Ducks Unlimited Podcast

00:00 Mike Brasher Probably everyone listening to this episode has attended at least one Ducks Unlimited event in their lifetime, one of these fundraising banquets, and if you have, you will have listened to this sound. And so what you just heard there was the auctioneers chant brought to you by Junior Staggs here in the studio with us, and that's going to be the topic of our episode today. Auctioneers and the service that they bring to Ducks Unlimited helping us raise money for conservation is a signature part of our banquet system. And anytime I hear that, it just kind of takes me back to those places. So joining me in studio is Junior Staggs with Auctioneer University and here in West Tennessee, Junior, great to have you here in studio with us. Hey, thanks for having me, man. As well as Jimbo Robinson, Ducks Unlimited's Director of Event Marketing and Field Support. Jimbo, welcome. Absolutely. Thank you for having me. To start with, let's do some introductions. Junior, tell us about yourself, who you are, and kind of we'll get into more of your story of how you came to help Ducks Unlimited.

01:15 Junior Staggs But who are you and where are you from? So my name is Junior Staggs. I currently reside in the metropolitan area of Paris, Tennessee, called Puryear, a little town halfway between Paris and Murray, Kentucky. I was born in Alabama. I am a transplant to that area. I did not grow up around the auction business. I married into the auction business about 18 years ago. Almost backed out, I was telling you guys before we got started. I suffered from debilitating stage fright, so the thought of standing in front of people the day before auction school almost kept me from attending. But we went and I guess as they say, the rest is history. My wife's uncle started the business in 84 that I went to work for, and I worked for him until about six years ago. Went out on my own, but Katie and I have three girls. The good Lord's got a funny sense of humor and be careful what you wish for because I have got three beautiful girls now, and we live on a little farm there in Puryear and love it. I own an auction company called Bid Last and Win and just recently started a brand new auction school called Auctioneer University.

02:11 Mike Brasher The idea that an auctioneer, a professional auctioneer, a champion auctioneer such as yourself could have stage fright at any point in their life is something I never thought I would hear. I bet you have some amazing stories and life lessons to other people listening on how you overcame that to be the person you are and to develop the skills that you have, and I bet we'll get into that as we go forward. Absolutely. Jimbo, how about yourself? Your first time on the podcast, you've been with Ducks Unlimited for a number of years. Tell us about yourself.

02:37 Jimbo Robinson Yeah, so I was born in Memphis, Tennessee, moved to South Carolina in the middle part. It came back of my life and then came back to Memphis in 2008 to go to work for Ducks Unlimited in a different role. I was a regional director for 13 years and here recently moved from the field back into the office in my new role. Duck hunting has just been a way of life in my family. I still am very fortunate and blessed to hunt with my grandfather, my dad, and now my son and brothers and uncles and cousins. It's a way of life in our family as my grandmother says. I've been blessed to have this opportunity not only to take my passion for waterfowl hunting as my daytime job, but also to share it with my family and friends. The auctioneering part of Junior and his story and I have a lot of similarities. I think it's why we became such close friends when we did. We joke because I say he was a blessing to my life, he says I was a blessing to his life. It's great to be here with you all, especially Junior. I'm transitioning out of the regional director role and the many text messages we've shared since that time and now. It's pretty cool.

03:52 Mike Brasher Yeah, and the fact that you identify each one another as a blessing to each other, I think that means it's a good fit. You found who you needed to at whatever time that was in your lives. Jimbo, for those that may not be as familiar with some of the responsibilities of the positions that you've held, regional director, let's start there. One of the things that we try to do on various episodes is peel back the onion a little bit on all the different aspects of Ducks Unlimited. Conservation is our business. That's the end product, but there's a whole bunch of stuff that goes into raising the funding, building support, building partnerships to eventually get us to that. The event-based fundraising system is an absolutely crucial part of that. Most folks know Ducks Unlimited because of that event-based fundraising system, the banquet system. Absolutely. In your position, former position as a regional director, what do folks like you do? It's a huge undertaking. What is that?

04:44 Jimbo Robinson It is a huge undertaking, but what you do on a day-to-day basis is you're the face of Ducks Unlimited in the local community, but you're not the backbone. The backbone is your volunteers, your caterers, your auctioneers, your attendees, everybody else that makes up what you do. That's one of the things I've always said, but a regional director really cultivates relationships within local communities all over the country in all 50 states. We work with those local communities to raise money for Ducks Unlimited. You have a local committee made up of an area chairman and an area co-chairman, and those volunteers, with the idea of having a banquet or whatever event style you do, we have multiple events now, will sell tickets, raise money. You're kind of the cheerleader for those local committees, and you encourage them, bring them ideas, steer them in the right directions to making a very successful fundraising event. It looks great when you do it that night, but the back work on the volunteers teamed up with the regional directors, what makes that night so successful?

05:53 Mike Brasher How many regional directors do we have across the U.S. right now? 85. 85. How many events on average would each of those regional directors be responsible for?

06:02 Jimbo Robinson On average, I would say some probably 35, 40 events a year, big dinner events. Now that varies, obviously, throughout the country, but I would say on average I'd say 30 to 40, 45 events. And you're on the road a fair bit. Oh, you're constantly on the road. Not only are you attending the event itself, but you have committee meetings, you have state leadership meetings, you have state conventions, you have lunches with volunteers. I mean, the list goes on about how much time you spend on the road. We call it windshield time in the regional director world, but that's your time to process and to talk to other regional directors or talk to friends and auctioneers. And it's kind of your, it's your office time, right? We always laugh that that's our office. Well, your office time on the phone is what is done in that behind that windshield. And the stories that you could tell about driving as a regional director, I told myself in 2011 that I was going to write a book because somebody had given me that advice. And I, for a while, I kept notes in my phone and that phone probably ended up in the bottom of a duck hole somewhere. And that stories went away and then started everything else. But it's the stories you can tell as a regional director are just incredible. And the quality time you get to spend with some of your elite, I say elite, quality volunteers is special too. A lot of those will travel with you to events. And that's really where you get to kind of build that relationship, not only with him, but with others in his local community that he knows and share ideas and thoughts of what will work. And that's what's so neat about our regional director system. And what has been built over the years is that each regional director is his own business person. They run their own business with their local volunteers and that team of volunteers within their region is what makes us so successful as an organization, Ducks Unlimited, because they, everybody does things different based on what works in your area.

07:57 Mike Brasher And that's what's so neat about what we do. It's not an in the box system. Junior, when you think about the Ducks Unlimited banquets, what comes to mind, whether based on your experience as the auctioneer or attending, working with Jimbo or any others that you may have attended as a youngster?

08:11 Junior Staggs To be honest with you, I attended my first Ducks Unlimited banquet in Paris probably, what, seven or eight years ago. And I guess one of the guys that have been doing that one up there, they, because I grew up just north of Florence, Alabama in a little town called Collinwood, Tennessee. I knew one person that duck hunted. We were big time bass fishermen. My dad and I loved to small mouth bass fish on Wilson and Pickwick Lakes. And our, I think his name was Tim Astin. He was our local TWRA officer. He's the only person that I knew that even hunted ducks at the time. This was 30 years ago. So when I moved to West Tennessee, I was a bass fisherman. And so I did a little Turkey Federation stuff, a little NRA stuff. And then I got the call about Ducks Unlimited and went by and I mean, I think Jimbo said it best. I mean, that regional director, I mean, I thought basically Jimbo was Ducks Unlimited. You know, and I did that one a couple of times. And then I think seven years ago, I filled in for a guy in New Madrid for that Riverbend chapter. Oh my goodness. It's so much fun. I mean, and this is going to sound cliche when I say it, but that group of folks becomes family. They really do. Jimbo alluded to the fact that he and I, you know, we consider each other blessings. See, I lost my dad March 14th of 2019. So it's been just a little over four years ago. And so needless to say, the best way I've heard that put is that when you lose a father, it's like living beside a mountain your entire life and waking up one morning and the mountain's gone. So I was, Trane was running off the tracks and that fall he called me and he's like, Hey man, what was right after the Paris event? He says, would you like to do a big event for us in Memphis? And I'm like, yeah, I didn't realize how much I needed that event. And that's really what kind of kicked off our friendship was that big, it's the big sponsor event wasn't it? I think we did the Memphis dinner that and then we did the sponsor event. We did. I mean, and after that, I mean, that's why I said, cause I knew the fairgrounds and I knew these smaller buildings that, and then we come down here and then that's why I was telling one of the girls that was showing me around today. I mean, this is my first time back in the belly of the beast, if you will. I mean, I've seen it outside after hours, but there are many cars out there now as there would be almost for a banquet down here. You know, but so your original question was, what do I think? I think of family, I think of fun. And of course, when I get involved, I think of fast talking. You know, but it is, we just try to, we try to have fun. You come in, we try to keep the process moving along. We know you've got things to do. We live in a busy world, so we try to get these things over as quickly as we possibly can. But yeah, I mean, these folks become family and we try to have fun while we're doing it.

