Summary:

In this episode of "In The Bunker," join us as we explore the entrepreneurial journey of Brian Gaddis and Jesse Johnson, owners of DFW Metroplex Bubble Ball. They delve into their experiences of understanding and implementing effective marketing strategies, overcoming challenges in product quality and vendor logistics, and the unique aspects of buying and scaling a business.

Our episode highlights:

• Brian and Jesse’s background and how they ventured into the world of bubble ball.
• Challenges in determining the most effective marketing strategies and their approach to trial and error in business.
• Insights into the impact of COVID-19 on their business and the experience of purchasing an existing business.
• Valuable advice for fellow entrepreneurs facing similar challenges, including market saturation, the efficacy of Google Ads, and the importance of better tracking and analytics.

Bio:

Brian Gaddis and Jesse Johnson bring their respective backgrounds in recreation and sports management to the world of bubble ball. Brian, a Texas State University alum, and Jesse, a graduate of Western Michigan University and UNT, combined their expertise to purchase and grow DFW Metroplex Bubble Ball. They specialize in offering unique and engaging bubble ball events in the Dallas area, leveraging their knowledge and skills in the recreation industry.

Links:

• Website: http://www.dfwbubbleball.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dfwmetroplexbubbleball
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dfwbubbleball/
• LinkedIn (Brian Gaddis): https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-gaddis-28992241

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Welcome back to in the bunker.

Every business owner has faced challenges and we love to share those stories today.

We've got Brian and Jesse in the bunker with us running Jesse were faced

with the challenge of understanding what marketing is most effective.

I'm excited to jump in and learn about how they've overcame this challenge.

But first, before we jump in, let's go get a 92nd high-level

background on both these guys, Jesse.

Why don't you give us that background.

Who are you?

How'd you get here?

What does that look like?

Yes.

I grew up in Michigan, born and raised there, moved to Texas here about 2005.

Graduated from UNT in recreation or management degree.

Got some great idea to go get a master's as well.

So I did that too.

But I've been in sports my whole life playing it, beat

around it, going through YMCAs.

So that's kinda how I fell into the recreation and then,

purchased the vehicle with Brian.

And that's how we got started with that.

Awesome.

Awesome.

Brian, what about yourself?

Who are you?

No, definitely.

I grew up in Houston, Texas, and when I graduated high school, I decided I

would go to Texas state university, not sure of what I wanted to do.

I just knew I wanted to be out in the hill country, going out, going to

school, decided to be a recreation major.

So I majored in recreational administration.

That took me all over the place with internships, but I ended up

in my final internship in Dallas.

And through that, I ended up staying up in Dallas and then I, ever since my

first internship of 2007, I've been just.

iNtrigued by trends and best practices for recreation all over the

place, private, public non-profit.

And so through that, I got together with Jesse and we saw

that bubble ball, bubble soccer.

It was was a hip new thing back in the mid two thousands and then

decided to So I bought the business in

2017.

Awesome.

Now you mentioned your degree for those who, are listening.

Can you define what that looks like a little bit?

Yeah.

Texas state has an accredited.

Bachelor of science, recreational administration degree plan, where

you do different, you have different classes, courses in regards to different

coursework and understanding, recreation, all the types of recreation that

as well as what that looks like as.

pArt of the coursework though, is a lot of hands on.

So even in my first even, I hadn't even, I hadn't even declared the major yet.

And I took the, most work intensive class, a record app.

Programming and recreation.

And we literally built a haunted house for a neighboring city.

And then we also assisted in putting on there another special event at Christmas.

And so it's a lot about.

Learning on the job.

So I turned also at at my church's recreation center in Houston,

and I learned, operations there.

And then I also learn the operations of campus recreation

at Texas state in the sport club.

The vision.

And then I ended up at the water court in Dallas that was run, had

just been taken over by the city.

So it was a publicly run, a waterpark home, a beach.

And so anyway, it just, it's a really interesting degree, has a really

good community of professionals that.

