Full Transcript – Ben Erwin – Wild Business Growth Podcast #305

This is the full transcript for Episode #305 of the Wild Business Growth podcast featuring Ben Erwin – Charitybuzz, The Secret Bucket List. You can listen to the interview and learn more here. Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.

Ben Erwin 0:00
We’re gonna figure this out.

Max Branstetter 0:16
Go figure Welcome to the wild pack. Totally butchered that. Welcome back to the Wild Business Growth podcast. This is your place to hear from a new entrepreneur every single Wednesday morning who turning Wild ideas into Wild growth. I’m your host, Max Branstetter, Founder and Podcast Producer at MaxPodcasting, and you can email me at to save time with your high-quality podcast. This is episode Mr. 305, and today’s guest is Ben Erwin. Ben is the CEO or chief cheerleader, as you’ll hear in the episode of Charitybuzz, which combines entrepreneurship and philanthropy on Charitybuzz, you can bid and win once in a lifetime, experiences, including interactions with celebrities, business leaders, just once in a lifetime, concerts, travel everything in between, and the money goes to charity. It’s a really, really cool combination awesome business. And in this episode, we talk entrepreneurial charity ship. We talk inspiring your team as well as your partners and customers, and of course, a little bit of some of the best Big 10 rivalry in football history. It is Ben. Enjoyyyyyy the showwwwww!

Aaaaaalrightyyyyyyy we are here with Ben Erwin, CEO of Charitybuzz, one of the most charitable and buzzy companies you’ll ever come across, as they say, but no. Ben, super excited to speak with you and talk all things Charitybuzz and really the combination of entrepreneurship and philanthropy. Ben, thank you so much for joining. How you doing today? I’m doing great. Thanks

Ben Erwin 2:16
for having me, man, I’m excited. Chorus,

Max Branstetter 2:19
of course, back at you, and we have to shout out our mutual friend and one of the awesome people on your team, Matt Scheff. I call him Scheff. You probably call him Matt, but I go way, way, way back to the Sammy fraternity in college and even pledge it with him. And so this is like an interview long, long time in the making, but I know how much he loves the organization, so so shout out, Matt. Now’s your chance. What questions do you have about Matt in college on the record? I

Ben Erwin 2:49
think we have very different relationships with Matt, very different histories. So

Max Branstetter 2:54
slightly.

Ben Erwin 2:55
I would love to know what Matt was like in college, in a fraternity, but I also don’t want you to do too much disclosing here that’s going to put him in a difficult situation. So maybe just one, one of the best stories you have about Matt that’s appropriate to share on the podcast, the

Max Branstetter 3:17
time he was in prison was was pretty crazy. No, no, I’m just going. We had our walkout one week when we were pledging. We had a trip up to Chicago, and he, like, selflessly, was like, hey, like, we could take my car, packed a bunch of people in the car, we drove up to Chicago, and it just turned out to be like an awesome weekend. I think one of the best memories from that Chicago time was, like, one checking out Northwestern campus and just kind of like seeing that college life and seeing another Big 10 school like that. I know you’re a big 10 fan. We’ll talk about that in a bit. But also, we got to see a White Sox game, and had, like, really, really good seats for that. I’m a Cleveland fan, so a little bit in the bed of the enemy there, but it was just an awesome time with that. So But overall, I just think, you know, Matt was pledged class president, and just like, had such a reputation of being like, so selfless, selfless and generous and helpful, and it’s seriously one of the funniest people I’ve ever met. So we go way back, and then we’ll save that time he was in maximum security prison for another conversation.

Ben Erwin 4:16
It was a short stint, though. He disclosed it when he applied here. But, yeah, Matt, is told all the time in the office that he’s the funniest person, so now he self acknowledges as the funniest person. So I guess that that’s continued. Just got to make sure it doesn’t go too much to his head, speaking

Max Branstetter 4:34
of Big 10. So I know you have a lot of IU people on your team. You also are a big fan of Ohio State. Ohio State football. Where did that come from?

Ben Erwin 4:43
So it’s the Ohio State.

Max Branstetter 4:45
Thank you. Wow, true, yeah.