10:44 Mike Brasher One thing I'll say here is people are listening to this. I obviously have Jimbo and Junior here in the studio with us and we're going to be hearing some of their story and experiences, but there are hundreds, if not thousands of other people across this country, hopefully listening to this episode, who are also represented by Jimbo and Junior in the stories that they bring and their experiences within the Ducks Unlimited banquet system, event-based fundraising system. You guys are just the ones that are here local and able to tell this story about a very important and sort of signature aspect of Ducks Unlimited, quite frankly. So we want to make sure that we give credit to all those other people that are virtually here with us in this conversation. And kind of to that point, Jimbo, is this idea of how do we select? What are the many different ways in which an RD or the volunteers or anybody else associated with those local chapters, how do they go about selecting an auctioneer? I'm sure there's tons of different ways in which that happens, but based on your experience and what you've heard from some of your other RDs, how do y'all go about that?

11:52 Jimbo Robinson I think one of the main things is that the volunteers on the local community, they will, in every community you go to, somebody knows an auctioneer. And in certain areas, the auctioneer business is bigger than it is in other areas, and I don't think I knew that before I came to work at DU and in this banquet system. But local volunteers, when we get together and it'll be like, hey, my cousin is an auctioneer, or man, there's a guy that does the auctions every Thursday at the car lot. And there's, I think, and Junior can correct me if I'm wrong, but there are auctioneers that do it for a living and there are auctioneers that do it for fun. And how that's broken in between there is probably a thousand different things. I would say that an auctioneer for a Ducks Unlimited event, most of the time they understand what we do, most of them. And if they don't understand, they become familiar with the process. But some people hire companies and some people hire buddies and some people hire a friend of a friend that they know that's a really good auctioneer. And it's kind of like caterers. And I'm going to use this in a loose term. If there's any auctioneers, there probably will be a lot of auctioneers listening. But it's kind of like a caterer. If you find a caterer that works and fits for your local area and fits with your people, then you just ride with that same caterer multiple times. And I think that one of the things that I learned that I probably didn't learn early in my career as regional director that I did later on was when somebody learns your people, that is the best thing you can have. Because they understand when to push, they understand when to pull back, they understand when to make a joke, they understand when not to make a joke. And I have been a part of crowds where I wanted to crawl under the table because you're standing up in the front of the room with that person as a representative of this, of you Ducks Unlimited in this local community. And if they say something that goes not well in the crowd, they're looking at you and all those people in that community and those volunteers are going to wear you out. And that's one of the things that I think it's a trust factor between a regional director and an auctioneer and that local community that builds. And I think that the way that that local group selects an auctioneer is a lot of times they know somebody, but they also lean on the regional director's advice for what he's seen in other areas that works.

14:20 Mike Brasher How important is that to be able to, as an auctioneer, to read the room, to know the people? I've been to DU banquets sometimes that are in the immediate wake of some big national event. There's all that that goes on as well that you have to be aware of sometimes. But just on a fundamental basis, how important is it for you as an auctioneer to be able to read the room and then maybe adjust your tactics on a given night?

14:45 Junior Staggs I think it's everything. I really, I think it's everything. When I'm teaching my auction school or presenting a class somewhere, I have this process that I call the three little P's. You plan, you practice, and you perform. But the most important of those three little P's is the pivot. That's the one that's left out, but it is. It's the most important. I think it's the most important in life. And you kind of said that. How do you adjust? So if you walk in and there has been something, you have to be able to cater to that crowd. And that's one of those things. Jimbo alluded to the fact that you think of auctioneers. And one of the first things if you introduce yourself as an auctioneer, the first thing the general public wants you to do is talk fast. I make my living as an auctioneer and I talk fast the least amount. It's kind of like the cherry on top. It's what everybody knows. It's the marketing, it's the contract negotiating, it's the item knowledge and things like that. But when you come into one of these things, I think it's equally important that you know the product that you're selling. I mean, Jimbo, I don't know if you saw that earlier, but when you handed me this decoy to sell as we led into it, I don't know ducks. I don't care to tell you, I've never sat in a duck pit in my life because I'm a bass fisherman. Everybody told me it was more addictive and more expensive than bass fishing. And I was like, I don't know if I can handle both of those because I was lucky enough to marry a really good bass fisherman. She can outfish me. And I was like, I don't know if I can handle both of these. So when I picked it up, I'm looking at it and I'm thinking, well, I could shoot a picture of this to my buddy in Michigan. He could tell me exactly what it is. Jimbo has written me a note that it's a pen tail. You know, I should have sold enough of them to know that it's a pen tail, but he's written me a note. You know, he knows, he read me, he knew. I don't know what I, but I don't have to know this product 100% if I kind of know what it is. I know roughly what it's worth. Then that for me, that's when the fishing comes in because my fish is out there. Here's my bait and my chant is my cast. You know, I'm just trying to get one on the line.

16:40 Jimbo Robinson So one of the things that Junior that I learned early on is you have an auctioneer that does not do a lot of DU banquets. They'll say, Hey, Jimbo, can you write me? Can you give me some starting amounts and what it's worth in the catalog? And I used to always say no, because I don't want the auctioneer to have any dollar figure in his head. You don't want him to have an anchor point. I don't want him to have an anchor point because a lot of those guys will get stuck at that item or get stuck on an amount. And if it bidding slows down, they're done. And I've seen. And so what I'll do with Junior is if there's an item that I know in the room that somebody is there and we need to get to, or it's been donated by somebody locally. And this comes from Junior and I working together really since 2019. But we worked together prior to that a few times at Paris, but for one year working with an auctioneer, you're doing 30 events. So I pretty much know everything that Junior is going to do in an event. I can tell you every story he's told. But the thing is, is I didn't ever give Junior dollar amounts. So he is on. He's the expert when it comes to an auctioneer. He's there to sell the item for the most amount of money and raise the most amount of money for DU. So I'll give him if we have a reserve, I'll give him the reserve. If we have a special item that's donated in the room, and I know that this person will get upset if we sell below that, I will tell him, hey, get to this or we need to get to here. And I don't care how you do it. There's just things you do as a regional director and an auctioneer and I can do them in the room now. We obviously, Gabe Baker, our new regional director here in West Tennessee is doing the events. Gabe's young. Gabe doesn't know all the tips and tactics. So I came to an event to help Gabe and be in the room in case he had a question. And Junior looked at me and I nodded at him. Yes, go ahead and do this because I know. And so, but that's one of those little things about Junior and amounts and his what he does that is so special and unique to auctioneers is he doesn't know. And what's funny is this is one of my funny things about Junior is we sell a big trip during vacation. Well, Junior starts at 10,000 almost every time and everybody in the room gasp or laughs or laughs. Huh? There's no way. And I just sit back and smile because I know where he's going next. You start high so that people in their head, they're thinking, whoa, this is a high value item. That auctioneer just started at 10,000. But knowing that the reserve is set at 6,000, I know what he'll do. He's going to back it down and he'll say, I need practice. And so do you all. Let's start at 2,000 and then we build it up. But at the whole time he's doing that, people in the crowd are going, he started at 10. If I can get this for eight, that's two thousand dollars less than where he started. I'm getting a deal and I know I'm making eight thousand dollars on this trip. So it's something that where you have an expert and professional auctioneer compared to a different auctioneer and what the bar they set and where he wants to get to and where we get to. And that's what has made Junior so unique in what we do and what a lot of auctioneers, professional auctioneers that do.

