Speaker 1: Welcome to another episode of Strictly Business, the podcast in
Speaker 1: which we talked to some of the brightest minds working
Speaker 1: in media today. I'm Variety co editor in chief Andrew Wallenstein.
Speaker 1: For many people, Red Bull is the energy drink that
Speaker 1: gives you wings, but for the past ten years, the
Speaker 1: beverage company has become a lot more than that, the
Speaker 1: pioneering force in the worlds of branded entertainment and action sports.
Speaker 1: That non carbonated component of the business is overseen by
Speaker 1: today's guest, Garrett Meyer, who has served as CEO for
Speaker 1: Red Bull Media House for the past two years. Thanks
Speaker 1: for coming in, Garrett. Let's do a little level setting
Speaker 1: for those who may not be familiar with Red Bull
Speaker 1: in the media business, because as long as you've been
Speaker 1: in the job, you've been pretty quiet and let the
Speaker 1: brands work do the talking. Now it's your turn. Yes.
Speaker 1: The Red Bull Media House over the last ten years
Speaker 1: has been a drive of everything that we've been doing
Speaker 1: on the content on the media side, both in support
Speaker 1: of what we do on the brand side, but also
Speaker 1: with a lot of the unbranded exercises. So during that
Speaker 1: time we've created red Bull TV as a stone alone
Speaker 1: app as well as an integrated experience red Bull dot
Speaker 1: Com together with all the various content features that we've
Speaker 1: had a cross video, whether that's music that is audio
Speaker 1: in general, our podcast, but also our text and our video.
Speaker 1: We're really much focusing on the editorial pieces around our events,
Speaker 1: around our seven d plus athletes that we do, but
Speaker 1: also all the inspiring and inspiring stories that we hear
Speaker 1: in the world, whether that's in sports or culture, dance, music, etcetera.
Speaker 1: So we're super excited that we're now at a point
Speaker 1: we really feel what kind of can take it to
Speaker 1: another level. And So you've been at this now for
Speaker 1: the past few years, but the Red Bull has been
Speaker 1: in entertainment for a lot longer than that. What did
Speaker 1: you inherit two years ago and how has it changed
Speaker 1: in your time in the top job. So when I
Speaker 1: came to the job a couple of years ago, what
Speaker 1: I found was a company, as you said, super strong
Speaker 1: and Brandon Entertainment. We've done some really really good pieces
Speaker 1: of content. Everybody remembers Stratus, Felix Bomb Gardener jumping from Space.
Speaker 1: And I think we had gotten ourselves to a really,
Speaker 1: really strong point where we had platforms that attracted a
Speaker 1: sizeable audience. But now given where we are two thousand, seventeen,
Speaker 1: eighteen and nineteen, media world, as you know and as
Speaker 1: we all know, changing rapidly with an influx of content
Speaker 1: investments that has reached absolute new heights, with an unsurpassed
Speaker 1: amount of content that we're seeing out in the world
Speaker 1: being consumed on multiple platforms. So for us, it was
Speaker 1: really important to take it to the next level. Next
Speaker 1: level for US means really still focusing on platforms that
Speaker 1: we have, but they're really becoming much more audience centric.
Speaker 1: Audience centric for US means finding audiences that kind of
Speaker 1: find communities around the world or locally to kind of
Speaker 1: get together. For us, obviously that has to do with
Speaker 1: a lot of the course boards that were in, whether
Speaker 1: that is surfing, whether is skateboarding, whether that's bike king,
Speaker 1: but a lot has also to do with things were
Speaker 1: not so relevant, so not so known with which is music, dance, arts, etcetera.
