Episode 19 | LIVE from the SEDC Annual Conference in Williamsburg | Scott Poag, Carrie Cole, & Lacey Bachus

Hello SCDC members and welcome to the 2023 annual SCDC conference held here in beautiful Williamsburg, Virginia. Hi, I'm Ray Methven with Insightful and the truth is while Matt Matthew weren't looking, I hijacked the podcast again. So you have the next few days with me and with a lineup of guests I'm really excited about. We'll have conversations with community leaders, state leaders, really good vendors we love. So stay tuned and join us. Good questions coming up. And folks were joined by Scott Pogue. He's the current chairman of SCDC. Scott, thank you so much for taking a moment to join us. Absolutely, thank you for having me and thank you for being here with us in Williamsburg. I've got to say, congratulations on running such a great conference. Williamsburg has been wonderful. This has been a really relaxed but informative conference. I love it. We always love being here with SCDC. Congratulations and kudos to you. Thank you, I appreciate it. This is one of the largest events that the Southern Economic Development Council has ever done in the over 75 years that we've been in existence. I think the last I checked earlier today, we had about 465 people officially registered for the conference. Wow. Well, Scott, it's no secret, but I would love to hear your thoughts on, you find yourself as the current chairman in a really transformative time for SCDC on a number of fronts. Talk about them and what has that felt like? Sure, so I'm actually the youngest chairman ever in the history of SCDC. And so the YP program brought me into the organization and that's really where I found my love for it and worked my way through the board as an alternate director for the state of Georgia and then decided to take that jump and make that commitment to get on the officer track. So I was in that leadership role. I believe I was the secretary of treasure in 2020 during COVID. And as you can imagine, like most businesses and organizations, it was especially trying for us during that time being a membership organization and most of our revenue coming from in-person events. And so coming out of that, we also had to go through the retirement of Gene Stinson, who was our long-term president and all the great contributions he made to the organization. And so last year we were able to hire Matt Ticket who's done a fantastic job for us. And so really the timing was well, with my new leadership role coming in, Matt coming in at the same time, we shared a similar vision for the organization and what it could be and what that next evolution looked like. And you're starting to really see a lot of the fruits of those labors come out. I think you can feel, for us, you feel a real energy all around the conference. And I think we have a lot to say, thank you to you and thank you to Matt and Matthew, just for the energy that you've injected into this. It's been wonderful to see. We've been here at this conference at the SCD conferences for five or six years now. So this is exciting to see the growth that's coming now. Let's look forward 12, 24 months. What does the coming year or two years look like? Sure, so that's something that I'm very excited about. When you look at the chairman that come after me, we all have a shared vision and have that continued energy that needs to be necessary to take SCDC to the next level. So I'm very excited about that continuity of leadership. You know, with a lot of the new initiatives, I think the one that I'm probably most excited about is this new FDI committee that we've started. Sure. I think there's a tremendous opportunity for SCDC to fill a gap between the federal government and then the individuality of the states and really filling a void to help with the federal direct investment or foreign direct investment initiatives for the United States and really be a major player in that arena. And you're actually going to make this an international footprint, correct? Correct, yeah. So many states, they have international delegations and boots on the ground in the different countries that typically invest in the United States. But we have great partners that we've attended the Hanover Messe in Germany for several years. We're having talks about doing some shows in Korea next year, but really bringing together the brain trust of people in SCDC that are players in that game already. And how can we leverage that and put that experience together? We've broken that committee up into three subcommittees, one of which will be a continuing education to educate members on how to do foreign direct investment. The other will be more of a domestic relations focus with creating relationships with the US Department of Commerce and the consulates and all of those kind of international players that are located inside the borders of the US. And then there'll be a third bucket that will focus more on the international footprint and going to the trade shows and actually trying to make contact with those companies looking to do business in the US and then figuring out how we can help facilitate those introductions among our members and our member states. Okay, we're talking with Scott Pogue, our current chairman of the SCDC, Scott, for the folks who are listening and aren't here with us today, what is coming up, tell them about 2024 and about the annual conference in 2024. And let's get some of these listeners here. Yeah, absolutely. So as I said, here in Williamsburg, this is the largest event that we've ever had. And so my successor, Brian Gwynne, I will be chairman next year and he'll be hosting his annual conference in Savannah, Georgia, which is my home state. And so he just couldn't get enough of me. He wanted to come hang out with me some more, I guess. But I think probably the most negative feedback will probably get at this