Video Transcription
Scrappy:
I’m Scrappy. Welcome to The Come Up a video podcast featuring Southwest Florida entrepreneurs, business leaders. We’re sponsored by Content with Teeth, a creative content agency with over 20 years of experience right here in Southwest Florida. And as you can see by this fat head behind me, they do it really big. Really big. Specializing in copywriting and video production. They’ve got content if you want to sponsor The Come Up or be a guest, hit me up @heyscrappy on IG or text Mike at 21000. Today really digging this guest. Very interesting, very innovative. Today’s guest is Matt Wolff, owner of Ticket Time Machine, an innovative company that celebrates sports and business moments of our past with commemorative tickets. Remember that Dolphins game you went to last year with your family? Well, Matt can hook you up with the tickets all over again. Matt, very clever idea buddy.
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, I appreciate that. It’s ironic I grew up in New Jersey and I don’t like the Dolphins, but what are you going to do?
Scrappy:
Yeah, so tell us about your company.
Matt Wolff:
Yeah. Ticket Time Machine, we’re keeping the printed memory alive with our physical keepsakes. And so if you have an event, you want to commemorate it with something a little bit unique. We customize and personalized, we’ve bridged it with some physical experiences to really enhance the experience of the fan or the attendee and then also have old school tickets. People request this all the time. “Hey, I went to event, I have a digital ticket, can you print me something?” And we have our stock, we can do it.
Scrappy:
Which of the two are more popular?
Matt Wolff:
Well, the people sending for the authentic one, I get more requests for that just because it’s a one-off thing. The animated stuff that we do is more for B2B type stuff.
Scrappy:
The animation and the commemorative. It’s like two different audiences, isn’t it? Two different customers.
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, two different customers. Although you could go B2B with the authentic stuff. I think they’ve moved away from that a little bit and everything depends on volume and what you’re kind of looking to do. But yeah, people love the old school ticket, just walk around with like, ‘hey, this is a cool thing’, rather than whatever they got going on digitally. And I get why they’re doing it, for admission. But people still want something to commemorate and remember the events that they went to and it brings back the memories of who they were with and there’s a whole host of reasons why someone would want to remember an event or a trip or anything.
Scrappy:
Something very tangible. Something that they can touch and see and feel and share with their family members.
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, it’s never going to go away. I don’t know why people think, money’s never going to go away. It’s not in our lifetime at least. And there’s a reason why people like it. It’s not worth anymore than digital funds, a credit card or cash. It’s worth the same, but it’s never going away. So yes, the people want physical stuff, some people hate it, some people want it. I’m a minimalist, I don’t want any clutter, put it all on my phone. And I’m not that type of person, that’s why I started the company.
Scrappy:
Sure. So where do people typically place these things? And they do they encase them? Do they create plaques? They have frames? What do they do?
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, I just posted about that today. All kinds of things. There’s scrapbooks, memory boxes, people just collect them in a shoebox, they frame them, people have created tabletops with them. There’s so many unique different ways that you can do to keep these things and it just depends. Do you have a ton of them? Is it just one real special event? We’re working on some stuff where you can put an acrylic picture next to the ticket that you did-
Scrappy:
Cool.
Matt Wolff:
For a game. That’s maybe just a one-off type thing, but people have hundreds of these tickets. Sport-
Scrappy:
I was going to ask you about that actually because my dad and I went to Fenway Park many times. We’d see Carl Rimsky and I was a kid and maybe to place Carl’s picture on the commemorative ticket would be kind of cool.
Matt Wolff:
So we would love to recreate, literally recreate a ticket from the past or create a really cool ticket. We don’t have permission to do that.
Scrappy:
Okay.
Matt Wolff:
So everything relies on who do we partner with or who becomes a customer of ours. And that’s the ideal way, is for them to become a customer. We supply it for them to offer it to their fans and we’re working on some pretty neat stuff with regards to that. Have you ever been to an event that was worth talking about that had nothing on the back of it? I’ve never been to-
Scrappy:
No, no. Definitely not.
