Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: All right, it's on. You ready?
[00:00:02] Speaker B: I'm ready. Let's do it.
[00:00:03] Speaker A: Let's do it.
Welcome once again to the Stan and Shen show. Stan Hoodie with the Daily Gazette. And Shannon is on assignment. But I am pleased, thrilled and overwhelmed to introduce Tracy Page from her advertising department, who is here to talk about super, super Fun Day Sunday and the Gazette Wedding Show. So, Tracy, introduce yourself and tell us what's going on Sunday.
[00:00:31] Speaker B: All right. Well, hello, my name is Tracy Page and I am the events person here at the Daily Gazette. What an honor. How much fun is this, right?
And Sunday we have our 25th annual capital regions premiere wedding show that is going to be going on from 11am to 3pm Free admission, just have to register. Registration is going to close online on Friday, but you can register at the door.
So what do you want to know, Stan? Tell me.
[00:00:57] Speaker A: So 25 is silver, right? It's the silver.
[00:01:00] Speaker B: It is the silver anniversary of our show.
[00:01:03] Speaker A: And so for those of you who don't know, if you haven't seen Tracy salesperson, event coordinator extraordinaire. So we got real close a month ago as you coordinated created out of a warehouse, which was our former press room, this wonderful 130th anniversary of the Gazette itself as an entity. And it appeared that you did it without breaking a sweat.
[00:01:34] Speaker B: And I had. So you know the story, right? You do know that I was given two weeks to the day to take a warehouse and turn it into a fun room that we could do our celebration in and all of that stuff. And yes, I did do it without breaking a sweat. I did. It was. No, I just called who I needed to call and I made things appear. And then we decorated and we had the food and it was fun and we made a. Stan, you know, we made a lot of last minute changes that day.
[00:02:01] Speaker A: We did, we. We did a lot on the fly and. But everything went, it looked great. I think everybody who came, all our invited guests, I think we had a top turnout. I don't think, I think very few people on the list missed the event.
And I know that was well received.
And just regarding that, I, when I talked to you about the wedding show, then coming on the podcast to talk about the wedding show, you're like, oh, that's old hat. I've done this stuff for years. So I'm okay, I believe you. I'm not gonna source this out. But what's your background?
[00:02:37] Speaker B: So I have been doing events since I was 19. I've been doing actual car shows, hot rod Shows, that sort of stuff. Since I was 19 years old. I retired doing that probably when I was about 45. I said I had enough. So both kids raised in that industry, which is fun. I've worked here at the paper for. I think I had about over 20 years here. So between advertising and events, Saratoga Automobile Museum. I was their event coordinator there. So I did their. Their galas and their fundraisers there.
There was one point that a gentleman actually tracked me down from the Saratoga Automobile Museum because he wanted to build a museum at his house for cars. So I did that.
So, yes, I am. I like to coordinate and put things together. It makes me happy. So this year for the wedding show, you ready 20 here.
[00:03:25] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:03:26] Speaker B: So we moved the wedding show from the hall of Springs, which was a huge, big difference. We went to the city center, so we have twice as much space. I told everybody that we were going to do twice as much stuff and have twice as many vendors, and we did it.
[00:03:41] Speaker A: So how. How big. How big is it? How. How big is this? I mean, this is the biggest and the best we are. Sunday afternoon.
[00:03:51] Speaker B: Yes, biggest and the best Sunday afternoon. We have over 80 vendors at the event. We are doing a backyard wedding experience. Which food trucks that are going to be doing food sampling all day long. I have wineries that are there that are going to be doing sampling all day long. I have the other one, brewing company, which, you know, Randy Lewis, that works here, too. So he's going to be there all day doing sampling. We have a ton of, I'm going to say, probably 15 different venues or caterers that are going to be serving food all day. So it is definitely going to be a fun day.
[00:04:25] Speaker A: Gotcha. The.