conference is that we had too many good sessions that people couldn't decide which one to go to. Back to back. Exactly, and so I think we're going to continue to see the caliber of our speakers is probably some of the best content that I've seen at a conference in a long time. And I think we'll continue to see that theme at SCDC events. I agree, I agree. Well, Scott, thank you so much for joining me. Thank you for talking to our listeners who can't be here. I'd like to close with a handful of questions for you. Let's play favorites today. Here we go. Scott, what is your favorite holiday? My favorite holiday is Christmas. OK. Yeah. What's your favorite dessert? My favorite ice cream. A particular flavor or just ice cream? I mean, I'm never going to say no to ice cream, but if I had to be nailed down to one, it'd be a Reese's Blizzard from Dairy Queen. No, OK. What's your favorite movie? Top Gun, Hands Down. Original or new? I mean, original for sure. Got it, got it. What's your favorite karaoke song? Oh, so kind of on that top gun thing, you've lost that love and feeling. Got it? Now, final question. What is the worst haircut you've ever had? Oh, man. Someone must have teed you up for this. So when I was in high school, I had a shaved head, wasn't super short, but I mean, it was a buzz cut. And I went to my mom one night after I'd cut my hair and said, hey, can you trim the back of my neck? And so I handed her the clippers with no guard on it. And she proceeded to give me a racing stripe to the scalp on the side of my head. And so as a senior in high school, that was a very traumatic experience for me. We have been talking to Scott Pogies, our current chairman here at SEDC Scott. Thank you for sharing some time with us. Absolutely. We've got a busy few days ahead of you. We really appreciate the time. Well, thank you all for being here. Yeah, take care. Thank you. Bye. Hi, folks, and we're here with Carrie Cole. Head of sales with Lightcast. Carrie, thank you for joining us. Thanks so much, Ray. Thanks for having me. And for the folks who don't know Carrie and I, go back a long way. We've known each other. Most of you are going to know Carrie as gazelle. And that is still Carrie's sweet spot. But Carrie, talk to us a little bit about the changes that have gone on professionally with gazelle and what that looks like now. Thanks so much, Ray. Absolutely. So yes, gazelle biggest news this year is we're now under the Lightcast family of products, which is very exciting for both Lightcast subscribers and also gazelle. As you guys know, gazelle's here for business attraction efforts with economic development organizations. We're working with plenty of some of the top tier economic development organizations in their business attraction strategies and business attraction kind of engagement efforts. If you guys know gazelle's here to help you find your targeted kind of ideal company profiles through targeted industries, targeted locations, trade shows, what we do uniquely is we're using AI to prognosticate growth of those companies. So we can help you find companies, let's say associated with drones or unmanned systems industries. But we're going to look to see which types of signals these companies are expanding or exhibiting, excuse me, to kind of show future addition of jobs either their current location or establishing a new facility within the next 12 to 18 months. Being under the Lightcast family of products is really exciting for us because we're going to see more labor analytics coming into our AI. A lot of our current clients already using Lightcast products to help with bringing labor market analytics to the companies that they're trying to recruit, to showcase the workforce that they have available within their jurisdiction, keeping up with the skills trends, making sure that their workforce is prepared for the types of jobs that economic development is looking to bring within their jurisdiction. So again, I kind of think of us as becoming that full data-driven approach to economic development recruitment, engagement, business retention, and expansion, so it's really, really exciting and it's been great to be under the new team. We're talking with Kerry Cole, Director of Sales at Lightcast. Kerry, what's on the horizon for the next 24 or 36 months? What's that look like from your point of view? Yeah, well, because else specifically, we're really going to start using more Lightcast data within our AI. So we've actually been using Lightcast or MZ data since we started Gazelle. So when we look at value chain analysis within our product, that's always been pulled from Lightcast. When we look at the labor or the industry performance that weighs into our AI, we've also been using Lightcast. But now, since we're under the same umbrella, the same family, we can kind of share some of the algorithms from Gazelle and what typically Lightcasts use in their data sets as well. Additionally, I can't go without saying that we're adding quite a lot of new features within Gazelle. We're actually kind of revamping the platform as a whole. We're calling it Gazelle 2.0. So you're going to see things like a location score. You're going to be able to look at a growth kind of story of companies. You can look at the historical trends of a company as well. To again, just yield better decisions for company research. Well, Cara, you hear an SEDC conference with me. What's been your favorite takeaway so far from the conference? Honestly, the southeast, the south in general. You guys know I'm in Alabama. I do love all things southern. And so it's so great to see the success at the south, especially the southeast. I guess the entire south of the US has seen. It was said earlier in the kickoff speech this morning. The south is something to be proud of. And I do think we have some of the strongest economic development organizations here within the