19:49 Mike Brasher So how many books or how much have you studied like psychology of decision making? Because some of the things that you've talked about here, an anchor point, the fear of losing out, getting people engaged in something, having when they think they're going to once they bid on something, they have some ownership of they feel they have some ownership of it. And you you kind of go from that. I mean, how much of that are you? Have you studied? Have you read up on because that plays into that kind of human decision making? Right. Brace yourself.

20:20 Junior Staggs Not a lot. I was told a few weeks ago. Actually on the way to Oklahoma back in February that that that I was not going to be successful because I didn't read 12 to 13 books a year and most successful people read 12 to 13. I haven't read 12 to 13 books in my life. I don't watch TV. I don't listen to the radio very little. I work. I love to work. It keeps me busy. And so really, I think a lot of it is just that on the job learning you. It's that. And that's one of the things with the auction school. I tell the guys, I want you and we did that. That was so fun. We went to Syxton the other night and I was like, hey, some of these guys have never been to an event like this before. Could I bring them with me? And they're like, absolutely. And there were a couple of guys scared to death. They did not because I told him, I said, look, we split you in two teams or six guys. We split you. This is like my granddaddy would say sink or swim. You know, when you're a kid, he said, my dad, my dad threw me in the water and it was sink or swim. And that's kind of what it was. But I think that's you learn. And when I was in auction school, a guy said, every time you get an education, it costs you something. Either you've signed up to take the class or you had to learn it the old fashioned way. And when you learn it the old fashioned way, you don't forget. So these guys are down there. And that's one of the beauties of being the auctioneer. And a lot of people. And that's one of those misconceptions, just like the fast talking thing. A lot of people think that the auctioneer is just up there talking fast and it's confusing and they don't know. So when I'm up there, I can look at you and tell whether or not you want to bid again. I can look. I have a good enough relationship with my professional ringmen that I can say, Justin or Ben or whoever, go talk to this person and ask them to bid one more time. And I'll tell them, I won't quit until you do. When you shake your head no, I'm going to ask you one more time, but then I'm going to stop. You know, it's not going to be one of those things where I'm going to sell it out. A lot of people are afraid to raise their hand because they're afraid you're going to just sell it out from under them real quick. We're here to raise money. You know, that's what our job is to raise the most money we possibly can. When you tell me you're finished, I'm going to sell out. So I think a lot of that has just been, it was those years of doing those pro bono deals, you know, because for me that was kind of getting some experience, you know, but as far as reading and studying, not a whole lot. It's just picking up on real world events, you know, and happenings. And that's like he mentioned the woodliners and I forget sometimes that he's heard every one of them, every joke that I tell, everything that I work in. But each week, and we may do three in a week, that's the first time those people are ever hearing it. And they'll hear it again next year, but they're going to forget by then. But I just told them, and sometimes I think, God, you just use that Thursday night. It's Friday. But these folks have never heard it before because they're slapping their legs and laughing or whatever. But and that's another one of those, you just like that. Did they react well? Some of that stuff, and I forget which one it was, shake it up. My wife's favorite one is shake it up and down. It works a lot better when you shake it up and down. And I didn't read this. It was just a spur of the moment thing. And the people reacted well to it. So I kind of put that in this mental Rolodex. I'm like, hey, I'll use that one again. And there's some maybe they don't react to it. One of my favorite ones is if somebody just raises their hand once and no offense, Billy Ray Cyrus, if you hear this, but I say Billy Ray Cyrus had more than one hit. Nine times out of ten, that person is going to raise their hand again because people don't like to lose. Or you say your mother didn't raise a quitter or second place don't suit you. I'm not forcing you to bid. I'm just asking you to bid. Second place doesn't suit you. They can't help it. And it's funny. You're going to wake up tomorrow morning and regret it. You're going to hate yourself on the way home. If it's on a Saturday, you could brag about this one at Sunday school tomorrow.

23:51 Mike Brasher It's just little things like that. So let me ask you a question about, as you see the auction getting underway and you start to see the reaction of the crowd, the energy in the crowd, if it's not going well, because you do these multiple events, you're seeing the same items event after event, a sample of the items are going to be the same from event to event. And so when you see maybe the temperature of the proverbial temperature of the room isn't that great and maybe items aren't selling as good, what does it take to not sort of process that personally, to take it personally as though you're not doing a good enough job?

24:27 Junior Staggs How do you kind of separate that from just the way the room is versus I'm not doing a good enough job? It's funny you say that tonight because tonight is MUS night, right? My first varsity chapter was three years ago. MUS, we did it at some little feed place on the other side of town. And that night, I realized because you think when you're coming in, you know, and not to toot your own horn, but I'm here. We're going to raise some money. We're a big deal. But then all of a sudden you realize you're just like the bartender. You're just like the ticket girls. You're just like the kid. You're there and you have one job. Nobody, nobody. Now, it's changed because now a lot of these times, I mean, you build a community, you build friendships. So these folks do some of these folks do know me now. They'll hug my neck when I walk up. But then that night it hit me. Oh, you're just you're just a hired hand. You know, you're just like these other guys. You cannot take anything personal. These guys don't know you. If you get up there and you're doing your thing and they're just not because I'll be perfectly honest with you. I'd say 95 percent of the people in the crowd have zero idea how the auction itself works. They're there because it's a fundraiser. They're there because it's an event. It's my job to make them enjoy. I tell people sometimes we're going to treat you so many ways you're going to have to like one of them, you know. And so so it's my job to do some little something that gets them involved because they really don't want to do that. You know, they're afraid to raise money. They're afraid to raise their hand or that that the thought of it being a high pressure sales thing kind of scares them a little bit. I hate high pressure sales. That's why I put the ball in their court. I won't quit until you do. You know, I'm not going to you know, you got to get some of these guys. It's why they got two speeds wide open or stopped. You know, a lot of times one of the big things as an auctioneer that owns an auction school, people call the one to know what are your filler words? What words you saying at these events? A lot of times it's the money. How much I have, how much I'm asking for and and or now, you know, I'm just I'm hitting that number 250, 50, 50, 275 and now 300 now 325. It's not that 20. It's not confusing. I'm not trying to confuse them because my job is to raise money. And if you know where I'm at and you know where I'm wanting to go, then we've blended this thing and it's a beautiful marriage when that thing happens. So try to be clear, try to work the crowd and don't take it personal because you're just a hired gun.

26:44 Jimbo Robinson And we've and I don't mean to interrupt you, but we've been numerous times and and and Junior could almost name every place. I know I can. We've been to events where it's not happening. Oh, yeah. It's tonight is not the night and neither one of us recent memory have ever taken that personally. And they're in what's really what I have always enjoyed about Junior is no matter what other other chairman, other volunteers from other chapters will come and we'll sell a couple items for less than what we paid for them. And they'll look at me and they'll say, why did you let him do that? And because I and my answer has always been because we'll make it up somewhere else. Junior knows where it should be. Junior knows what we need. He knows the end result and Junior will make it up on another item. He'll hit on something that we don't always hit high dollars on and he'll make that money up tenfold. And that's one of the things about Junior that, you know, may has made my job so much easier is that I never have to worry about us losing money on an auction.

27:43 Mike Brasher That's a pretty I consider that a pretty insightful decision on your part to go ahead and sell something, even if it's at a bit of a loss, because when you fail to sell something, you're sending a message with that. We don't have a good crowd or we're not. And tonight isn't the night for us to raise a lot of money. But when you sell something, most people don't have any idea whether you're selling it at, you know, at a 200 percent gain or or loss. Right. And so that's pretty means that is that part of your thought process there? We just don't want this. We don't want to start creating a bad atmosphere.

28:19 Junior Staggs But I think that's that goes for just a regular and I hate to use the term Saturday auction. But if you're doing a regular estate auction and I sat down with the seller like, well, what are these items? I mean, there are certain things. I mean, if it's a house or a car, I don't care to take it with reserve. But I start every item, especially my online auction. I start every item at a dollar. If I sell a five hundred thousand dollar house, it's going to start at a dollar because I want everybody to be involved. And once you've owned it for a little while, I've said this before, you own it for a little while, own it again. OK, so that's that's one of the things that we try to do. But I tell them, I'm like, some of these items may bring a little less than what you're thinking. Some of them are going to bring a lot more. But at the end of the day, I think the average, the whole picture, if you look at the whole picture, you're going to be extremely satisfied.