From my experience, I'm thrilled just because the lighting's better in the city center, because I was just there for the RV show last week. So when I knew we had the wedding event coming up, and then when I found out that it was the city center, I'm like, okay, I've got good lighting. So that made me happy. And then to find out the amount of vendors and then a ton of brides already.
[00:04:49] Speaker B: Oh, yes, a ton of brides. We have 300 brides registered already, and we are just ramping up our advertising now. I mean, we wanted to get everything in place. So this week we're going to be handling it like crazy. But, yes, we have 300 brides registered right now.
[00:05:00] Speaker A: Right now. Today. As we record this today, they can still register online through Friday at noon.
[00:05:07] Speaker B: And then at the door on Sunday and.
[00:05:10] Speaker A: And you talked about.
It's. It's a quick. It's a quick show. It's a small window, 11 to 3. But all the action is kind of like you want to be there for the first half of this. This wedding football game, right?
[00:05:21] Speaker B: Oh, of course you do. You know why? Because we have $6,000 worth of door prizes to give away, which are from the vendors that are there. So we have overnight different venues. We have somebody's giving away luggage, but you have to be present. And we're doing all of those prize giveaways before 12:30.
[00:05:39] Speaker A: Okay, so it's. You get what can you. Can you go. Is this a situation where a bride could come in with the crew?
[00:05:51] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:05:52] Speaker A: Could be mother. Could be mother in law, could be best friends, sisters, future sister in laws and get done stem to stern. Do you think like from A to Z get. Be done?
[00:06:03] Speaker B: Yes, they can be done. We have wedding dresses there. And actually so we also have fun. The Scotland shop is going to be there. So they're actually going to have wedding attire if you want to do a Scotland or Irish themed wedding. So they are going to be there. And we do have Lily of Saratoga that's going to be there with wedding dresses. So yes, we can get A to Z. Everything that you need under one roof and we can get you all done in one day.
[00:06:26] Speaker A: All right. And then. I know, I know we were invited. The show was invited.
[00:06:31] Speaker B: Yes, you guys were.
[00:06:32] Speaker A: We were. And in a sense are that the.
Hopefully I pray the future bride, Shannon is not going.
[00:06:42] Speaker B: She's not going.
[00:06:43] Speaker A: She's not going. She's. She's wedding adverse at this point in time.
[00:06:46] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:06:47] Speaker A: But again, just as you are my lovely co host, today I'm bringing the OG Bride.
[00:06:54] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:06:55] Speaker A: To do the show. So we have the OG bride, my wife Rita.
[00:06:59] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:07:00] Speaker A: So we've got 35 years in.
[00:07:02] Speaker B: Okay, so you have some tips.
[00:07:04] Speaker A: So. Yes. And Rita is full of them.
[00:07:06] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:07:06] Speaker A: So. And she has strong opinions. And again, I think you and I are. Are close enough to remember the.
Probably my wife will say the horrors of taffeta dresses.
[00:07:17] Speaker B: Oh, yes.
[00:07:18] Speaker A: And the big hair.
[00:07:19] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. And I got married back then.
[00:07:22] Speaker A: That's. Yeah. So, you know, we were marri.
The southern tier in Johnson City at. At. @ St. James and it was Catholic aerobics. Aerobics. So it was an hour ceremony and it was up and down and up and down and kneel and stand and Neil and stand and things like that in August.
[00:07:39] Speaker B: So no air conditioning.
[00:07:40] Speaker A: Oh, God, no. Still. No, still, still. St. James is still not air conditioned, so she's very excited to go and talk to some brides and also see what's going on and things like that are there. Are there. What? When you think of, like, when you go back in time, you're like, oh, yeah, I did do that. And then you look at now with brides, what do you think's changed? And what do you think the show's gonna offer new brides?
The millennial brides, I guess.
[00:08:07] Speaker B: Millennials.
[00:08:08] Speaker A: Not to use a bad word, millennial.