Ben Erwin 4:47
Gotta get it right. My dad grew up in Columbus. His I don’t know how many generations back they go for being Columbus. It was just in his DNA to be a Buckeye he ushered at the horseshoe when he was a kid. Uh, he didn’t go. They went to Miami, Ohio, and then went into the Navy. But I didn’t have a choice. So I was just raised that we are Buckeyes, and this is what we do, and we have an obsession with the team and everything and anything that goes with it. I’ve done the same with my son. I have a nine year old son of indoctrinated him fully into Buckeye fandom. We’re sick. I know everything about recruiting. I know what kids in high school are going to be on the team in two, three years. I take these games way too seriously. I’ve been known to cry during wins during losses, and I’ve really, really high expectations this year, it’s like, win or bust. So I’m just trying to temper them so I can be, like, elated when it happens and not completely devastated. Knock on wood if it doesn’t. The

Max Branstetter 5:52
buckeyes are just one of the true powerhouses of college football, like going to Indiana. Like, we have some more volatility, I will call it in the football space, mostly on the downside, but, and then basketball, it’s the same sort of thing where it’s crazy hype and then usually don’t deliver, but, but with the Ohio State, I think it’s, it’s just incredible, like how OSU just reloads every single year and like, the expectation is like, National Championship or bus so it’s, it’s an interesting time for the program. Got to get back ahead of Michigan on the rivalry.

Ben Erwin 6:23
We will, yeah, we give them one year. We will win the national championship this year. We will beat them this year, and they will have one year in my lifetime to be able to gloat to me and talk shit to me, and that’s it, because in my adulthood, we’ve dominated them, and this will be the third national championship. So enjoy it while last Wolverines, because it’s not going to happen again.

Max Branstetter 6:45
There we go. It’s on the record, not that any signs were stolen in the process. And speaking of Big 10, I know charity buzz actually has further Big 10 ties with Todd Wagner. So going back to IU, huge fan of Mark Cuban, Todd, what they did with broadcast.com in the early days was like, incredible. He’s co founder of that, I know that, like, he’s was Kappa, SIG, it IU, and, like, there’s

lots and lots of lots of history there. What would you say, like, has been the impact Todd has made on charity, Buzz and, like, fellow organizations in the in the family, since he became owner? Yeah. I

Ben Erwin 7:19
mean, it’s tremendous. You know, like his, I think his resume speaks for itself. I remember when he acquired our business. I was here under the previous owner, and then Todd acquired us in 1516 and it was such an awesome opportunity, because I just decided I was going to absorb as much as I could. Like, here’s a guy who did it like to the most extreme and awesome levels, and then so I always get curious about, like, what what led to the success? What are the characteristics? What can I learn? And I think it really comes down to, like, a desire to get in the weeds. You know, I think a lot of times you assume when someone reaches that level of success, they no longer want to get in the weeds. But Todd loves to get in the weeds because that’s how he understands everything, and that’s his curiosity just forces them into the weeds, work ethic, discipline, commitment. He’s definitely somebody who subscribes to the philosophy of, if you outwork everyone else, you’re going to be successful, like, that’s when luck happens, is when you’re just hustling. And that’s something that I truly believe in as well. But just, you know, he thinks about things on a higher level, and how, you know, X, Y and Z can all kind of come together. So it’s been it’s been awesome. He’s also just like a great guy, a bit of a mentor. Learned a lot from him, not just in my role, but just overall, as a dad, friend, colleague, you name it, the guy, and he puts, you know, he walks the walk and talks the talk. He’s He’s generous, he’s philanthropic. He does so much for causes he believes in, for IU and a lot of different efforts and campaigns there, but he does it because he believes it’s the right thing to do, not for notoriety or publicity, because you don’t know about any of it, and I respect that. That’s just a really cool way to go about living your life.

Max Branstetter 9:21
Well, speaking of really cool things and really cool segues,

let’s get to charity buzz overall. And so it’s a really cool organization, as I mentioned. It’s kind of the hybrid of, you know, entrepreneurship and philanthropy and charity. And you’ll need to correct me on the top keywords in the philanthropic, charity space, because I’ll stumble over all of it. But how did your journey at Charitybuzz begin?