29:02 Jimbo Robinson You know, and that's that's really what we're trying to do. We used to say that about trips. Yeah. And Junior and I have had many, many conversations about are we going to sell this trip to a proxy bidder? That's not the right word, not a proxy bidder, but a dummy bidder. Right. We're not going to sell it, but we don't want to lose the momentum in the room. So we used to do that a lot with trips up, sold. It's undervalued and it's sold to 178. 178 is not a bidder. It's Junior's back pocket bid. And we don't sell it that night. We used to do it all the time. And recently, probably COVID created this where we're where sometimes somebody just needs to think about it. Right. And it's a trip that we can sell multiples of. And this is, you know, where we we have an unlimited amount of trips, which we don't have a ton of those, but we do have some. And so Junior will say, if you're interested in this event, come see Jimbo. This is what it's going to take to buy that item. And we used to not do that. And we've started doing that more recently because sometimes and this has happened a lot more since we started this process. But they'll come up and start talking to me about it. Give me some more details. What's the what do you know as the regional director for the what do you know about this trip that will help me want to buy it? And I don't do that on on on certain trips, but our trips that we have a lot to sell, I will do that. And Junior knows those. And so we will allow somebody kind of think about it for a little bit. They got to do it that night and then say yes. And that works well, too. So the trips are one thing. Other items, man. Most of them have never not sold something because of that. You want to keep that momentum going. Yeah.

30:24 Mike Brasher Momentum is the word that I was looking for that I wasn't able to grab, wasn't able to find. But because I've been to banquets where and that's exactly it. Items are selling, items are selling, and then you you don't want to lose that momentum because one or two don't sell. Or let's say the momentum is say you don't have momentum right at the start, but then eventually you get it. And so I'm sure you guys have had numerous experiences. You just talked about how you had some where you just know it's not the night. Talk about the other. How exciting is it when for you as an auctioneer, how exciting is it for you when there is intense competition for item after item? And it feels like it's it's you're getting top dollar for every everyone.

31:06 Junior Staggs That's that's when you really you get to look like a superstar because because that's the easiest nights. Those nights when the bids are a little scarce. That's when you have to work your tail off, you know, but those nights when everybody's there and they're having there have been nights. And I hate to keep going back to New Madrid, y'all. But if you ever get the opportunity to go to that little Eagle Building in New Madrid, Missouri, oh, my goodness. The first weekend of March every year, it is worth it. I mean, and every year I think it cannot get better. This year, y'all, we had we had been to Jackson for that South Gibson deal. We had just sold the first gun of the year, which this year is a 28 gauge super black eagle. All right. Jimbo Bentall made it for a year. It's come with the 12 other 20. Now we've got 28 gauge. I think it's sold for was it five thousand that night? We have Jackson and we sold to all right. So we get to New Madrid and this is just like a purgatory. It's just a lot of it's a farming community. Eight hundred. Yeah. There's eight hundred people. Eight hundred people in New Madrid. I mean, it's a little town. OK, just a little farming community about like Puryear. And we get and I tell you, and that's one reason I'm looking forward to Vegas so much this summer, because I tell people that's I probably had more fun in that room than I have anywhere there. But this year we had the gun of the year brought ten thousand dollars and we sold two of them. All right. And this is where this is where that relationship with your RD, because he looks at me like seventy four hundred and I'm just I do I shake my head. No, I'm like these guys, we're going to get to a point and it's they're going. But right now we're raising bucks for the ducks. So you can tell if there's more money in the. Yes, you can tell me just the fire in their eyes. But the thing about it is, is when somebody comes up and says, when you get to this item, let somebody set it in and don't take your eyes off of me. They're telling you ring them that. I mean, it's game on. Yeah. I mean, I'm not a professional pickpocket, but I'm going to I'm going to put your feet to the fire. All right. So these and these are these are good guys. And these these are guys that have become friends. I bumped into this gentleman again at Saxton the other time. He came over and shook my hand, wanted wanted my card, you know, for another little event he might be doing or something. And I think that's neat, you know, that you built that relationship here and you may get to do it over there. But anyway, we're sitting there and this thing gets to ten thousand. And guess what? We sell two. And then there these these we got to Saxton the other night. And that that crowd was off a little bit. And we get to that trip and we sold four of those trips for seventy three hundred dollars a piece. You know, and it's just like, holy smokes. It's amazing, you know, when all those things in the plan comes together. Jimbo kind of alluded to this earlier. One of the one of the and to go back to a previous question, one of the hardest parts, though, as as as the auctioneer is when when you have to and I hate to say market and sell an item because you're really the marketing opportunities over when you get up there and these folks are seeing these big trips, you know, for a lot of folks, for most folks, a sixty five hundred dollar trip, that's a big purchase. Sure. It's a big purchase. You need to think about that. You know, that's like what I do when I'm when I'm selling grandmother's estate. I want, you know, two to three weeks, four weeks to market that item because for me, it's not about the event. It's not about the fast talking or the online auction on Saturday. It's about the items that we have. People really don't care what the process is to get it. If you let them know what they've got, what what's here and they're looking for that, they're going to find a way to get it. You know, not everybody has the Internet. So an older person might come over. So, hey, can we do that? That's kind of what it is with these bigger items on those trips. That's the hardest part because you've got to and sometimes you get them sold. Sometimes you don't. But that's why we started that. I mean, I thought, you know, this guy, he's we're close. Now, if we could have six thousand for a trip and we're hung up at thirty three hundred, I don't care. Folks, the same way if I've got something on my lot tomorrow, you know, we were over there and we're way off. You say, hey, guys, we're not even the ballpark. Let's go on to the next slide. That way you're not killing the momentum. But if we get close, you know, we're close to getting this deal done. Talk to Jimbo. He's on the ground. Talk to Jimbo. We want to get it done. Let us know if we get it done. We'll give you a big round of applause. You know, let them know how much we because this thing, the volunteers, yes, but it takes bidders to make an auction. It takes normally takes at least two bidders to make an auction. You know, yeah. So the bidders are the backbone of that thing. You know, they make it happen.

35:17 Mike Brasher So and Jimbo, the nights where everything is going, going gangbusters, you've got a lot of active bidders. Those are the nights. Those are the happy nights for the R.D.s. Right. You live for them.

35:26 Jimbo Robinson David Schussler, when David and I, when I when I we talked about this new role, I told him, I said, you know, one of the hardest things about this decision was that adrenaline. I played college football. Yes. You know, I played college football and going out in that field and having people, you know, clap for you and playing in front of larger crowds was was an adrenaline. The word adrenaline junkie is probably not the best word to use. But you get that as a regional director and the live auction to me, I've always explained to a lot of my friends that don't come to all the events, but they come to a good number of them. I say this is entertainment. This is not what you would consider a certain banquet. This is an what Junior does is a profession and an entertainment aspect that you can't buy everywhere else. And when you when you I've had a lot of people message me and send me Facebook messages and say, can you send me that guy's number? I want to reach out to him, tell him thank you or tell him, hey, man, what you did is incredible because just like the guy that that hangs sheetrock that looks really, really good in your house that you pay a lot of money to do that. That guy's a professional and that's the same way Junior is. And so having a professional do your work is priceless. And so when he started, it's really funny when he started his chant earlier, when we started this podcast, I had goosebumps and I still to this day get goosebumps listening to his chant. And I have heard it more than anybody, probably more than anybody because I've been there every time. Have we done 100 together in the past three years? Pretty close. Absolutely. And so besides Justin and Ben, his two ringmen, I've probably heard him more than most have. And you don't get tired of it. I never do. And I was going to say this earlier about selecting your auctioneer accents, tones. There's a lot of things about a voice that carry heavy weight in an auctioneer. I think Junior is a amazing singer. And I think part of that plays into Junior's soothing tone as an auctioneer, not overbearing. The only time it's overbearing is when I put when I have to have five speakers and people have to sit right in front of them. But it's not Junior's fault. Right. And what's really funny is I've worked with him so many times. I know, man, I'll give him a nod of, hey, you know, your voice is too high. He cranks the bass up. He understands that. But it's a soothing voice. And that sounds really… No, I get it.