[00:08:09] Speaker B: But you wanna know what I think? I think that today's wedding is anything you want, right? And I think that we have everything that you possibly could want there. Even if you wanna do a wedding in your backyard and you want to have a food truck and you want to have somebody show up with a food truck that has alcohol, we have that at the event. So you can kind of look at that and see what that experience is going to look like. If you want a more formal wedding, we have plenty of venues that are going to be there, and they can certainly show you what they can do. We have a couple of barn venues that are coming, which are actually kind of cool. So whatever you're thinking you want to do, we'll have it there. And if you're going there with a blank slate, even better, because then you have the opportunity to think about, okay, you know what? I like that. Or I like that.
Yes. And I have, you know, I've, you know, good for you. Been married for 35 years.
[00:09:01] Speaker A: It's, it's all Rita's work. She has not killed me. That's, that's, that's the strength of the entire partnership, is that she has not killed me.
[00:09:10] Speaker B: She's not killed.
[00:09:10] Speaker A: She has not killed. So it's all, all the credit to Rita for, for putting up with, with myself and my 17 personalities that she gets.
[00:09:20] Speaker B: That's. That's certainly OK.
[00:09:22] Speaker A: I like to consider myself, you know, like Michael Jordan. It's like, you can't stop me. You just need to contain me. And she does a great job of containing me and keeping me grounded. And as much as I say yes to everything, Rita's the one to say no because you've already said yes to three other things.
[00:09:43] Speaker B: Right.
[00:09:43] Speaker A: And so she grounds me in that aspect. But we do.
[00:09:47] Speaker B: You have a calendar hanging on the wall by the door. So you write in all your things that you're gonna do.
[00:09:51] Speaker A: I. We're getting better.
[00:09:53] Speaker B: Okay?
[00:09:53] Speaker A: But there's a lot of. When is that. When is that you know, so as we get older, it's like doctor's appointments and then a newsy event. And it's like, oh, can we move the doctor appointment? Because we're taking newsy out on the road.
[00:10:04] Speaker B: We got things to do.
[00:10:05] Speaker A: So even Reed is on the newsy train.
[00:10:07] Speaker B: Good for her.
[00:10:07] Speaker A: You know what?
[00:10:08] Speaker B: She did an amazing job at the 130th. Right, right, right. Even though I was like on the fly as far as, you know what. Oh, my God. I'm gonna change everything we're gonna do right now. And I know it starts in an hour, but right now we're doing it.
She went along with it.
[00:10:22] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. It's. It's. It's so great. So when you get that list and you've got the vendors and obviously you've got to book vendors, right? You want booth sold, right? You want vendors, you want door prizes. There's a big list.
Who is the big get? Who surprised you? Who came through big? Who do you want to give a shout out to?
[00:10:42] Speaker B: I want to say. So, okay, Northeastern Fine Jewelry came in huge. They're gonna. They have a 25 by 25 booth in the center of the whole thing that they're working with total events.
[00:10:53] Speaker A: They're like, pop up. They're like a pop up show, right?
[00:10:55] Speaker B: It's a whole pop up show right there. They're bringing in jewelry. They're gonna clean your jewelry while you're there. They've got, you know, cleaning cloths and solution. They're handing out all kinds of stuff. So yes, they're. They're like our top sponsor. And then, you know, surprisingly, Yankee Trails is bringing a bus inside.
[00:11:13] Speaker A: It fits. I was at the RV show. I know, I know. They can get it in there now, right?
[00:11:17] Speaker B: So they came through and I was totally surprised. They called me up and said, hey, we want to bring a bus. And I went, bring it in, bring it in.
[00:11:23] Speaker A: Call Ryan. Yeah.
[00:11:25] Speaker B: Our other big sponsor was Artistry of the Face. So it's all about the face and doing all kinds of stuff. So. So they have a really big. They have a large booth there, and they're going to be doing giveaways and all that stuff. So it's. We got very blessed with this event that it kind of. It got some legs and it started moving. This is my first year as the promoter of this event. It was put on by our events person that was here before. But she left and I finally convinced our bosses that I should be doing that job.