Ben Erwin 9:48
Yeah, so I went to school in DC. I went to George Washington, and I went there because I ever since I was like, 12 years old, I decided I was going to be a lawyer, so I needed to major in political science. You. And DC was the best place to go study political science. I did against Georgetown. So it’s George Washington. And while I was there, I realized I didn’t want to be a lawyer. I didn’t want to have my entire career surrounded by billable hours, like I wanted to just figure out something else. So I remember when I graduated college, it was almost like there was a fork in the road. Path to the right was go figure out a way to make a bunch of money. That’s the only reason you work is to make money. And the other fork was, go change the world. Work at a not for profit, and NGO eat ramen noodles, but do something that you believe really makes a difference. And naively, was like, I’m going to take the one to the right, like, I’ll make a bunch of money, then I’ll give money away, and that’s the only thing that matters. And I vividly remember a conversation with my sister, who’s five years older, but thinks she’s way wiser than that, where she was like, you’re an idiot. Like, you think all that matters in your career is making money. Like, get ready for a reality check. I was like, you know what you’re talking about. So I did financial consulting sales, and I was miserable. So I was making decent money, I was achieving quotas, but I just hated my job. Made my life not really fun. And I left because I no longer wanted to work there. And I was like, I need to go find something that I’m passionate about. So I first started working at Callaway golf. I’m a golf nut, nerd fanatic, but then they wanted me to move to Iowa. I don’t love golf that much. No offense to Iowa. So then I just stumbled on charity buzz. It had just started. It was an idea, no business, no plan, no strategy, and I fell in love with it because it was like those that fork in the road was merging back together. It’s for profit, it’s online. It’s a big idea makes it can make a really big difference. So I just decided I was going to be the head of business development. Made up a title, a role, because, again, it wasn’t a like a fully baked organization, and just went out and started hustling. Built the value proposition, the sales strategy, reached out to all the different charities, and we built this thing fast, and it’s been a wild ride. I’ve been here for a long time, but it definitely feels like it’s two different companies in one. It was kind of the company before we were acquired by Todd, and the company after we required by time I’ve had I’ve worn a bunch of different hats, but what keeps me motivated is what we do at the end of the day is we raise incremental dollars for charity. So we’ve raised hundreds of millions of dollars since I’ve been here. It’s not like we’re redistributing or funneling those dollars that were already going to charity through our platform and taking a fee or just distributing it differently, simply put, these dollars would not be given to charity without charity bus so like, what we do matters, who we help is important, and if we were not around, I think less ideal situations would occur. Because I believe what drives me is a world where more money goes to charity results in better outcomes for everyone. Like, it’s simple, I don’t need to explain it in detail, because I can’t, but I think everyone can get behind that. If we just gave a lot more money to charity, like, people would get help, environment would get preserved, education would get reformed, diseases would get cured. So that’s what I want to do, but I get to do it with like a capitalistic for profit mentality, and so it keeps it really interesting. It’s been this like merge of the two worlds that I didn’t think could coexist 20 some years ago.

Max Branstetter 13:38
So you had those two paths you were deciding between, and somehow you kind of went through one in the middle, or, like, a blend of, like, hopping between the past was, yeah, I

Ben Erwin 13:48
think charity was just like the merge, right? They, like, they diverted and they came back together. Now you’re seeing a lot of it, right? There’s a lot of social enterprises, there’s a lot of companies, but back then there, there wasn’t, it was really, it was, like, this simple decision, and it didn’t make sense to me then. So I’m glad to see now that there’s a lot more opportunities for people to be able to kind of check both boxes at the same time.

Max Branstetter 14:09
So before we get to more on like the ins and outs of the business, I’m curious about your career path there. So like, you started really focusing on business development, you know, you’ve been there for over a decade, like, almost two decades now, personally, what do you think has been key for you? Like, continuing to grow in your career there and like, ultimately become this CEO and leading the charge there today?

Ben Erwin 14:32
Oh yeah. So I think live is just like this, this passion, this commitment I have so like the purpose, and that’s what will motivate me and force me, in a good way, to work really, really hard and try to outwork everyone. So as I was coming up as doing sales, running a sales team, running revenue, I always, I think it’s a lesson my dad told me a long time ago, I was like, never leave the office before. Boss, like, just put in the extra effort, send the extra email, make the extra call, and over time, that compounds, and that makes a difference. So I think that’s a big reason why. Like, at the end of the day, I’m a salesperson, I think of sales as the ability to encourage someone to see the world through your eyes. So that works for if I’m trying to make you buy something, but that also is leadership, right? I need to get everybody to be able to see the future, the strategy, the path, the way I do. And if they do that, then they’re going to follow with me, and we’re going to work all together. Because in my current role, I’m the Chief Cheerleader. I have to, like, inspire, and I have to set the tone, and I have to make people as passionate about their work as I am. So I have to sell them on it every single day, and that’s something I’ve always been good at. I’m a people person. I thrive on relationship building like I love in person meetings. I love just like, getting the energy from other people. I love understanding what makes people tick, what makes what drives people to, to mobilize, and then just beating that part down. So I think that’s a lot of it, you know, and results like, I’ve been able to build the business, but that’s because I’ve been able to get a lot of really great people, like your buddy Matt, and a bunch of other people here to do it with me, because I definitely couldn’t have done it alone, but I’ve got a lot of a lot of other people who believe in it as much as I do.