38:10 Junior Staggs But it's, I've got a guy crush. I hate to admit it.

38:15 Jimbo Robinson I know. I'm almost feeling I do. It's a funny thing. It's mutual, brother. It's just, I think, hearing so many auctioneers throughout my career, I have never gotten tired of that one. And I think it has a lot to do with the tone of his voice, the way he carries it, and the cadence, and the way he carries the microphone. And I think that most regional directors in the country, I would say probably 75 to 80 percent, maybe more, have a go-to auctioneer. And that they will, a lot of them will probably tell you the same thing. It's a trust. It's the sound of their voice that they don't get tired of. And it's success.

38:47 Mike Brasher We're going to take a break right here. We're going to come back and we're going to talk a little bit about your story, Junior, going back to your stage fright issue. Sure. And then kind of what you're doing now and what are the other aspects of kind of getting into auctioneering and then some favorite stories, favorite memories, that type of stuff. We're going to get back into that. So stay with us, folks. We'll be back in just a second. Welcome back, everybody. We're here with Junior Stagg, auctioneer here in West Tennessee, and Jimbo Robinson, the director of event marketing and field support. And Jimbo is the one that discovered Junior and brought him to the DU auctioneer circuit. And so, Junior, I want to talk a little bit about your history, how you came to become an auctioneer, referenced earlier, that, you know, the whole stage fright issue. And so what was it? I mean, we've also heard that you're a musician, you're a singer, that you play the guitar. Forrest Gump. I'm a 21st century Forrest Gump. So maybe, you know, we could use your story as someone, there's a lot of people that don't like public speaking, don't like being in front of other people. You were one of those, but now look at you. What was that like? How did you figure out that you wanted to become an auctioneer?

40:00 Junior Staggs And then how did you get over your stage fright? So when I moved to West Tennessee, I went to school, started as a non-traditional student. I think I was 25 going to UT Martin, met my wife there. And she introduced herself and told me with this great pride in her chest stuck out that my uncle is an auctioneer. Told you I'd never been to a DU event growing up. I'd only been to one auction growing up. The little place is still going, Zip City, Alabama, Zip City auction house. It's not much bigger than this room. And if they sold a $10 item, they did a great job. So I thought, why would you be so proud of… So one of our first dates was one of his auctions there in Puryear. I could drive by it almost every day. And he sold the farm and he sold this tractor for like $50,000. And he sold the house and he said, I thought, people do this? So I'm just like a lot of you folks. That's one of the things that we've done with TikTok. We took this TikTok channel and we realized that not everybody understands. Actually, most of the people in the world don't understand the auction method of marketing. So, and I definitely didn't. I didn't know anything about it. So I was going to school, studying public relations, and I was working with a big company in Arkansas that's kind of, we won't name the name, but just a huge retail store. And it was my third tour of duty with them. And I was working in management. And the first time back as a student in several years, so I said, look, if I need to step back, I want to. Well, they wanted, let me step back, but they want to take away about a dollar and 50 cents. I'm like, nope, that's not going to happen. Because when you need a cashier, you need something, you're going to call me. I won't pay for it. I want to go. Well, you're going to have to go. And her uncle's like, well, you come to work for me. And I started out, y'all, you talk about the American dream. I started out as a grunt, packing boxes as not even, not even anything to do with the auction. You're just getting it ready. And slowly but surely we started doing this. Well, I proposed to her in November 17 years ago. And he says, if you're going to work for, be part of this family, you got to learn to do this. And he handed me this worn out hoe. And it was down on the trailer at the end of the auction. I was like, I don't do that. I'm not going to do this. Stand in front of people. Here you go. He kind of thrust me into that position. So then I started to call that the ringman. You started working the ring, holding up items or whatever. And to kind of flashback 1984 when he started the business, my wife was born in August. He went to auction school in August and his only son died at 18 years old in a motorcycle accident in September while he was at his first auction. So you say Jimbo found me. I think the good Lord put me and Jimbo in the, I don't question those things. I think the good Lord put Katie in my path. He put Doug in my path. And because a lot of these things are generational. It's like farming. You know, you take over your dad's farm. Your dad took over your granddad's farm. He didn't have anybody to give it to. My wife, she went to school to be a teacher. That's what she's always wanted to do. And so I'd been working with him probably a year and a half, just working the ring, getting auctions ready. And it was about this time of year, y'all, a little town called Cottage Grove, Tennessee. I could take you to the very curve. And I said, what do I have to do to become an auctioneer? And he said, I didn't think you're ever going to ask. I just wanted you to finish college. But if you want to do it, I'll pay for it. And so he wanted me to go to Missouri Auction School at the time. That was like the Ivy League of auction schools and couldn't get in. So we went to a little auction school down in Tullahoma, Tennessee. And got the basic education that was required, came back and went to work. He had never heard me sell before. My wife had never heard me sell before because of that stage fright. And I got down the day before. I was telling Chris before the deal started here. But the day before, I mean, I went to him, I was like, look, man, I didn't sleep last night. The thought of standing in front of these people is killing me. And he looked at me and he goes, failure is not an option, Hoss. And I mean, when somebody gives you a tall order like that, that's pretty much what you got. So I went to auction school, got elected class president, and basically just did auctions for seven years. And lost a friend of mine in 2013. And he had encouraged me to compete. And he told me, just pretty point blank, you don't begin living until you step outside your comfort zone. And he passed away. And then I spoke at his funeral, first time I'd ever done that. And I thought that's the hardest thing I'd ever done until I did his auction. And so we did his auction, two-day event. And with five minutes to go before the Friday auction, I couldn't see I was sobbing so badly. Because you knew a lot of those items. Yeah, I mean, it was him. I was selling little pieces of him. And I don't know, it's just stuff. But for me, it was little pieces of him. 84 years and you got to do this. So I thought when the auction was over, his son lives in Colorado. And he says, look, I forget exactly how, but he said that was the utmost professionalism with a little bit of pizzazz. And for some reason, that just gave me this fire. And I thought, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to enter my first contest. Which was about 10 days later. And I'm a big Alabama football fan. Have been most of my life. And you guys will remember this Saturday night. That's why I have this Mississippi State logo right here. I saw that. You'll remember the kick six. I got Johnny Reb over here in the Mississippi State there. But the kick six, Auburn, I don't know what Nick Saban was thinking. But he kicked this dog on field goal and the guy ran it back 106 yards. That was the night before my first contest. So you can imagine how excited I was to compete. But I'd planned, I kind of knew what was coming. And I wasn't competing against, I've never entered a contest. And I've been fortunate enough to win nine championships, y'all. And I've never competed against anybody but myself. It was just a personal growth. But I went down there with the goal of winning. And in the pre contest meeting room, they're like, hey, by the way, we've added questions and answers to this year's contest. Something that was not on the YouTube videos that I'd studied. And I was like, oh, poop. So I got up there and I gave it everything I had. And I thought, this is pretty good. The guy that was going to win had been the reserve champion three years in a row. And he had been the student body president at the largest university in the state of Tennessee. He was a very eloquent public speaker. So when it came to questions and answers portions, the first question was like, as a member of the TAA, the Tennessee Auctioneers Association, what's something you would change? Well, I love country music. I'm three chords in the truth. I said, y'all, being the newest member of the Tennessee Auctioneers Association, I don't know that I've been around long enough to change anything. And my granddaddy would say, if it isn't broke, don't fix it. That was my answer. The second answer, I don't remember. But I sat down, went to the back of the room and I sat down beside my mentor and I said, I just kicked a 57 yard field goal and they're going to run it back for a touchdown. And he goes, yep, you sure did. And I thought, oh, I'd planned on the bid calling part, the actual chant, but I hadn't planned on the question. And then I won that thing. And then that kind of that was that stepping. I didn't just step out of the comfort zone. I jumped and then I pulled a parachute for a while. But yeah, went on to and I don't think I'm through. I'm going to enter this summer for the international championship. It's one that one of the prizes for it, if you will, is you get to come back to St. Jude and you get to do the little fun auction for the kids there. And as a Tennessean, St. Jude's part of your fabric. It's pretty special. And so that would be kind of the ultimate cherry on top. Sure. And that's kind of my why at this point, you know, to get to do that.