Help, it's, there's a lot of good networking in regards to

that as far as alumni and people

in the workforce.

That's cool.

That's cool.

It's always amazing.

There's so many different degrees and industries out

there and you start hearing.

The ones you don't even know exist.

And it's, now that you explain it, it's like, it makes sense.

Someone's got to, figure out the logistics of the programs and the,

all of the craziness that is involved in, those types of facilities, but

yeah, you don't think about yes.

And to

add to that.

If you've been to a Y YMCA, if you've been to a recreation facility,

someone is programming the facility.

So Brian and I both.

So we're running small businesses as revenue preservation.

So all of that income.

So if you, with any city citywide event, I'm pretty sure the

recreation department had something.

So you see it all the time, but just don't realize what's really

going on behind the scenes.

People put it on offering free opportunity for

that's.

Cool.

That's cool.

Yeah.

Awesome.

Obviously the two you guys met and you guys bought a business

you purchased a business.

I know, before we hit record, one of the sort of underlying challenge we

were talking about was understanding, what marketing is most effective and

the trial and error aspect of that.

When you guys purchased that business, what was that process like?

Did you know, you guys have a customer base or was that sort of

a cool now we have some product and we got to start at square one,

for me, me and Brian are opposites when it comes to certain

things like parking, I'm more old school.

Hey, let's just put it off to your is hopefully word of mouth.

Whereas, Brian is definitely the one with the analytics and looking at,

Different social media outlets that he had, but it was definitely square

one now, blah, blah, blah, is an event that you probably do one, or

maybe you have it in an annual exam.

So even with the customers that the prior owners had, maybe 10% of them

will be repeat customers because of, a school, a city or something like that.

But it was definitely start from square one being more active in social, because

that was one area that they didn't have.

They've been a little.

So they didn't really have a presence.

So that something that Brian what our social media out there, the

biggest thing is a lot of people don't know what it is, right?

So you see this big, giant bubble, you call it Sumo ball

or whatever you want to call it.

So I think that was the one thing that we tried to just to get

people, to stay disciplined, see what it is and the proper name for.

Got it.

Yeah.

As we're talking about this, obviously there's an element, for it's your

guys' business is bubble ball.

It's those big, giant inflatable we're coming out of out of COVID

and so that term, I know I've seen.

On the news, like there's people like walking down the street and a

giant bubble ball thing and it's oh, Hey, I can go out and do whatever.

So you guys, Brian, maybe give us the quick overview of what does that look like

for an event that you guys are running?

What does that look like for the service that you guys are offering as well?

So we can understand that a little bit better as we further discuss this.

Yeah.

In regards to bubble ball, we do events for all types of customers.

So we do.

We kind of group it into organizations and, private birthday parties

or any type of private party.

So in regards to an organization we just see how long they need us for and,

we'll go out there and we, set up the beds and let people play and make sure

they stay safe and, lead activities.

We have a good group, if not, we just make sure they know how to get in the

bubble and they can, hit each other or sometimes sometimes play other games.

Like I said if we want to organize it, but if it's a steady stream of

people, we want to make sure everybody gets a chance to eat at least, do

what they want to do, which 99% of the people just want to hit each other.

So we let them do that.

And then we keep it moving.

As Jesse says, and then we, we.

We take it down to the end and we clean up and we're out of their hair.

So we're, we're self-sufficient, and it's very much similar with a private parties,

but we tailor it to the amount of people.

If it's.

The main amount of people is under 20, that would participate in a

birthday party for the most part.

And so we, we set up and then we lead games, different type of games.

We lead soccer, we lead different games sharks and minnows and some other ones.

If I just said the name, I'd have to actually explain what it was, we

do a game called protected general.

We do a last man standing.

And so in regards to that, we tailor the experience a little bit more or the

individual and to really make sure we're keeping the kids engaged the whole time.

Cause we know, the event is just for those 20 people and we make sure, they have.

A lot of fun and are able to sleep well that night.