Max Branstetter 16:37
Have you thought about chief cheerleader as an official title. Yes, it could be. You know, we we had on Steven Lee’s episode 291, which I just looked up because I can’t remember any numbers anymore. I’ve fully come full circle negatively on that a lot of episodes. I appreciate it. But he is the founder of gooder, the sunglasses company, and he goes by Chief Executive octopus, and he’s all about spirit animals. So you never know what CEO could mean these days. But I like chief cheerleader, if I could pronounce it correctly. Yeah,

Ben Erwin 17:11
I think that’s I mean at the end of the day. I mean, there’s, there’s obviously more to it, but if the leader of the organizations doesn’t have the most energy and isn’t setting the tone. I don’t think it’s fair to expect anyone else to be at a level higher. So I gotta set the bar and then have other develop other people into being vice president of cheerleading, Director of cheerleading, and like, when you get people that are super passionate, super driven. I think that’s what creates hustle and hard work. You can’t just tell people to work hard, they’ll burn out, or they just won’t do it. But if you create a situation where they want to, they drive themselves to work harder, go the extra mile, then I think you’ve got a really, really great recipe. And I listened to a couple of your podcasts before we hopped on today, I was listening to the one with the founder of athletic brewing, and he was saying something very similar about his time with Steve Cohen. So you hear these stories all the time from like, truly the most successful people, Steve Cohen Todd has shared similar stories and how Mark has operated. Like it’s not a coincidence. This is what separates the great people and leaders from everyone else. Like they they work their butts off, but they force other people to work their butts off by inspiring them, not not mandating it.

Max Branstetter 18:37
Right? Yeah, exactly. I appreciate that. Uh. Shoutout Bill Shufelt Athletic Brewing Connecticut’s finest as well. So we’ll get to that a little teaser. But um, would love to dive in more to charity buzz and how you operate and how you’re different than some other companies in the space. So for anybody who’s not familiar, like what, what type of experiences and events do you provide that add a pretty interesting wrinkle to you know? What some might say is, like a typical charitable company.

Ben Erwin 19:11
So I like the most fundamental level, what we do is we compel people to give money to charity through exciting and unique access and experiences. So there’s just a couple interesting stats that I think really illustrate why we do what we do. So back in the 70s, they started to measure the percentage of GDP that was donated to charity. It was 2% it’s 2% in 2023 it hasn’t changed. In 50 plus years, we’ve been stagnant. So the relative amount of money that goes to charity is the same. And if you think about it, it shouldn’t surprise you have charities evolved and innovated? No, it’s the same. They ask you to give money to their cause. It’s the same practices and activities over and over again. Yet the percentage. Of GDP that is spent on non essential activities. So that’s restaurants, travel experiences, concerts, you name it. It’s growing, and now it’s almost 25% of GDP. So simply, what we’re trying to do is grab a portion of that 25% of offering up people, opportunities, items, exclusive access, things that they either didn’t know they wanted or never knew were available, they end up spending incredible amounts of money to live out their wildest dreams, and then we funnel a portion of those dollars to charity, and that at scale is how you’re going to get that 2% to increase to 3% right? One more percent of GDP would represent a 50% increase in the relative amount of money going to charity, and would be the first time in the history of measuring that that amount of relative money going to charity has increased. So how do we compel people to do it? We do it through unique experiences. That might be a dinner with George Clooney. It might be tickets to SNL in the after party. Could be a table at rails, the hardest reservation in the world to get it could be exclusive bourbon from pappy Van Winkle, like a guitar lesson with John Mayer, Steve Vai a pitch meeting with the head of a big private equity firm. Like the cool part is is the opportunities are endless. There’s so many different ways you can skin this proverbial cat, but these are all things that people want first because they never knew they were available, because this is the first time. And two, how much are these experiences worth? Well, it all depends on who you ask, and that becomes really interesting. So there’s not like a market value, it’s how much is dinner with George Clooney? Oh, if you’re a big George Clooney fan and you have a lot of money, the answer could be six figures, but maybe you’re not a big George Clooney fan, and the answer is, I’d rather go have lunch with the lead singer of Metallica, and that’s worth six figures to me, so it just allows us to have people dip their hands into their pockets that are separate from their charity donation pockets. But they weren’t planning on it, because they never knew these experiences were available, and it results in millions and millions of dollars of new incremental dollars being funneled to charities every single year.

Max Branstetter 22:37
I mean, you mentioned unique experiences. Holy cow, those are like, it’s almost like a secret Bucket List of experience. It’s like things that would be like on someone’s bucket list if they knew they were possible, but you don’t even think they’re realistic. So it’s like, you know until you hear about it. It’s like you would never even consider something like that. And then you’re like, oh, wait, I could do these things in my life. Like, that’s that’s unbelievable. So the fact that you make these possibilities happen, while it also has, like, you’re, you’re giving money to good causes at the same time, is really brilliant. Like, that’s, that’s a great combo. And I see how it’s really easy for you and Matt and team to get so passionate about it. How much of your time is spent, you know, working with celebrities and exclusive destinations to, like, set up these events, versus working on the relationships with the actual, you know, charitable organizations that this this money ends up going to. So

