is no RESTART Red Alert. Without the people, there is no Bandit Lites without the people. And what we're doing at this moment, and what we're continue to do for the next six months, is all about the people now. Is it about the companies? Absolutely. You got to have a company to go work with. But, you know, we're at halftime. We're coming out of the locker room. We've got as far to go as we have come. And our biggest, our biggest opportunity as an industry will be the mental health of the gals and the guys in this industry, because we're facing a moment where we're going to continue basically to not do what it is that we love to do for 5 or 6 more months, and we're going to have to help each other, prop each other up and provide for one another mentally, physically and spiritually to get through this desert so that we come out the other side in great shape. Do you know, a friend of mine said to me at the gym, he said, when you're going through hell, keep going. I think it was a Winston Churchill quote, and I think it's appropriate for our industry. But I do see that there's going to be a light at the end of this tunnel at some point, and we are going to go back to doing live shows with audiences and cheer and spectacle and and art in the form of music and visuals and, and big lit stages. And I think it's the you don't realize how much you miss what we do every day. Until we can't, we don't get to do it. And ultimately, I think we're all in this withdrawal phase and it's like, no, no, no, we want to get back to what we do and what we love to do. And I appreciate all three of you joining me today. I want to thank you, Michael, Brad and Ellen. You all are all contributing to an enormously important cause and the livelihood of so many people. And I look forward to seeing you all in person and doing gigs and applause for some great rock band that we're all enjoying. And you know, the future hopefully will get brighter. And all the efforts you're doing with Congress and everyone can play a part based on contributing their time and energy or lighting up their buildings, like with what information Brad provided. So I look forward to a fun September 1st. And this is Les Goldberg and The Road Ahead. Thank you for joining. Thank you Les. Thank you so much, Les.