And but yeah, it's pretty much pretty much a one, two hour event when we

do it with a, like a private party.

So that's kinda what it looks like in regards to an event that we would do.

Awesome.

So you've got a bunch of people running around and bubbles And playing

essentially different, different games based upon that, the number of people

that you guys have and such and I was on your guys' website and looking at

the the video and it's funny to watch.

sO as you guys, bought the company and started into that, and Jesse,

you were talking about, the issue of.

This is not a coffee shop where someone's coming in, three to four days

a week buying the same cup of coffee.

Your guys has customers maybe once a year, maybe twice a year

at most type element potentially.

And what has that marketing, trial and error that you guys alluded to?

What does that sort of look like?

And what stuff have you guys learned through that process?

Definitely, you're running ads, whether it be digitally with Facebook,

Instagram, get dabbling to YouTube.

buT like I said earlier, I think the biggest thing is always

going to be worried about.

And I think Instagram definitely helps because it's visual, right?

So AR is definitely visual.

So you definitely something that you want.

And then you always want to be a part of them.

And I guess for us, it was always someone's birthday.

It was always a special event.

So I think that helps us well and word of mouth, because if you have

a great experience with Brian, same experience, guess what?

You're going to tell your friends that we have kids, oh, I'm going

to do this from my first day.

It just trickle down.

And we will say that I think Google with those, that.

Do you see uptick, but a lot of times it's just people

inquiring or seeing what it is.

We're definitely at a higher price point.

So it's definitely not going to Chuck and team, but obviously you

understand the experience that you have, more important than

it's kinda, it's something where a lot of times, They will already

have known kind of what bubble ball is or bubble soccer is, or now we actually

do, hamster balls with your cold sore balls and they know what that is, but

they are trying to see, who does that.

And if.

wHo does the cheapest and available and use, unfortunately not with COVID, a

lot of the businesses that might have good SEO or at the top of search results

might not even be in business currently.

So the main thing is being on top of.

SEO in regards to, what we would be searched for.

And we've understood through this, that we're not going to be, at the

top of the list for special events in Dallas, but at the same time we

understand that is our price point or what we do is that gonna be, something

that everybody looking for that is really going to be interested in, Yeah.

Got it.

Yeah.

Yeah, for sure.

And obviously, you alluded to COVID COVID hitting some of your competition.

What did that look like for you guys, as obviously it affected

different businesses differently.

Would that look like for you guys?

What type of effect did that have on your.

So here in the Dallas area once we hit March of 2020, that's

when things came to a screeching halt.

So once spring break hit, we started getting emails and

calls back no back to back.

However, the funny thing about that is in 21, we actually did this then

in 2019, because of COVID because.

People were shutting now they want to get out.

And a lot of people saw, I know we were talking before we started recording

about you see what people in bubbles and the news was talking about it.

So I guess people felt safe to get in these boats, but you can still

have fun, have contact with people, but if you didn't have to physically

touch them, didn't have to worry about them coughing or sneezing.

So he was like a protective barrier that we have building bubbles.

So it's, COVID got a little more exposure, even though we understand what really

happened with them, not to minimize that, but it definitely picked up RPA

get going in 2020 and going to 21.

And I think what's interesting is a lot of parents with kids.

We're not as consistent customers, ever since the pandemic, as compared to

churches and schools, because I think a lot of times churches and schools have

their own budget for stuff like that.

And they know that safe, but.

Sometimes with parents, with kids, they want to make sure

that they have an activity.

I think that the parents of all the kids being invited would be,

feel comfortable doing in the state that we're in with COVID.

So I know for.

A long time, we wouldn't have a whole lot of birthday parties or

whatnot, but we still had churches and still had schools contacting us.

And I think especially churches, I just think they, they were still

needing something to do with their students, and w we were also video,

doing, we were hired to do videos, to just make sure that the kids were

staying engaged during that time.

Got it.