Ben Erwin 23:34
it depends on the on the team member. So the way that we’ve kind of structured the company is we have a few different sales channels. So we’re best known for our auctions. It’s how the business was founded, and it’s still the biggest part of the business. But we have a sweepstakes business. So dinner with George Clooney, we did a cocktail party at Cher’s house in Malibu. Yes, there’s a small number of people that will have a large amount of money that they can bid to win, but then there’s hundreds of 1000s of people that will give 10 bucks, 20 bucks, for a random chance to win. So we’re able to cast a wider net with our sweepstakes business. We have a storefront, so just fixed price sales. Some people don’t like auctions. They’re just like, tell me the price. Let me just click a button and get that thing, and then we have a private members club. It’s called access. So for essentially, like our top five 600 customers, they don’t want to waste their time with an auction, or they want to request something that isn’t currently available online, so we’re able to kind of broker, like incredibly unique and bespoke experiences for them in exchange for dollars that will benefit charitable organizations. And then the way we source the inventory is through charities. So Matt runs our charity partnerships team, so their only job is to. Build relationships with charitable organizations and then leverage their existing supporters in new and exciting ways to create these experiences, because they probably haven’t in the past. Maybe they do in room galas or events, but that’s a different audience than the charity bus community. We’ll source it directly from brands, vendors, wholesale, to be able to create really cool packages, and then be able to take those types of opportunities and then funnel some of those dollars off to charity, and then we have a whole team that works directly with celebrities, management companies, record labels, brands, and goes direct to create these strategic partnerships that can yield, probably like the highest quality or most exclusive opportunities. So each one of those teams kind of manages that subset of sellers or partners individually and uniquely, but that’s all they’re doing. Is like their their function is building, cultivating relationships to acquire the type of inventory we know will yield the best results for them and their charitable recipients,

Max Branstetter 26:11
in terms of how the business has grown and evolved over the years. Like, what do you think is a decision that that you made, or, like, a change that how you’ve operated that has been most instrumental in, you know, attracting more of these unique experiences and attracting more charities that want to partner with you guys.

Ben Erwin 26:32
So I think it’s the diversification of the revenue channels. So the way the business was originally structured was we did one thing, we ran auctions with charities, and we originally ran those auctions with charities around their large scale fundraising events. So spring and fall were really busy, and then Summer and Winter were pretty dead. It wasn’t a business, it wasn’t sustainable, it didn’t scale. So first, we created more of a platform so that you didn’t have to do this around your event, we tried to understand more and more like, what is the what is the day to day? What are the pain points for fundraiser at a charitable organization? And then what can we deliver to them that kind of speaks to or complements what they’re going through? So that was one. So then we create more normalization year round inventory that helps us build more and more of what our biggest asset is. So our asset is we have hundreds of 1000s of customers that are loyal to charity, Buzz, affluent, socially conscious want to do all this awesome, crazy stuff. So any charity kind of can just or seller can just plug into them. It’s not their existing donor base. And this is the big difference, is we’re not using technology to say, hey, here’s an option now go promote it to all of your existing supporters. That doesn’t take advantage of the most fundamental purpose of the internet, which is distribution. Like, how about you use this and go in front of completely new people? Because that’s how you’re going to drive incremental dollars. The second part would be the diversification. So that’s from the revenue channels that I just mentioned, the auction, the sweepstakes, the storefront, the private sales, and then the different ways we get the inventory, through charities, direct or our like source, vendor model. Fortunately for us, a lot of this was starting to be set up prior to March 2020 because if you think about our business in March 2020 we had, we had quite a bit of headwinds. What we traditionally have sold are intimate experiences surrounding large scale events. Well, those got wiped off the map, but we also had 1000s of those that were scheduled to happen in 2020, that had to be put on pause, reschedule, delayed. So that was just an incredible amount of administrative work and customer relationship management. But then we had some tailwinds. We’re an E commerce company. We’re not a cruise ship company like there. There was an opportunity for us to get through this, and we knew we had to, because our charity partners were getting hit and hurt by this more than anyone. Nobody was giving money during the beginning of covid, and anybody who was giving money was giving money to covid related charities, which makes sense, but I would argue they should be giving money to their current charities as well as covid charities, because the situation called for more help and support, because things weren’t going too well, but then that allowed us to be to operate with a larger or wider mindset into how to get through all of this. So what we proved to ourselves when covid hit was we weren’t going to just put our heads down and say, wake us up when this thing is over, and then we’ll get back to work. It was we’re going to figure this out. So we tried to understand what’s consumer behavior going to look like during this unprecedented time, and then what can we do to try to meet those consumers still engage with them and support charitable organizations? Organizations, and we made a lot of mistakes, like we ran into a bunch of different walls. Most of those walls were concrete, and we got bumps on our head, but a few of those were just drywall, and we went right through them. And so then we started to understand we can expand into all these different verticals. So what happened during covid Well, the collectibles market skyrocketed, like really high end spirits skyrocketed, trading cards skyrocketed. So we started to move into all those big amounts of money were exchanging hands. So why don’t we get involved and have some of those money exchanging hands, benefit, charity? And then we and then when you do that, and you’re just, like, so much activity is happening. Like, cool things happen. For example, we started selling the opportunity for celebrities to follow you on Instagram, and we just stumbled into it. We’re like, that’s a cool idea. I don’t know if it’s going to work, but let’s try it. No risk. I remember I woke up one morning and I was checking everything that was closing that day, and we had Mark Cuban will follow you on Instagram and it was at $5,000 I was like, there is, like, this is fake bidding prank. Is it? April 1, nobody’s paying $5,000 times when they follow you on Instagram. That auction closed at 330 that afternoon for almost $30,000 Oh, my God, so it was a light bulb. So then we started selling, probably still over a million dollars worth of social media follows during a very short window, because then, over time, they no longer became as valuable, as important as they were. So I think it’s our ability to be able to move within different consumer behavior trends or verticals that are getting really popular, and do it fast and prove to ourselves that we can take advantage of them, has really allowed us to grow. But again, it’s all just inspired by we got to figure out ways to get more money to charity, incremental dollars. That’s the goal, and that’s the goal. Everything we did is in support of that goal, and it aligned everybody to hustle and get some cool stuff done, and