south. So it's great to see kind of the pad on the back. Everybody can give to each other for everyone's success. Cool. Yes. Folks, we've been talking to Carrie Cole with Lightcast. She's the director of sales. All right, Carrie, you ready for some quick fire? Question. Oh, OK. We're going to play favorites today. OK. What's your favorite holiday? Oh, man. Well, Christmas is kind of lowest hanging fruit for me, but it's been Halloween's up there, only for my daughter. All right. OK. Tell them now, how old is your daughter? My daughter is going to be 10 next month. I've officially been a mom a decade. Cool. I know I don't look like it, but. No, you don't. All right. All right, young Carrie Cole, what is your favorite dessert? Ooh. I'm a chocolate chess pie girl. Ooh. Yeah. Keep it Southern. Yeah. What's your favorite movie? Ooh. Shawshank Redemption. Classic. I know this about you. What's your favorite karaoke song? Oh, my gosh. Karaoke. Now I feel like I'm going to have a wrong answer. There is no wrong answer. OK. Ain't no mountain high enough. Cool. What was yours? What did you think it was? We'll go with that. Ha, ha, ha. It might have been a journey song. Oh, man. No, my daughter's been singing that a ton, so it's top of mind. That, my heart will go on. So I'll spare you guys the ballad. My final question. What is the worst haircut you've ever had? Oh, let me tell you guys. When I was about five years old, my brother cut my hair off. So I've had a buzz cut. I've had a bull cut. I've had the Amish cut. So you name it. Those are all up there with me. That's why I've had the same haircut for the past 15 years. Folks, we've been talking to Carrie Cole of Lightcast. She's the director of sales. Carrie, thank you for joining. It's so good to see you. Thanks so much, Ray. I had a blast. Thank you. Yep, we did too. Bye. Bye. And we're lucky to be joined by Lacey Backus with Retail Strategies. Lacey is the Senior Director of Community Partnerships for Retail Strategies. Lacey, welcome to the podcast. Thank you. Good afternoon, right? This is exciting. And folks, Lacey and I in Retail Strategies go back away. So I'm excited to have a chance to talk to you. First, for our listeners, tell us about Retail Strategies. Retail Strategies. We are a real estate company that partners with communities to do economic community development through Retail Restaurant, Hotel Hospitality Recruitment. OK, which brings up my next question. Why is Retail Strategies at an Economic Development Contest? Yes, so most of the people here are focused on industrial, manufacturing, technology, life sciences, recruitment into their communities. And those are great. And those are needed, and that's what their focus should be. But then oftentimes, a mayor or someone in the community says, well, that's great. We got that plan and that factory. And you brought 300 jobs. But I want Starbucks, or I want to play, or I want a grocery store. And then that's not what the other 90% of this audience focuses on. And so we'll want them to know about Retail Strategies. So when the mayor asks them where they're County Manager, or even just them as a resident in their own community wants more quality of life options, that they know that Retail Strategies does partner with communities to bring things like grocery stores, restaurants, hospitality, entertainment, and also things like medical franchise, which is something that's growing very rapidly, especially in rural markets that don't have a lot of health care facilities. But urgent care centers, walk-up clinics, family care, eye care, dental care, all those are growing very rapidly by a franchise model across the rural areas. And that's what we help place in the communities too. Oh wow, that's great. So it's really a quality of life issue as well. Yes, I mean, obviously in a lot of states, it is sales tax. We are based in Birmingham, Alabama. Alabama is a heavy sales tax state. So a lot of these states, any kind of retail or restaurant is going to bring in a lot for their municipal budgets. But on the flip side of that, it is a huge quality of life to have amenities and options and things that you want to shop and eat. But then also going back to health care, it's having things just basic necessities that you don't often consider retail, but you see how it all plays in together. Well, retail, quality of life, sales tax revenue, those are all topics that are going to resonate with our SCDC listeners and every SCDC member who's here today. You are a very retail strategies, is a very innovation leader in the industry. I know you have some things cooking. So what's on the front burner? What's the next 12 months going to look like? Yeah, so we've been doing, like, retail, you know, restaurant, hospitality, recruitment for almost 15 years now. About five years ago, we started hearing from all the communities that we worked in. Like, thank you for getting us that grocery store or thank you for helping us develop our interstate exits with more restaurants. But what about our downtown and our main streets? And those retail and restaurant businesses, and that real estate that's sitting vacant. So in 2019, 2020, it's a hard time. But right before that, we launched our downtown strategies program, which is where we look at the downtown real estate in a city or a town, and then help uncover opportunities that they can do from a policy or administration perspective to nudge property owners within a downtown. Because that's the biggest hurdle to revitalize a downtown is there's, you know, these communities don't want these buildings to be sitting in this repair, but they don't know that they can be proactive and do things to incentivize or penalize property owners. So we started downtown strategies, 2019, 2020. And then when the pandemic hit, we were, you know, hearing from all the communities that we're working with, what can you help