[00:11:57] Speaker A: And again, like I said, after the 100 after the 130th and then, you know this. I think, I think you're locked in. So I think you're kind of, I think we've entered that Hotel California stage. Like, me included, like, you can never leave, right?
[00:12:09] Speaker B: You can never leave.
[00:12:10] Speaker A: It's like, no, you can't leave.
[00:12:11] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:12] Speaker A: Because nothing will get. You know, they say that, but.
But it's, it's much appreciated in everything that you do. And is it also unique, the fact that it's free admission? Is that like something.
[00:12:23] Speaker B: That's something new this year for us? We had never done free admission before. We had always charged $5 at the door. But I went to the parts of B and said, we're not doing that. We're going to do it this way this year. So that's what we're doing.
[00:12:34] Speaker A: Just throw it out and, you know, share a community event. And is this, is this kind of. Are you looking forward to this? Because you look at what we did for the 130th and that was, you know, celebrating two families, the Hume family, of course, and the transition to the D'Agostine family and maintaining our independence and family owned things like that. But we did make it a community event. We invited so many people out there. And then you look at this as getting our name out there again is what we're always trying to do. And we sponsor so many things, right. And we're part of so many things. We publish so many different publications in partnership with things. Is this, this kind of like where we want to be during events, during more just, just the Gazette being a part of the community in this way because we still got to make money. But the same token, this is in a sense fun money.
[00:13:23] Speaker B: I think this is, Listen, this is. I love how you say that's fun money. Unless you're the person who's up at 2:00 in the morning trying to figure out how to make it all come together. But yes, this is fun money. But you know what? It's extra, right? I mean, we're, we're doing it and we are going to do more events in 2025 or anything we can spill.
[00:13:42] Speaker A: On the Stan and Shen show with Tracy's pinch hitting, we can.
[00:13:45] Speaker B: We're going to be doing a spring and fall home show. We're going to be doing that this year and we are going to pull off. Are you ready In October.
[00:13:55] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:13:56] Speaker B: Which is Breast cancer awareness month. You ready?
[00:13:59] Speaker A: Near and dear.
[00:13:59] Speaker B: We are going to do a fashion show and all of the models Are going to be survivors.
[00:14:05] Speaker A: Oh, fantastic.
[00:14:07] Speaker B: So that is what I have up my sleeve for October of year.
[00:14:10] Speaker A: All right.
[00:14:11] Speaker B: That's kind of cool, right?
[00:14:12] Speaker A: That is. That is absolutely awesome. That is. That has got the Stan and Shen show with probably. Probably Rita's going to take that one over because it'll be standard. Read on. That one is, you know, married to a survivor, so that's an automatic hit. And it hits so many things, and it means so much.
[00:14:29] Speaker B: Oh, I listen, I'm a survivor myself, so 100%. Somebody had, you know, kind of made a suggestion, we should do some sort of something in October, kind of make it big. And I went, hmm, let's do a fashion show and let's find survivors to be the models and let's bring in people to do their hair and their makeup and. And we'll do the clothing and all of that. And I think that the one thing that always gets missed is that the pampering. For people who are going through treatment and are survivors, there needs to be more pampering. So my goal is to get people that do massages and nails and all of that stuff involved in this community event, because this is going to be a big one.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: All right, fantastic. All right, so this Sunday.
[00:15:11] Speaker B: This Sunday.
[00:15:11] Speaker A: February 12th. 12th.
[00:15:14] Speaker B: Nope. January 12th.
[00:15:15] Speaker A: January 12th. I'm already. I was pitching February ideas. I apologize for that.
[00:15:20] Speaker B: That's okay.
[00:15:20] Speaker A: So this Sunday.
[00:15:21] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:15:22] Speaker A: 11 to 3.
[00:15:23] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:15:24] Speaker A: But get there.
[00:15:25] Speaker B: Get there early.
[00:15:26] Speaker A: Get there early.