Max Branstetter 32:06
such is the story of how Mark Cuban came to follow me on Instagram. No, I’m just kidding. So Mark Cuban does not follow me on Instagram, but he might sign up to watch the webinar that I’m hosting for international podcast day. You never know, but that’s really, really cool news. I am partnering with Graphy to host a webinar on international podcast day. That’s Monday september 30, 2024 at noon. That’s 12pm eastern time, so Monday september 30, at noon, Eastern Time, to host a webinar on how to turn your podcast into a digital ecosystem. Big thanks to my friends at graphy for putting it on and graphy is your place to create and sell online courses, PDFs, links, host webinars, build communities and launch your own website and mobile app all in one powerful and scalable platform. You can learn more about the international podcast day webinar I’m hosting in the show notes that’s both in the description of this episode and at max podcasting.com/ben-irwin it’s going to be live, so hope to see you there with your questions, and you staying agile. Speaking of agility, let’s get to some impressive agility in the world of charity. So really impressive agility there, and I think there’s good lessons for any business about diversifying your revenue, having multiple revenue streams like that applies so well across the board. I want to focus in a little bit more on working in the charitable space, or at least having a charitable aspect of your business, because there’s a lot of current and, you know, aspiring entrepreneurs out there who want to make sure that, like, hey, like, if I’m gonna take the leap and do this thing and start a business like, I want to, in addition to whatever solution I’m providing, I want to give back as well. So what advice do you have for any entrepreneur out there who wants to make sure that like, charity is like, a key part of the business they’re building? First,

Ben Erwin 34:17
do it. You know, we’re talking about how this entire sector hasn’t evolved, hasn’t changed in 5060, years. And we know the agents of change in our economy are entrepreneurs. Right? The way they operate, the way they think, the way they’re incentivized, is what has created the greatest businesses of all time that have probably all happened in the last 2030, years. It’s all because of the drive and the brilliance of the entrepreneur. We need to focus more of them in the charity space. In order for like we asked the charity space to cure cancer, reform education, save the environment, feed the homeless. The list goes on and on, but we’re saying you can’t do it. It and make money. You’re not allowed to make good salaries. You’re not allowed to innovate, you’re not allowed to take risks and, oh, by the way, we’re going to criticize you if you don’t succeed. So we’re going to tie both of your hands behind your back, we’re going to blindfold you, and we’re going to duct tape you to a chair. But if you don’t figure all these things out, the solutions to these complex problems, we’re going to be super critical of you. So, you know, when I think a lot about this, it’s again, like, what I care about is output and outcomes. I care about is more money going to charity. I don’t care about how it gets there or the intention behind it. I think, in a perfect world, idealistically, everybody’s giving money for the right reasons. They’re super engaged, but we don’t live in an ideal world like we live in the real world, and the real world is whatever is going to convince somebody to give more money to charity, then we need to encourage it, and we can’t criticize it, because once the money gets into the hands of these charitable organizations, they’re going to invest and wield it however they see fit. So, you know, you see a lot online of somebody saying, oh, this person just donated this money. So their name could be on a building or a wing. Great, they gave a lot of money to charity. Like it shouldn’t be a problem, because you know what? You know what the fastest way to get anything done and the most powerful force in the history of the world is capitalism. But for some reason, like capitalism and charity, can’t coexist. I think if we could make capitalists, even like a portion of it, a vehicle for good, we should do it because we know it will drive what we want to happen, which is this outcome of more money going to charity? So I think a lot of people are hesitant to get into the charity sector. I think there’s a lot of misnomers and just societal assumptions about the charitable sector, and I think that’s what’s holding it back. So the more entrepreneurs, smart people, that can get in there and just focus on outcomes, not margins and budgets. Like, who cares? Just if you think you can help get this thing done, then we should go get this thing done and not worry about people questioning what your what your intentions are.