So essentially like you guys had an element or had an activity that was

an outdoor, activity, and Jesse's, you're talking about, people are

in these quote unquote, like these actual bubbles, and we're talking

about, Hey, make sure you maintain six feet while you're in this, I know.

We work with a pink ball company and they were talking about, yeah, six feet

really easily, you're on a paintball field and you come within six feet,

I'll just, shoot paint balls at you.

And I think there, I can definitely see how, you guys were impacted, which

makes sense at the beginning of COVID.

Cause no one knew what the heck to do, but then as outdoor activities were

coming back to more of a normal elements.

That makes sense that people would continue to explore that.

And, a large scale event outside, in a bubble makes sense.

It's good.

I Was gonna say, I think indirectly we're in the Dallas

area and the owner of the Mavericks mark Cuban was on shark tank.

I, he still is, but when the bubble ball concepts, the inventor of bubble

ball was actually on shark tank.

And I got a lot of people, he was on a TMZ interview and he just

said what they said, what are you, what are y'all getting ready to do?

Oh, we got these bubble balls out.

And, I think.

The American airlines center opens up this, the first thing we need to be doing

because it's natural social distancing.

And I think stuff like that when people actually, have influence say stuff like

that, it can go a long way, even though, who's, are indirect, Five minutes of fame.

It was really cool to see that.

And for that to be out there and for, somebody that influenced to say,

this is literally don't overthink it.

It is social distancing, we disinfected the bubble suits, but

I thought that was pretty cool.

Yeah.

That's cool.

That's cool.

Jesse, did you have

something to add to that?

I would just want to say that people just wanted something

and, let's just get out with, do something.

And, I think we had some good times, cause it was fun, safe activity

that the whole family, not just, kids, mom and dad could enjoy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I know.

Out in the California area, Man parks at the beginning of COVID

parks, the beaches, hiking trails.

Hiking trails were just, it was like the parking lot would just be so full

of people and there would just be hundreds of people lining up, just,

just hiking out and it was nuts.

It was nuts.

People were just trying to get out of the house and get a fresh breath of air.

And.

Get away from sitting on the couch and bingeing Netflix all day.

Yeah.

Awesome.

I don't know if.

Looking at the marketing aspect.

I don't know if there's anything that you guys look back on now and go, this

is something that really helped us, or, this was a piece of information

that we wish we would've known before we dove into buying a business.

Is there any sort of nuggets of information that you guys feel

like you wish you would've known before you jumped into this.

I mean for myself.

Not really, just because I think if we're just talking

about blah, blah, blah, right?

Not a lot of competition, we can fit the market with pricing, just

basically getting the word out now, have we purchased coffee, then

that's a whole different animal.

I think that we were lucky with what we did purchase.

We probably can only find one or two other companies in the area where can

you get a business to where it's only one or two other competitors not meeting?

So I think that was the biggest thing.

It may, Brian May have, he did more the marketing of social media.

So for him it may be something different, but for me, like just taking

that chance, seeing what happened.

Yeah.

I've seen seen this meme, this.

That's good that, we're getting exposure by doing this, but I wonder how we

can use exposure to pay our bills.

And that's something I learned.

I think I was naive.

Thinking that if we take the time out to do an event for free for the

community though, there's always a reservoir of, look what we, it's good

for, taking pictures and whatnot.

But I think to date, we have yet to get any business from anything that we did

for for organization not to say it's not a good idea just to, I think I would have

been a little more selective initially.

As far as when the whole, it's good for exposure.

And then I think that certain aspect of Google ads is not the best, like

paying for Google ads is not the best for small business owners, because

you can lose a lot of money in real quick in regards to Just paying for ads

that you don't really see a return on.

And I think if I had known that at the beginning that, people that click

on your ads or even like I said, at the beginning if you're paying

tons of money for a certain keyword, that doesn't mean that's going to

transfer into business in what we do.

And so that's learning

curve.

I think also then to go back on to Google, probably if we would have had

a landing, a separate landing page, then we probably could have measured a little

more just to see versus having to come back to track and come back to our home.