[00:15:27] Speaker B: Doing door prizes by 12:30.
[00:15:29] Speaker A: Door prize by 12:30. They'll have a stand reader show there.
[00:15:32] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:15:32] Speaker A: We're gonna do some live Facebook stuff, probably to kick it off for some of the drawings.
[00:15:36] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:15:37] Speaker A: We're talking some. We're gonna talk to some vendors.
[00:15:39] Speaker B: Okay, perfect.
[00:15:39] Speaker A: We're gonna talk to some brides.
[00:15:41] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:15:41] Speaker A: Some future. Future brides.
[00:15:43] Speaker B: I guess we're gonna do future brides and future grooms. We cannot leave out the grooms.
[00:15:47] Speaker A: That's it. You know, somebody's got it. I mean, somebody's got to stand there and take the bullet. And that's what I did, you know, and the first thing I was told by Monsignor when we were in the church for rehearsal, he goes. He reminded me that. He goes, stanley, you know, there's not a door on the right hand side of the church, so if you. If you want to get out, you have to go through the crowd.
[00:16:03] Speaker B: Right.
[00:16:04] Speaker A: And your mother's in the first pew. So needless to say, I stood there and took it like a man.
[00:16:08] Speaker B: All right, well, good. And you survived I.
[00:16:11] Speaker A: Again, thank you.
[00:16:13] Speaker B: That Rita survived.
[00:16:14] Speaker A: She's put up with me, and I have survived.
[00:16:17] Speaker B: Right.
[00:16:18] Speaker A: So that's, you know, that's how that goes. But one 3. Saratoga Springs City Center.
[00:16:23] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:16:24] Speaker A: Because that's Silver anniversary wedding show. Wedding extravaganza.
[00:16:29] Speaker B: Wedding extravaganza. The capital region's wedding extravaganza.
[00:16:34] Speaker A: Fantastic. All right, so I will see you on Sunday.
[00:16:39] Speaker B: I will be there.
[00:16:40] Speaker A: And we will. Rumor has it Shannon may make an appearance with a friend who's going to a wedding.
[00:16:46] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:16:47] Speaker A: So I. Once she finds out the amount of food there, she may take the trip to Sarah.
[00:16:52] Speaker B: Listen, there's food. There's food and wine, right? There's food and wine.
[00:16:55] Speaker A: That's like one and two on her, like, daily.
[00:16:57] Speaker B: Here we go.
[00:16:58] Speaker A: It's like. And then Jim is third.
[00:16:59] Speaker B: It's like a table set up in the backyard area with umbrellas. So you can sit there and eat.
[00:17:03] Speaker A: Food and drink wine, join and talk and plan and.
[00:17:06] Speaker B: Right.
[00:17:07] Speaker A: And then you're there for any advice, any.
[00:17:09] Speaker B: Anything.
[00:17:09] Speaker A: You and Rita are there for any. Any nervous brides. You can calm right down.
[00:17:13] Speaker B: I am here. You want to hear a little funny story?
[00:17:15] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:17:16] Speaker B: My daughter got married 11 years ago.
Are you ready? So when she told me that she was getting married, you want to know what I told her?
[00:17:23] Speaker A: What?
[00:17:23] Speaker B: I said, honey, all I need you to do is show up that day and be beautiful. I got the rest of it just like Sunday. Right. And you know what my daughter did? She just. She just. I doubt I put the whole thing together for her.
[00:17:36] Speaker A: Fantastic. And you did it for us, so thank you. Your daughter should thank you every anniversary and remember that day.
[00:17:42] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:17:43] Speaker A: For what you did. So thanks for pitching in. Listen, a wonderful co. Host.
[00:17:46] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. Thank you. I'm here. I'm here for you.
[00:17:48] Speaker A: And then we'll see you on Sunday.
[00:17:49] Speaker B: I'll see you Sunday.
[00:17:50] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:17:50] Speaker B: All right, perfect.
[00:17:51] Speaker A: Bye.