Max Branstetter 37:17
Yeah, when you talk about the flack or like stigma tied to it, or people questioning people’s motives. I always think back to that curb episode about the anonymous donor, where they talk about that, and there’s a whole debate about anonymous donor versus putting your name on thing and, like, which is more honorable, and things like that. But I’m totally with you. Like, if someone’s giving money to a good cause, like, let’s just stop right there. The commentary like that, that’s amazing, like it’s a fantastic thing, and they go to great organizations. What would you say is the the most challenging thing about being in the charitable space that you didn’t see coming before you got into it?

Ben Erwin 37:55
So we’re a for profit company. We make money. We try to make as much money as possible for our shareholders while running a good business. And we get criticized for for getting for taking fees, right? I think people get really uncomfortable with the idea of like, there’s a company that’s making money off of charities, not discounting that we’re delivering, like, this real incremental value that like without us isn’t there, and not applying that same level of diligence to event planners, consultants, everyone else that’s in this charity field, because we’re just pretty transparent about our fee structure. So probably didn’t anticipate it being that much, because I just believe so much that what we were doing was so necessary. I mean, think about this for a second. So we work with an organization without naming names. Let’s say it’s the Food Bank of southern New Jersey. So you’re the head of fundraising for the Food Bank of southern New Jersey. Every day, you wake up and you’re thinking about, how do I raise more money for the Food Bank of South Jersey? Well, your your pool is the same. It’s people that live in South Jersey who care about hunger, food justice, food deserts. That’s it. It’s probably not growing, if anything, it’s probably staying about the same. But you have access to a really famous musician who grew up in South Jersey who cares about hunger issues, and you’re able to get that musician to auction off or provide an experience to meet them at a concert. And you use a platform like ours, you’re not just going out to people in South Jersey, the same base, who’s not going to be that interested, who’s seen it over and over again, and you put it on a global platform that specializes in maximizing these experiences for as much money as possible. And that goes for six figures to a fan of that musician who lives in Europe. At the end of that year, that fundraiser in South Jersey, one of their biggest single individual donations of the year was from a human being in Europe, because they loved the access to the musician that you had like that does not. Exist in this world without us. That’s incremental. Why would that person give money to that organization? And again, you could say, oh, he, he or she just gave money because he wanted access to musician. Yeah. But guess what? That money went and fed tons and tons of hungry families in South Jersey. So there’s the the immediate discomfort forces us to have to explain ourselves, probably a little more thoroughly than we need to at the beginning, to kind of like, handle those objections or those levels of unease about a for profit company in the charity sector. Yeah, I think there should be a lot more of them, and I don’t think our business model needs to be audited or criticized any more than a pure for profit company that’s making massive margins and nobody’s batting an eye because their stocks performing well,

Max Branstetter 40:56
let’s wrap up with some rapid fire. Q, a, ready for it? Let’s do it all right, let’s get wild. What is your favorite Buckeyes football memory of all time,

Ben Erwin 41:07
winning the national championship against Miami. I was a freshman in college. All my buddies were from Miami. They should have beat us. Maybe they did beat us for that pass interference call, but I got to call all of them and rub it in their face. It was unexpected, and I loved every second of it.

Max Branstetter 41:24
Yeah, that’s an absolutely crazy game. My cousin Josh was at it. He made his custom OSU hand signals for it. Just crazy, crazy. I love those early, early, well, not Yeah, or BCS bowl games, whatever it was, what is a a weird talent or a party trick you have, like, something you just have a knack for doing, but it really doesn’t impact your business. You’re just good at it.

Ben Erwin 41:47
I don’t have one, but my son, who’s nine, can solve a Rubik’s Cube in like, 20 seconds. So if he’s with me, he’s my party trick.

Max Branstetter 41:56
Oh, that’s awesome. That’s That’s incredible. Something I could never do. I just kind of looked at it was like, No, you know, somebody else can specialize in that. That’s and it was your son. I was like, no, just all right, what was the like, the unique experience that you put together a charity buzz that kind of hit you as like, wow, we’ve kind of like reached a new level here,

Ben Erwin 42:19
maybe 2014 2015 at that point, we had specialized in experiences with a list celebrities. And on the time of the site, we had a lunch at The Ivy in LA, like the Hollywood hotspot, with a huge movie star, and everyone was super excited. That was like the perfect fit. And then we also had lunch with Tim Cook at Apple, and everyone thought that was cool, but we hadn’t really done anything business wise before. The lunch of the celebrity went for 100,000 the coffee with Tim Cook went for 600,000 Oh, my God, while we didn’t think it was awesome, there it was the watershed moment where we launched our business experiences vertical. More charities have access to business leaders than celebrities. That’s usually their board, and that actually has the potential to raise more money, because there’s inherent value in being able to sit down with these titans of industry. So it led us to create an entrepreneur auction, which has raised probably ten million for charity just through, you know, kind of like the business meeting of a lifetime, all to support great causes. And it’s just opened up a whole new vertical for us.