So like when I fill out the form of state Google, okay.

Was it a Google ad or was it just you in the search box?

So having that landing page probably helped us determine if it, if it was

even worth it and we probably could stop.

Halfway through with

Google.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Sadly, definitely not things that I've heard before.

Brian is, we were talking about Google ads, for those who are listening,

like you want to make sure you have a monthly budget set because if you do.

Depending on the industry, it can be anywhere from between, a dollar or so, a

click to, car insurance and life insurance are upwards of about 60 to $70 a click.

And you look at it from a conversion perspective.

A hundred people to hit a landing page.

And if you get 10, 10%, which is insanely high, typically it'd be

about 2% actually fill out a web form.

And then out of those 2%, only 5% of those people are actually

going to convert to a sale.

So it's like you start looking at the massive number of people that you need.

So you need a thousand clicks to get, like three sales.

And so then you start realizing, okay, that's a thousand

clicks times $50 per click.

I need to spend $50,000 to get two or three sales.

And you start to reverse engineer that, and you realize like that is

not a sustainable business model.

And there's definitely other ways to do, some guerrilla marketing.

And some stuff like that.

And Brian, you talked about doing those sort of community

events where they're free.

That's great for photos.

Like you mentioned, Hey, you guys got photos that way.

That is a great way to reduce the expense of what, you didn't

have to hire a bunch of actors.

You put on a free event for the community, so that's great, those

are the types of things that we love, chalk it up to a business lesson and a.

We're not going to do that again.

And actually the thing about it, we didn't even really

pay any marketing in 2020.

And like I said, we had a better year.

So if it was, I'm not sure if the traction on the social media pages from Brian,

probably but we didn't know Google ads.

So Facebook ads, Instagram ads at all.

And to be perfectly transparent with that.

I think at least Instagram, which is our biggest following we've had, like

in the four years or going on five years, I think we've had two customers.

And so those campaigns from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, they're good.

They're good to clout Facebook.

If you, cause people do find it's interesting, people do find us

through Facebook that might be.

Webpage has set up.

Cause that's how they have to go to, to ask us a question like right

when they go to the website, but it shows up like, oh, this is, this

business, so we in the beginning we paid it or are to help get more

followers for them to see our business.

Cause it's harder on Facebook, but other than that I don't know the whole lot of

business we've got from social media.

And that's just like going down to the business model though,

because of the price point.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And in reality, it depends on the business type.

It depends on, so many different factors when it comes down to that.

And that's where.

For me, every business is super unique and every business has

different needs, a different market.

Jesse, you were talking about market saturation.

If you were to open another coffee shop in your town I don't

care what city you live in.

Throw a map of the U S up on the wall, throw a dart at it.

And there's probably a dozen coffee shops within a few miles of that dark.

But take a random city name.

Search that random city name with bubble ball or one of your other keywords.

There's probably maybe one not much more.

So obviously market saturation, if you're thinking of starting a business is a huge

thing to do some serious research on.

I think that's really valuable.

And I think with Instagram too is more of, because I do it myself

searching, I save a post, then I come back to it a week or two weeks.

So I think that's what Instagram is.

People are seeing it and they come back to it in a month, two weeks or whatever,

and then it could be some traction on.

Yeah.

Yeah, for sure.

Awesome.

It was super good chatting with you guys.

I think there's a bunch of different, really good takeaways

from our conversation today.

For those who are listening and do want to find out more about

just bubble ball in general, or if you live in the Dallas area and.

yoU want to have a party and just clobber someone in a bubble ball.

I'll have the links to both your guys's website, your Facebook, Instagram page,

and all of that in the show notes, along with both Brian and Jessie's bio those

will both be down there as well, awesome.

I appreciate your guys' time today, having you on the show.

Really good.

Good having you guys.

And yeah.

All right.

Thank you.

Thank

you.

Thank you guys.

Thanks for listening to this episode of, in the bunker.

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