Matt Wolff:
So why would you do a commemorative one? It doesn’t really cost any money. Anyone who knows printing, it’s pennies to put something on the back of that, even if it’s just a black disclaimer. And I use that as an opportunity to sort of entertain, like an Easter egg type of thing where I’ll put a joke as a disclaimer, strong lyrics, just to make up something funny that people will read because most people don’t read the disclaimer and then they’ll start to read and they’re like, wait, what’s going on?
Scrappy:
Well you have to be creative because if I’m going to encase maybe 10 events, both sports and music of my past, these ticket stubs are going to have to look really different and unique. Each one of them.
Matt Wolff:
Yes and no. Because if I showed you my book, which is over there, most Ticketmaster venues use the Ticketmaster stock, which looked exactly the same except for that. Now it’s tricky without getting into the whole big thing of it. Ticketmaster would give you stock for free. It’s a whole trick they do. But you can get your own stock with your own advertising and your own marks and for the teams and the venues that were ordering 300,000 a year, whatever it was, it doesn’t cost a lot of money and you can get someone to pay for it. So you’d have your own logos. So then it would kind of have the same look, but it has a design but different stuff. So I think there’s value to having something that’s all the same, especially now, look you can’t have it. So here’s here’s what it is. But there is beauty in having the mark, the design, the look, the feel of a Dave Matthews concert and a Phish concert, a certain sporting event that looks a little bit different. So we’re working on offering both of those and we don’t have any data to say which one does someone prefer, but eventually we’ll find out which prefers. But my guess would be there’s a lot of each.
Scrappy:
Got you. When I was in middle school, I was in Jacksonville, Florida and I snuck into a Michael Jackson concert. I got in the sixth row by pretending I was a security guard, even though I was very young at the time. And it was awesome. It was an incredible experience. I’ll never forget it. What would you make for me?
Matt Wolff:
Yeah. So now what I could do is I could print a thermal ticket for you and put Michael Jackson on there. That’s what I could do. Now I would never tell anyone to do this, but you can go and the world is pretty easy to figure out how to create your own ticket if you wanted to make a ticket, whatever you want to call it, and go to a Kinko’s and print your own something that’s nice. What we like about this is, this is an actual thermal ticket. It’s thermal stock. This is what everyone used to get into an arena and an event. So there’s again, some authenticity to that, although it might not look as cool. There’s a lot of tickets out there for some of the best shows I’ve been to that they don’t look very good. I have Tom Petty tickets, they were just Ticketmaster tickets on the regular Log Nation stock. But ultimately what we’d want to do is partner with the Michael Jackson estate to come up with a program for anyone who’s seen Michael Jackson-
Scrappy:
Absolutely.
Matt Wolff:
And let’s print something that’s really cool and let’s customize it.
Scrappy:
So your thermal ticket is one of your differential advantages because there are young people who can get on Photoshop or myself and try to replicate something on our own. So what’s your sell, what’s your differential advantage as far as the customer’s concern?
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, that’s a good point. The core of what we do is going to be the thermal ticket and the animated ticket. You can go to 10,000, maybe even more printers and get a regular ticket, even a seasoned ticket and they could maybe put some foil, they can put a perf on it, whatever. There’s thousands and thousands and thousands of companies who can do that. If you start looking at who can do a thermal ticket and you start looking at who can do an animated ticket, we’ve narrowed that down to a very small group of companies and from that we just do it better. We offer better customer service. We operate from the viewpoint of a fan, not a printing company. Say you print this. Well look, I don’t think that’s what you want to do. I think you want to do this. More on an offer like the consulting side of being someone who’s a fan, who’s trying to say what’s going to give the best value to the person on the receiving end.
So that’s really the differentiator and we don’t want to sell on price, but man, this [inaudible 00:09:29] of tickets that are being sold out there that I think are just, anyone can go print or being sold for twice as much as the stuff that our stuff is being sold for. So there’s a lot of things that I think differentiate us, but I think the authenticity and the uniqueness of it. The digital experiences that we’ve added to our stuff, even way more. Just all kinds of, there’s going to be augmented reality and UGC where you can just take a picture of yourself with Michael Jackson behind you and now you post it to social media, video response, engaging with the audience, all different types of stuff. That’s also something that’s going to differentiate us. But it’s good that you brought that up because we are doing the stuff that there’s not a lot of people who can do.
