Friday May 27th, 2011 - Milwaukee, WI Time to make Schlitz happen. After thinking carefully about all the things I’m currently working on, this is the one project that I think needs to be developed first. Everything else can be put on hold, but this one needs to get some attention so I can get it off the ground. The ultimate goal is to create a brand with this project, and market it to those who lived in or near Milwaukee before 1990. I’d like to have a website packed with content about as many Milwaukee themed topics as I can, even though Dave Mierzwinski has a wonderful site of his own called Retro-Milwaukee which is located at www.retromilwaukee.com. Dave’s site goes way past where I’d even think of going, and is more for historians that want to look back at Milwaukee’s culture. I’m interested in getting laughs, and that’s very different. Dave has been extremely supportive of what I’m doing, and I always want to be respectful and mention his site whenever I can. When my site is up, his will have a link. Another person who has my respect is John McGivern. He’s done several shows about his Milwaukee roots apparently, but we’re completely different people and I think there’s plenty of room for both of us. He’s an actor, I’m a comic. He grew up Catholic, I didn’t. His take and my take are going to be completely different. I’m not trying to copy what he’s doing and I’m not trying to gun for him to put him out of business or anything at all like that. That’s not the right way to do business. I just want to make room for my show, and doing the best job I can will help do that. Having other shows like it will only help. George Webb is a Milwaukee based hamburger chain that has been around since 1948. McDonald’s came along later, but both have been successful for decades. I think this will be the same thing. I’ll go in with respect, and hope to meet with John and tell him exactly what I plan on doing so we’ll all be on the same page from day one. That’s what I’d want. There are plenty of potential venues to choose and that’s why I went up there today. In a perfect world, I’d like two or three smaller venues to do semi regular shows on weekends starting in the fall. I need to work all summer to have a solid product when the actual gigs do come in, and I also want to have all the promotional legwork done by the time it starts. I also called two major radio stations and asked for a rate card. I will have to let people know somehow, and radio would help. I’ll also hope to buy ads on ESPN 540, because of my regular appearances on The D List. They’ve been great to me so I hope to reciprocate. I’m looking at this as a business, but also a labor of love. I had lunch with my long time friend Mark Krueger who sells ad space for the Shepherd Express newspaper. He’ll help me get bang for my buck with ads and coverage, and I hope I can be a regular customer. I had dinner at Drew Olson’s house as I hadn’t seen him and his family for a while. We had a blast and also ran some ideas up the flagpole about all this. What a productive day.
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