Max Branstetter 43:20
You just never know what’s going to get the most interest. So it’s always that’s always got to add, like, some more excitement whenever you list something or have an auction like that. That’s awesome. All right. And then last one, what are your ties to Stan Vegas? And the term Stan Vegas, I know we mentioned it in the bill shoe felt episode 293, athletic brewing. But the term Stan Vegas has been around for maybe more than people thought. I

Ben Erwin 43:47
grew up in Westport, Connecticut, still, like my closest friends are all guys I grew up with, and two of them moved to Stan Vegas after school. They lived like right by Bedford Street and right by where Bobby V’s used to be. I forget what street, yeah, and we used to go there all the time because they had the apartment that was just a fun place to pregame and hang out with. And my buddy Kevin and Jack used to call it Stan Vegas. And according to them, they made it up. So if anybody heard it prior to it’s probably like 2007 2008 you got to let us know. But if not, I am crediting Kevin and Jack with developing the term Stan Vegas, which you always thought was funny, because it’s all relative, like in Connecticut. It’s lively, but it’s not lively compared to Las Vegas. And so we always were underwhelmed when we would go out to the bars and clubs, because we’re like, no, like, this really isn’t what stay in Vegas should be. It’s not really living up to the name.

Max Branstetter 44:48
I think that’s why the name is so magical, because it has such like, zing to it, and it’s really taken on life if it’s not. I first heard it from my old roommate, the big D, Danny, who I first heard it from him, and. 14. He was probably saying it before that. And there’s billboards, there’s beers called Stan Vegas. Beers like it’s really a thing, but who knows, your friends might have, might have invented it so and now they’re we just need to StamVegas sphere. Now we’ll be on par with Vegas. But Ben, thank you so much. This has been awesome. Just huge fan of what you’re doing, and CharityBuzz and all brownie points for having Matt and the team cheerleading, but thanks again for coming on. Where’s the best place, if somebody wants to learn more about charity buzz or find out more, like I know you got the entrepreneur auction coming up, connect with the business in any way, or just connect with you. What’s the best place for them to do that?

Ben Erwin 45:39
Yeah, so just to stay up to date with what’s going on the sites, go to Charitybuzz.com, sign for our newsletter. We add new things to the site every day. It’s very dynamic, so it’s the best way just to stay up to date on what’s launching and what’s closing. Should go to our About Us page if you want to learn more about all of our different channels. My email is my name, Ben a charity buzz. Email me. I can route you to anybody and everyone, including Matt, if it’s a new charity partnership, and just check out the site like I said, it’s fun stuff. We have this entrepreneur auction coming up. It’s launching on national entrepreneur day. Yep, that’s day. Obama created it. We learned November 19, hundreds of experiences with the biggest names in business, power lunches, portfolio reviews, cups of coffee, Shadow sessions, you name it, it’s going to raise tons and tons of money. So if you’re looking to get an in, into an industry, a company, an investor, this is where you can get the access. You can do it and support a cause they believe in. So you’re breaking the ice before you even meet them, and it might be the opportunity that will change everything for you. So check it out. And thanks for having me. This was super fun, of course,

Max Branstetter 46:50
of course. Back out. You. Thanks for all you do. Last thing, final thoughts, it could be one line, word of wisdom you can sing. Hang on. Sloopy, whatever you want. Send us home here.

Ben Erwin 46:59
O, H, I, O,

Max Branstetter 47:01
I, O, there you go.

I’m really struggling to figure out who Ben roots for in football. Thank you so much, Ben, for coming on the podcast, sharing your Wild story and all you and the Charitybuzz team, including Scheff do and thank you Wild listeners for tuning in to another episode. If you want to hear more wild stories like this one, make sure to follow the Wild Business Growth podcast on your favorite podcast app and subscribe on YouTube for the video versions. YouTube is @MaxBranstetter You can also find us on Goodpods, and for any help with podcast production, you can learn more at MaxPodcasting.com and sign up for the Podcasting to the Max newsletter. That is where podcasting meets entrepreneurship and the worst puns you have ever heard or seen or or felt. You feel them deep, and you can sign up at MaxPodcasting.com/Newsletter Until next time, let your business Run Wild…Bring on the Bongos!