46:52 Mike Brasher Appreciate you sharing all that, Junior. Let's talk about the you've kind of gone beyond that from from being an auctioneer. Now you are you're teaching. Yes, sir. The future auctioneers talk about that you are and had auctioneer university. That's your that's that's the I guess the organization that you started. Sure. So tell us about that.

47:12 Junior Staggs That's one of those things, too, just like Jimbo mentioned with with when you're going to do an event like this, you need to know your product. You need to kind of have an idea of your crowd. The same thing if you're going to win a contest. I mean, it's not an auction. It's not a Saturday auction. It's a dog and pony show. It's an opportunity for you to get up there and showcase your talent. I call it the chocolate gravy recipe. They give you a scorecard. This scorecard has a hundred possible points. If your overall appearance is not there, if your introduction is not there telling you what the recipe is, you just got to serve them what they want. And if you put a little too much sugar in it, it's not their recipe. If it doesn't have enough this, it's not their recipe. So I started doing a thing after I went to three classes. I started a YouTube series and it was basically just kind of helping people build their bid calling chant. And from that, I was actually coming home from Memphis one night about this time of year, six years ago. And my mama didn't want to talk. My granny didn't want to talk. My wife didn't want to talk. I thought I'll just go live on Facebook, start answering some questions. And that turned into like a 21 or 22 episode series of answering your questions live. And about November that year, somebody, one of those things says, hey, man, you should you should teach a class. And we call it the bid calling boot camp. We'll be doing a class coming up April 25th and 26th. I think will be 70 people from across the United States and Canada have come into little Puryear, Tennessee. And my little office, it's an old double wide trailer. And actually last year, about this time last year, had a gentleman fly in in a 19 million dollar Cessna citation with his son and daughter-in-law to take this class. And that was probably what motivated me for this year because I mean, this guy had reached the pinnacle. When you can buy 19 million dollar Cessna citation, you don't need the bid calling boot camp. But the bid calling boot camp is more than just working on your chant. For me, it's it's that ministry. It's that sharing, overcoming, you know, this is where I was at. This is really where I was. And if I can do it, you can do it. Well, from that, we saw a need for an auction school that was kind of preparing people for tomorrow's auctions. You know, for the most part, auction education has been the same for 100 years. You go in, you learn a basic chant. I can teach a parrot a basic chant. I could write a script over there that you could read. You could do the basic chant. But folks weren't learning how to market themselves and they weren't learning how to do social media marketing or online auctions, things that I hate to call it the future because we're probably 15 years behind on some of that. You know, they weren't learning that. So that's what we're and my best friend and business partner in the auctioneering university, he teaches at a university level, teaches graphic communication. He kind of does what Chris does over there. And he has been another one of those blessings from God. He just happened to be there at the right time. And he does all the things that I can't do. And we worked in some aspects, online auctions. Jimbo did a great job during COVID. There were so many people that weren't allowed to do auctions. And I'm not just talking about fundraising. I'm talking about grandmother's estate. These things are getting put on hold. We were doing online. We were doing virtual. We'd set up a studio just kind of like we are now. No live crowd. We were going live streaming the auction. But I could talk to people just like I'm talking and looking at you. But I was talking to him virtually.

50:12 Mike Brasher And you were doing the auctioneer chant. Yes. Did you had to slow it down at all?

50:17 Junior Staggs Some, some, but not really. You know, that's really what he reached out to me. I mean, that's that's I mean, I really I think that's why we really hit it off because he was he was such a trailblazer with that one. He is he is I don't know up around the lake or somewhere. He said, hey, man, I just saw a sign for an online auction. He was thinking about how can we because because one of those things, I mean, whether you can or you can't, you're right. I think that was Henry Ford, whether you can, you can't, you're right. So when the world tells you, you can't do auctions anymore, you've got to how can I do auctions? So for me, it was online. So Jimbo, he saw the sign. He goes, hey, man, I saw a sign for online auctions. Can we do this? Well, see what we can do. You know, well, then we couldn't meet inside. Well, you do you start meeting under a tent. This parking lot. We raised a lot of money right here in this parking lot. You know, over over the past three years, a little over two million dollars. And I think we may hit that three million dollar mark in Vegas this summer. It's going to be fun. And did I did I was I keeping track? Not really. But will that and 50 cents get you a pack of juicy fruit? Yes. But but when you look back at that entire body of work, there were some auctions that were a little low, some that really exceeded your expectations. But as a whole, if he's happy and my committees are happy and D.U. is happy, I've got no choice but to be happy.

51:25 Mike Brasher You know what I mean? So you mentioned sort of the amount of money that you raised, two million, three million. Is that this year long? No, that's been since my first D.U. event. OK, and I had a question here on some of the what I was thinking about is Jimbo, do we keep track of that? Sort of informally? Some do, some don't.

51:41 Jimbo Robinson Yes. So we there's not a formal when you do a financial, whenever committee does a financial report, they put a live auction number. So, yes, there is a tracking of that. You could easily do it for Junior. We kind of had a number in mind and I had to go way back and he started doing the new Madrid auctions in almost 2014. And they're big, 70, $80,000 auction. So when I was looking at the number and we did some auctions, we did a really neat auction in the fall, Fate in the Field, a conservation through our partnership program here that I'm sure the podcast have heard about. But the partnership with Arts Memphis and Ducks Unlimited, we did that auction and they we had nine or 10 items. I can't remember. We raised almost $85,000 and that I said, man, I was doing the math in my head. I'm going, man, I need to go back and look at all of Junior's. So I went back and I Junior kind of pushed me on a program. He talked about marketability earlier about put about how these trips are auctioned. And when I first started, I would tell him I'd say he would say, have you sent this information out to attendees? No. Why? Well, man, they don't know this trip. How do you expect me to sell these trips? And that is a never thought of it. So I changed. He pushed me to change the way that I presented it that night. We started doing full color programs. Every trip got a full page. We started doing a lot things differently that we had not done in the past. Thanks to Junior giving me advice on how to market something to sell it that day quickly, kind of like what he does with tractors and items that when he does a yard sale, not a yard sale, but a tractor farm type sale, which we have a lot of here equipment wise. And so I learned a lot from him in that time, but I've kept up with Junior's numbers. I went back and pulled some numbers and there's some areas I may have given him a little more money than than I could remember or that I had written down on stuff. And, you know, back a couple months ago, I think it was we had to get a thousand or fifteen, no, six thousand dollars.

53:41 Junior Staggs That was a surprise to me. That was your last.

53:43 Jimbo Robinson That was my last official really event. And I and I had from what I am very close, plus or minus thirty thousand. And to Junior now, that's that's a lot of money, but it's not pretty close to the folks we hang out with. Yes. No, that's a lot of money. But for money raised that night for for an auction that's a Junior and I have done, that's about average. So I knew he was close. And so I from what I could tell is about sixty seven hundred dollars away from hitting two million. And I had already planned it like if we didn't hit that number that night, I was going to be walking out with a door with a bunch of writing on it that was going to look really funny. I guess I'd thrown it away. I don't know. But because I had put a date on it and when the auction started, I did not think we would get there. Then all of a sudden it just exploded and we hit it on item four or five, which was mind blowing. But yes, I know that Junior's raised two million dollars, especially now how we get to three million. It will be you know, it won't take long. But I know others, Jason McKee and I talked recently about auctions and his auctioneers raised three hundred fifty thousand dollars. I think it's becoming more of a thing. And in my new role, one of the things I'd really like to work on is a way to honor some of our auctioneers and the amount of money they raise for DU.

54:57 Mike Brasher Absolutely. I think that'd be great. Recognize the contributions, the very important contributions that you all make to it because it's everything that you said. I mean, it's I'm learning so much just by being part of this, learning how you read the audience and how you how you then adjust and change and just all the little tips and tricks that's it doesn't just happen. You think about it. If you know, it's a well-oiled machine.