Michael Barnes:
Hi, I’m Michael Barnes, owner of Content With Teeth. We are a creative content agency in southwest Florida. We specialize in copywriting and video production with over two decades of experience creating unboring content. If you struggle to create compelling stuff for your business or client, check us out at contentwithteeth.com. Now back to our show.
Scrappy:
Well actually that’s my next question. What’s the competition like in your space?
Matt Wolff:
Well there’s companies that do print the normal stuff. I would say normal. It’s really nice. Some of it’s nice, it’s full color, there’s foil, it’s great. But nowadays with the machinery out there and the stuff you can do in your own home, I just don’t think, it’s common. It’s just more common. The only difference is they’ve been around longer. They might have some of the bigger relationships than we have now, but that’s going to change.
Scrappy:
That’s what I find fascinating in entrepreneurship. When you make that leap, you go from a full-time job to something full-time within your passion in your field. Tell us about that experience.
Matt Wolff:
Yeah man, that’s the question, when do you jump? And I felt like I jumped at the exact right time and even after everything that happened afterwards I would still go back and do the same thing. But I went from having a very nice paycheck and to not getting any money and no one’s giving me money unless we bring jobs in and it takes, if you’ve started a business before, it takes time before you can start getting enough revenue to start paying for things and not having to put that back in. So it’s tough. You have to be mentally strong. You have to be 100% in, like “Hey, I’m going to make this happen. I’m going to do whatever I need to do to make this happen”. And just know that it’s going to take longer than you expect.
It’s take longer than I expect. It’s taken longer than it should, but I think if it’s what you believe in and you’re passionate about it, that’s an important thing. I think I’m solving a problem, that’s another important thing. And I think I have a good product and that’s a good combination to have.
Scrappy:
Absolutely.
Matt Wolff:
But I say just do it. Start what you want to start. I don’t say just jump and do, you have to have the plan, you have to understand what might happen but you should just start it. That was the biggest obstacle for me in the past, is I just never, I got to that first roadblock and I was like “eh, it’s too difficult. I’m not going to be able to do this”. And this time I just said, “I don’t care what it takes, this is what I’m going to be doing and this is it”.
Scrappy:
You’re all in.
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, I was all in a lot of ways. So mentally, financially. I’m bootstrapping this thing, no investors and with no money coming in, it’s not an easy thing. I saved well and I’m lucky. And you spend smart but it’s not an easy task. I recommend you really getting your mind around what is life is going to be like and what the company’s going to be like and the trials and tribulations that you’re going to go through, the rollercoaster. But I would say there’s very few reasons why you shouldn’t take a chance. The only one is if you can’t give it your all and if it’s just not a thing that is going to be a thing and that’s hard to know, but sometimes you can just tell something’s not going to be a thing.
Scrappy:
Sure, sure. Matt, you’re obviously passionate about this business. From a percentage standpoint, how much of it is financial opportunity versus passion? If you can differentiate the two.
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, that’s a great question. Who can differentiate that. I started this because I’m a fan and this is what I want, this is what I think fans should be able to have. Now I quit my job to make this my full-time business because I believe in it enough that it’s going to take me to where I need to be financially. To live the lifestyle and continue to do the things that I love to do. Which by the way are events, sports and entertainment and concerts and travel to go do stuff. I think it’s going to go way beyond that. But if it doesn’t, it’s okay with me. I just need to be able to provide for myself and my family, live the lifestyle I want and be able to provide.
Because everything we do, like you say, “hey we need a win-win situation”. And then I hear people say, well they want to win-win-win. For me it’s got to be a win-win-win-win. So it’s got to be a win for Ticket Time Machine. It’s got to be a win for ever who’s ever getting our stuff. It’s got to be a win for the people that they’re involved with. Sponsors, partners, their kind of community or organization.
Scrappy:
Absolutely.
Matt Wolff:
And then a win for the fans. And it’s very easy to have all of that. And so that’s important to me. Everything we do is going to be fan first and that doesn’t always equate to the highest profit, but it doesn’t matter. I say even if I don’t make something, I don’t lose money, we should do it. Almost always, especially at the first rate. And I think that there’s organizations that should think that way but they don’t.