us with now? You know, businesses are shutting down, restaurants are shutting down. And at that time, we were looking at doing small business support services, where we help communities directly support their local restaurant owners and their local store owners. And so using what we know about real estate, like how can we help a business owner have a better relationship with their landlord? How can we help the landlord be a better, have a better contractor or, you know, lease terms with their, their, their tenant? But also using what we know about why Chipotle is so successful, why Chipotle is obviously not every small business owner can do those, but we have found some great partners that we're forming relationships with that are able to show how a small business owner, a local mom and pop, or somebody that has a coffee truck, what these other national restaurants are doing, and how that they can implement smaller things into their own business. So a lot of that is online marketing and online fulfillment, especially, you know, during the pandemic, people couldn't go into stores. So most of these small businesses, they might have had a website, but it had maybe the name, the phone number and the address. It didn't really have a online shopping option, online fulfillment options. So using some, like I said, different training partners, how do we show these small business owners? You can do online sales, you can sell through Facebook and Instagram, you can do all these things, or how can you do your own app and which partners are industry-vetted already? So you're practicing a lot of ongoing education in addition to traditional retail recruitment, one stop, and then gone again, you're really sticking with the community over time. Yes, I mean, we want to, like I said, bring in new retail restaurants hospitality, if they have those opportunities, for sales tax for quality of life, but we also want to help communities strengthen their small businesses and their local restaurants that are in their downtown or their main street. And that's one of the things we heard the most during the pandemic is we need to help our small business owners. And yes, there was some flush of capital and cash that were coming through with some of the federal options that were coming through for PPP funds, but that might have helped them put a bandaid over their need, but they really needed to know, okay, well, how do we keep going and keep building at larger base and how do we keep thriving and not just surviving in the pandemic? So that's what all these training modules that we're developing is, again, showing a local restaurant tour, things that everyone's facing about workforce, about HR, about inventory, and how to streamline that, again, using what we know, what my national restaurants are successful, and forming some good partnerships with those that focus on online marketing or restaurant resiliency strategies. So this small business support is something that we've just now started launching, and just really seeing how it's changing truly, like small business owners are very appreciative for this hands, it's hands-on training, it's specific, like one-on-one knowledge sharing with them. Excellent. Well, I know retail strategies has always been a very proactive member of SEDC. You've always been here day in and day out, so I know everyone here at SEDC appreciates it. We're really happy that retail strategies is part of it. I'm happy to call you a friend as well. We're talking with Lacey Backus of retail strategies. Lacey's the Senior Director, Community Partnerships. Now, Lacey, I have to close these out with some really piercing questions. Okay. We're going to play favorites today. What is your favorite holiday? Oh, gosh. I don't know. I feel like many people would ask something like that when you know, and I don't have a favorite or a non, or something that I just don't, gosh. I wish I had a great answer to that question, right? I like them all. Okay, good. Well, let's do a different one then. What is your favorite dessert? Okay, that I could talk about a lot. I do not have a craving for salty things. You could put chips, fries, any of that in front of me. I'm not going to care. You put something sweet in front of me, and there's going to be, you know, Lacey's eyes are going to lit up in my mouth to start watering. But I actually really just enjoy good old sugary candy, like twizzlers and skittles, and like that would be my go-to comfort food. Yes. That's a Southern girl, that. What is your favorite movie? I used to have, you know, there's some quintessential ones, like a Princess bride. If anybody grew up in the 80s as a young girl, that was one of your classic movies that you always and still can quote most of it to this day. Because it is just something that is timeless. Yeah, yep. Okay, what is your favorite karaoke song? I do not karaoke. You do not karaoke? I love to sing. I have a passion for live music. I go to music concerts, festivals, and love to see live music perform. And I love to sing, but I am terrible at it. And I do not, you want to subject anybody to it, even during karaoke. Okay. So if you want to hear me sing, say next to me at a concert, but that's the closest I'll get. Got it. Then we're going to flip the switch and ask a different question. What is the worst haircut you've ever had? Well, like I said, I was in the 80s. So there was a lot of bangs, a lot of big perms. Nice. I have, I'm sure, a plethora of photos of me with permed bangs, hairspray, you know, bangs up a couple of inches, braces on, and oh, I'm sure there's plenty of those from the 80s. I can find this. Yes, get a good old Southern hair from the 80s. Nice, perfect. We have been talking with Lacey Bacchus of Retail Strategies. Lacey, thank you so much for spending a few minutes. Thank you, right? I was good to talk with you. Yes, good to see you. Bye. Bye.