55:22 Jimbo Robinson And one of the things that we most a lot of big auctioneers, huge auctioneers that travel the country and I'm not going to say in fancy jets, but they travel the country to do these mega mega events. They charge 10 percent. If we charge 10 percent of if Junior charged Tennessee Ducks Unlimited, myself and our committee members 10 percent of the money he raised, we wouldn't be able to afford him. So, yes, Junior has never asked. We have a number that we've settled on. And if Junior goes above and beyond and we have those big numbers, yes, that committee will pay Junior a little bit more. But it's it's not you can't make a living doing DU auctions. And I know some people that have tried to do that have lost. But I know that what Junior brings to DU is a lot more money than what DU pays Junior.

56:13 Mike Brasher And so you do auctions outside. I mean, you're a professional auctioneer. You do a lot of auctions outside of Ducks Unlimited.

56:20 Junior Staggs That's my full time job. Yeah, I went full time. I worked after after leaving Martin. Of course, my wife was teaching first grade then. And I was working in a computer lab coaching soccer, boy's soccer in the spring, girls softball in the fall. And did that for I worked there for six years, I think, coached for three. And there was the last year. I mean, and it is. I mean, it's a percentage based. And that's one thing. When in my retail days, I just wanted to get paid a percentage. I hate high pressure sales, but I love sales. I love being rewarded for how hard you work. And I mean, I love coaching. Don't get me wrong. I love it. I miss it. And but the thing that it is, is I missed a commission check. That was probably twice of what my little stipend was to coach softball one year. And I told my wife, I said, honey, it's time we make some pretty tough decisions. Am I going to do this? Because Jimbo kind of alluded to this earlier. How many different genres there are in the auction business there? I don't have a number to back it up, but I would say the vast majority of auctioneers are part time auctioneers or contract auctioneers. I own an auction company. I mean, we sell everything from Rolex watches to to lake properties and fruit jars to, you know, collector car, whatever. We've sold everything in between. And that's that's kind of that we made that decision that first year. It was rough. You know, we didn't eat out as much as we like to. But that's one of those. I mean, you it goes back to that plan, practice and perform. I mean, I had a business plan of what I wanted to do. You know, when I went out on my own, it was the scariest thing in the world, you all, to leave that guaranteed money. And and start your own thing. But a guy told me when I was 19 years old, he says, look, I knew I'd worked for him for two years. I knew the day that you hired on, you wouldn't work for me forever because you're never going to be happy until you're working for yourself. My mother has been a hairdresser for 40 years. You know, she kind of planted that entrepreneurial spirit. My dad was more of a he was he was a working man. He needed he needed a boss. You know, he wanted to he was a heavy machinery operator. He wanted to work on his own, but he needed to clock in and he wanted to clock out. And when he clocked out, he didn't. I mean, there are a lot of times I mean, I clock in at seven o'clock in the morning and he could vouch for me here with my big consignment auction that we did back in March. There were a lot of nights we were down here in the big room and I'd be an hour early cataloging. I've got two phones. I don't have a secretary. I've got two phones and I'm cataloging like this right here. You know, what are you doing? I said, man, I'm trying to get caught up on this auction. We're doing that at nine o'clock. One night I had Justin drive me home and I think I fell asleep and hunting with the phone with the phone like this. It's not like that always. But I mean, there's no clocking in and clocking out. It's if you're willing to hustle and you're willing to get out there and do it, you can you can make a good living in this. How can people get in touch with you and find out about Auctioneer University? Auctioneeru.com. That's auctioneertheletteru.com. That's our website. Brent has made that thing pretty doggone mobile friendly because we know most folks are looking at it from a mobile device. But all of our contact information is there. Of course, I'm the TikTok auctioneer on TikTok, Junior Stags on Facebook. And I'm like a box of chocolates, y'all. You never know what you're going to get. But I also try to be pretty transparent. You know, what you see is what you get. You know, what you see on social media, hopefully is going to be the same guy you see when you finally meet me. It still shocks some people. I just called a young lady. She's coming in for the boot camp from Middle Tennessee in late part of this month. And she's it really shocks them when I call. I don't have a secret. I'm like, I don't want a secret. I want to be the face, the voice that you hear on the other end of the line. You know, some folks want somebody else to handle that. I'm not a great, I'm not a great delegator. And I'll tell you, I'm not a great delegator. So we're working on it. We're working on it.

59:58 Mike Brasher We're going to start wrapping this episode up here in just a few minutes. But we have, we still need to talk about favorite stories, favorite memories. Who wants to go first on that? Jimbo, you have a favorite memory, favorite story from a DU event?

01:00:10 Jimbo Robinson I would say my favorite story is when Junior showed up to Jackson, Tennessee three years ago. This fall will be three. Yeah, this fall will be three. And he looked at me and I said, what is wrong with you? And he said, man, I suffered another bout with Bellis-Palsy. And I said, so you can't feel the right side of your face. He goes, not at all. And I said, I'm no rocket science scientist and I wasn't born yesterday, but in order to chant and do an auction, I would assume that you probably need to feel most of your face. And he said, we're going to do the best we can. Most money we ever raised in Jackson. Now that was also coming off of COVID and that was one of their first big events coming off COVID. That played a very small part in it. But the part that amazed me was it never changed. Nothing about Junior's chant, nothing about the way Junior did an auction changed. And I've told this story numerous times to other people. That one is probably one of my favorite stories. One of my funniest memories is Junior never messes up very often. And this past fall, we were rolling on an auction. I mean, one of these highlight big auctions and Junior hit 6,500 three times. And we got to 7,500. With new bids. No, like the same chant, he hit 6,500. We got to 7,000, something paused us a little bit, got stuck and we ended up at 6,500 again. Then we got back to 7,000 and somehow we ended up at 6,500 for the third time. And he just looked to me after he got done, shook his head and started laughing. Then both of us couldn't stop laughing after that. But we got, I think we ended up selling it for $8,000, but it was funny. And I just kept looking at him and nobody in the crowd caught on. Not a single person. I did because I've heard it so many times and I know when he goes up and down and how things. I just started laughing, looking at him. I was like, we were at 6,500 three times there. He goes, well, let's go.

01:02:10 Junior Staggs Yeah, it happens, but that's the beauty of it because 99.9% of the time, unless there's an auction savvy person in the crowd, people ask, what if you mess up? You just roll on. You roll on. I mean, you just roll on. Because if you stop and acknowledge you messed up, there goes your momentum.

01:02:28 Jimbo Robinson Sure. You know, Junior's not a man of fancy things, right? That's the thing. What you see is what you get. He just alluded to it a second ago and you're never going to see, no matter what happens with Junior, he's laughing. He knows where I'm going with this. There's a, you're not going to ever see Junior roll up in a limo and somebody open the door for him, right? What you're going to see Junior roll up in is a car. Toyota Camry. A Toyota Camry. A Toyota Camry. A 1994 Toyota Camry. And Junior's ringmen are not small people, right? So I looked out in the parking lot and they come beat bopping into DU Park. I'm like, somebody's lost. That was Shredboil last year. Somebody's lost, right? When people come to the event, I'm not putting anybody's cars down whatsoever because I drive an old car. But when they rolled in in this 1994 Camry, it looked like one of the wheels. I thought they were in the wrong place. And I said, who is this? I said, Hey, Roger, go out there and check on that car pulling in the parking lot. And man, he goes, man, that's your auctioneer. And I went, I just put my head down and started laughing. Well, this past Thursday night, we had our crawfish bowl again. I don't know if it must be something, but the crawfish bowl is him and Ben and Justin. He has to bring an extra guy. Yeah, he has to bring an extra guy. They roll up and the three of them are in the front seat of this. 04 F-150. Probably 1990. It's 04. 04. It shows my age. All right. 04. They are packed in there. Justin cannot put his hands. He has his hands tucked. Single cab. It's a single cab tucked in between his lap. And I just said, y'all that's not right.

01:03:56 Junior Staggs He's laughing. I'm like, you're laughing at my truck. He said, I'm just laughing at the situation.