Scrappy:
Right.
Matt Wolff:
I say “Hey, you’re not going to lose any money. It costs you nothing. Let’s let the fans decide”. Jesse Cole of the Savannah Bananas who are going gangbusters now. They have a special on ESPN coming out. It’s just crazy. He said, and this is how I think how I got them to work with me after getting in touch with them. I said, “we let the fans decide. We don’t try and determine what’s going to work or what’s not. We let the fans decide and they’ll let us know”. And that probably includes taking a risk with time and money and energy. But the stuff that we can do is say, Hey, it’s not going to cost you anything. Let’s just put it out there, whatever sells will sell and let’s let them decide. And by the way, just because it doesn’t sell like crazy doesn’t mean it was a bad idea. There’s a lot of factors that go beyond that, which I have stories I could share with you. But to go back to the question, it’s a high number, is passion.
Scrappy:
Got you. Got you. I think it’s awesome. And I just got to say we’re sponsored by Content With Teeth, a creative content agency with over 20 years of experience right here in southwest Florida. As you can see with our fat head, we do it big. Specializing in copywriting and video production. We’ve got content and if you want to sponsor The Come Up or be a guest, hit me up @heyscrappy on IG or text Mike at 21000. The last one I have is because you’re passionate about it and maybe your margins, you don’t mind a slim margin to do something special and leverage forward. Walkathons, Marathons, cancer Society, breast cancer societies. Have you thought about that?
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, we’re doing, I mean we do stuff like that. Charity events.
Scrappy:
You’re killing me Matt. I’m not creative here, I’m not original here.
Matt Wolff:
We’re working on something for the cancer and in-person cancer event. All of them. I mean, look, anything, the stuff that you have to try and get creative is like what’s not an event that people want. We’ve done graduations, a thank you for a corporate event. Trade shows and conferences that you want something that’s a little bit unique, like this is something we did for a conference in a trade show where you can walk around. But for me, the little league, the Special Olympics, those are huge things that are not ticketed events. Let’s create tickets for them.
Scrappy:
Absolutely.
Matt Wolff:
Because it’s a great memory, not because you need a ticket to get in. That’s the whole thing. Nine out of ten stuff we do is commemorative or souvenir. Now we can RFID, we can barcode. So we can grant access, limit access, and we can do admission if you need us to. Most people don’t. And so I say, we already have ticketing, we do digital. That’s okay, let’s work with the people who don’t even have tickets. There’s no tickets to this thing, but let’s give people a ticket who want a ticket.
Scrappy:
I’m sold. I think it’s amazing. I came up with 10 ideas that I thought I was really proud of and Matt-
Matt Wolff:
Oh they’re all great ideas by the way. They’re all great ideas, but it’s those ar the things that, it makes me happy to know that that’s what you think of because that’s exactly what you should be thinking of. Are you going to be at any Gator games this year?
Scrappy:
You know what? I love my 60-inch TV, my family, the announcers, my dog. I mean, I was up in Gainesville a couple weeks ago and I visited the school, but there’s something about just getting every ounce of the game in front of me as opposed to being far away. I know this is an experience attached to being there, but I tend to stay home.
Matt Wolff:
No, there’s a lot of people who are like that. I love to go. If I live there, I probably would go to almost every game, but I’m four hours away and I’ll go to a couple games. I go to Jacksonville for the cocktail party.
Scrappy:
Cool.
Matt Wolff:
I’m going to be at the first game. We got something special brewing for that, for some of the fans who-
Scrappy:
Awesome, awesome, awesome. Matt, Ticket Time Machine, man, I really appreciate you. I learned a lot in this experience and always love talking to creative, innovative, charismatic leaders of the future. And you’re doing it. I really admire that you’re taking the sacrifices and risks to do something on your own. It’s totally awesome, man. And we’re brought by Content With Teeth, Content With Teeth doing really innovative things from a content perspective. Matt, thanks again buddy. I really appreciate you taking the time.
Matt Wolff:
Yeah, it was great to chat with you and I talked to Michael, got some more information about Content With Teeth and looking forward to seeing some of the capabilities, but really appreciate the time.
Scrappy:
Yeah, I enjoyed it. Thank you very much.