01:04:00 Jimbo Robinson They're packed in there, but that's Junior. That's his humble upbringing and who he is. And I mean, the way they don't care. They just traveled the events. He broke down one time, had to get a buddy, pick him up and an old beater. I mean, there's stories about his, it doesn't bother to him, but the one thing I can say of all the funny stories we have, one of the ones is he's never let me down. I send him the event list. He moves things around to put Tennessee DU and us first. And a man that is of his talent and of his popularity now, he still puts us first. And the only time I ever got mad at him is when he told me like the third time that he had the school board meeting. And I said, man, you got to get rid of the school board.

01:04:43 Junior Staggs I'm the only person that's ever resigned a school board so we could do Ducks Unlimited Banquets. I think.

01:04:48 Mike Brasher That's dedication. So what about you, Junior? I'm sure you get this question often. Like what's the strangest item you've ever sold? I want to go there. That's probably going to be outside of Ducks Unlimited Auctions with you, I guess. But within the DU auction experience, anything in particular stand out? Favorite moment? It doesn't have to be a funny moment, but a meaningful moment.

01:05:14 Junior Staggs Anything stand out in that regard? I think really for me, and it's going to be outside of the DU auction, but it's still going to be DU family. And guess where I'm going with this one? I'm going back to New Madrid. Bill Henry's biggest fear is that when I go to Las Vegas this summer, that I'm never coming back to New Madrid. He's scared to death. He's scared. I mean, really, he's been doing that. He's been their chairman. How many? 40 years or something. 40 plus. That's his baby. He doesn't have any children. That's his baby. He's scared to death that when I go to Vegas, it's going to open that door that he's seen that's going to open for a long time. And I've promised him I'm not going anywhere. I said, I don't think you realize. I mean, when I'd gone over there, y'all, and I'm an emotional guy. Okay. The Saturday night, the last time I spoke to my dad, I was getting ready to go to New Madrid. And a lot of times when I talked to my dad, we just talked. But my girls had ran off. It's a long story. We won't share that one. But my girls had ran off to the Ranton Uncle's house. I was scared. I thought I'd lost them. I thought somebody picked them up. So I called my dad and we went through this story. And I got to tell him I love him and all that good stuff. We had a great last conversation because on Thursday of that week, he died. He had an aortic aneurysm driving home from work and he's gone. He was here one day and he was gone. And that committee at New Madrid, Missouri, every member of them, from the youngest one, Olivia, to the oldest one in the group, sent a card. It wasn't just a card that says, we feel for you. It was a card with personal inscriptions. That's still in my desk. When I have a horrible day, when I have one of those Murphy's Law days, you know what I do? I go to that top drawer of my desk on the left-hand side and I pull it out and I open up that card. And I remember that was the worst day of my life. And those folks, they're family. And Bill, I'm not going anywhere. But the thing that he probably talks about, the funniest thing you've sold, is probably the tie. Yeah, his tie. For Ducks Unlimited, yeah. For Ducks Unlimited, that's the funniest thing that I've sold for him is every year. Of course, our vests. And that's one of those things. It's just kind of an on-the-fly kind of thing. I bought a vest from him a couple years ago. And I was like, hey, could you make my guys get your, was it his mother? His mother-in-law, his mother makes these ties and made these vests. Bottomland camera. And we travel, yeah. I mean, it's pretty nice.

01:07:29 Mike Brasher I think I've seen some of those around.

01:07:31 Junior Staggs I think I've got them in the Bronco. I've got them in the Bronco. But I mean, they fix this up, but he this tie. But as far as the oddest ever, and I mean, this is one that's every year I've ever done, is we do a big event every year in January, February there in Paris called the Henry County Helping Hand. It's a fundraising auction phone-in, like a Jerry Lewis telethon style thing, but it's all over the radio. And a few years ago I was in there and it was like the Medical Center Day. Everybody, the little communities get a day, the churches get days and different things. So this was the Medical Center Day. And I'm sitting here live on the air and lot number 1307 comes in and I have to sell a vasectomy. I didn't just get to sell one that day. I got to sell two. You talk about a discounted vasectomy. That's one thing that I don't think I would want, but we sold two vasectomies that day. Two competing urologists or whatever donated these things. But yeah, that is probably the oddest or strangest thing I have ever sold.

01:08:22 Mike Brasher Yeah, whenever I was imagining the question that I was going to ask you, that oddest item that you've ever auctioned, that was nowhere on my radar.

01:08:28 Junior Staggs No, it never is. I mean, yeah, but who can say they sold one? I sold two. We've sold some amazing things. We've sold some scary things. But yeah, we sold Bill's tie a few times. We normally end the night like that. But that one up there, it's its own thing. It's special.

01:08:45 Mike Brasher It's special. And it was really, it was my first DU banquet, I guess. Absolutely. Wow. But yeah, when something like that happens, there's no other way that you can come away from that other than to identify that group as family. That's for sure. And so I can certainly see why you led with that whenever you described what Ducks Unlimited means to you when you think about them. Absolutely. Yeah, I appreciate you sharing that. So I have a question here like what's next for Junior and Ducks Unlimited. You've actually kind of introduced that already. You've mentioned it a couple of times. Las Vegas, that is our national convention. And it is early June, early June. Yeah, early June.

01:09:20 Junior Staggs I think we're flying in the last day of May and flying out the second of June. Is that right?

01:09:25 Mike Brasher Yeah, yeah, yeah, something like that. And we are going to be by the time this by the time this airs, this the national convention in Las Vegas will have already occurred.

01:09:34 Junior Staggs I'll be there. And so I look forward to to seeing you do your thing. It's going to be fun, man. Yeah. That is I told you kind of beforehand when I was a kid, all I wanted to do, I told Chris this, I just wanted to play music. But I really wanted to be the next Garth Brooks. And for me, that's going to be my Central Park. That is going to be my Central Park show. And this guy right here made it happen. Thank you, man.

01:09:54 Mike Brasher Absolutely. That's awesome. Anything else we need to cover here, guys? I mean, there's a lot more that we could discuss. We haven't even really gotten to a whole lot of tips. Well, maybe a few tips and tricks that you've done, but your style is all that kind of stuff that we could talk about. We don't have time for that. But folks, if anybody's interested in learning more about becoming an RD for Ducks Unlimited.

01:10:13 Jimbo Robinson Yeah, I mean, a regional director volunteer, anything that they want to do, they can send me an email. JRobinson at Ducks.org or they can go to volunteer for D.U. dot org or go to our new website, which still carries the same URL. But it's the improvements they've made on that website. It's incredible and learn how to volunteer there. But we have something for everybody everywhere. And we are always looking for volunteers for Ducks Unlimited. And one of the taglines I've always used is come see what all the fun is about because it's fun no matter what kind of event you attend or how you get involved. And people think that, oh, well, I don't have a lot of money, so I can't get involved with that. I don't have a lot of money. And I've been involved with D.U. on the staff and the volunteer side for a very long time. And I think that we can find, I have always told people that if you can't afford a D.U. ticket, let me know and I will buy you one just to come see what all the fun is about. Because what we do is fun. And lifelong friends have been made. I'm sure that lifelong partners have been made at D.U. events throughout the country at some point and lifelong friendships. And it's just something special.

01:11:19 Mike Brasher And what makes it even more rewarding is that you're becoming part of something bigger than yourself. You're giving to conservation, helping us leave the world a little bit better. Yes, sir. Absolutely. One other place where folks can go Jimbo is on that website that you mentioned, ducks.org. Scroll down to the bottom and look up careers. I think there's got a whole bunch of openings there. I'm sure there's some R.D. openings there as well. So encourage folks to check that out. Guys, this has been really fun. I appreciate the opportunity to catch up with both of you and kind of shed some light on an important part of the fundraising that that goes into Ducks Unlimited. Very special thanks to our guest on today's episode, Jimbo Robinson, director of event marketing and field support here at Ducks Unlimited. And Junior Staggs, the owner of Auctioneer University and a very well experienced auctioneer here for Ducks Unlimited, Tennessee. As always, we thank our producer, Chris Isaac, for the wonderful work he does with these episodes and getting them out to you and to you, the listener. We thank you for your support of wetlands and waterfowl conservation. Twenty one hundred, two hundred, two hundred, twenty two, twenty one hundred.