Speaker 1: So for us, building an organization that is really focused
Speaker 1: around these audiences and then speaking to these audiences with
Speaker 1: relevant content, finding them where they actually live, whether that's
Speaker 1: digitally or terrestrially, and then talk to them in a
Speaker 1: tone that is native to kind of their community and
Speaker 1: how they talk with each other. That is the relevancy
Speaker 1: that we're trying to create to also then work through
Speaker 1: what we've always believed in authenticity and what as we say,
Speaker 1: giving wings to people and their ideas and so now
Speaker 1: for the last two years, we've really worked on refocusing
Speaker 1: around audience centric programming, audience centric content creation also not
Speaker 1: just alone but also with a lot of the partners
Speaker 1: set out there. And so people understand it when you're
Speaker 1: talking about this sort of audience centricity. How is the
Speaker 1: Red Bull media experience different today than it was a
Speaker 1: few years You mentioned, for instance, partners, and I guess
Speaker 1: you're doing a lot more of that. Yes, absolutely. I
Speaker 1: think what really has changed is that what we consider
Speaker 1: the Red Bull Media network has really expanded beyond our
Speaker 1: own and managed platforms into other shared and distributed platforms.
Speaker 1: If you look at our relationship with that's with YouTube,
Speaker 1: or you look at our relationships with Twitch or other
Speaker 1: publishers that are out there, we've gotten a lot deeper
Speaker 1: in our relationship with traditional broadcasters. But even on our
Speaker 1: feature film site, if you look at some of the
Speaker 1: documentary releases that we've done over the last few years,
Speaker 1: we've shouldn't seen much much deeper relationships and distribution and
Speaker 1: theatrical releases. So overall we've just gotten much much broader
Speaker 1: in the way we kind of consider our own world
Speaker 1: of Red Bull and where our content lives, of our
Speaker 1: audiences lives. You mentioned hundreds and hundreds of athletes give
Speaker 1: us a sense of, you know, some of the big
Speaker 1: names that we've heard of that are sort of in
Speaker 1: the Red Bull camp. Well, I think that really depends
Speaker 1: on we go. You know, we talk about so many
Speaker 1: different disciplin lens, but you know, we have you know,
Speaker 1: as we talked about relevancy last week, Lindsey Vonn who's
Speaker 1: been with Red Both for such a long time unfortunately
Speaker 1: announcer retirement. But we have max Va staff and in
Speaker 1: Formula one obviously, we're working very closely with Anthony Davis
Speaker 1: on their basketball side, and we have Marcel here show
Speaker 1: For anyone who is now doing the winter season, especially
Speaker 1: me coming from Austria as one of the premier ski
Speaker 1: athletes out there, I think we can talk about a
Speaker 1: number of athletes that we can point toof over the
Speaker 1: years have provided so much success and so much joy
Speaker 1: to the people out there, and really our role in
Speaker 1: all of this is to just document all the successes
Speaker 1: and everything that they've been doing, telling their stories out
Speaker 1: to the world. And also your definition of sports probably
Speaker 1: keeps expanding. The sports is now part of the mix.
Speaker 1: Absolutely e sports. But as I also mentioned dancing, if
Speaker 1: you look at the Global Dance Competition, you know, we're
Speaker 1: very strong in any kind of urban sports. We host
Speaker 1: every year the World Championship and break dancing, which has
Speaker 1: been growing in popularity. That's the sport now, it's not
Speaker 1: it's always been a sport, but it's been a sport
Speaker 1: that actually has been growing in popularity significantly. And you know,
Speaker 1: the athleticism that you see what the athletes are participating
Speaker 1: in those has been huge. But yes, you're absolutely right.
Speaker 1: If we're looking at the sports and professional gaming, we've
Speaker 1: gotten ourselves into a number of different competitions with our
Speaker 1: own teams, with some of our own events, and what
Speaker 1: we're seeing is that, obviously, with that popularity that the
Speaker 1: sports is experiencing right now, again we found another kind
Speaker 1: of sports. But that being said, there's also a lot
Speaker 1: of sports that have had relevancy over the last few
Speaker 1: years that have now gotten mainstream attraction. I mean, just
Speaker 1: look at Tokyo for next year their WebEx Olympics. We
Speaker 1: have skateboarding being at it, you have surfing being at it,
Speaker 1: you have bouldering being at it. I mean those are
Speaker 1: all sports that we at Red Boats have been considered
Speaker 1: court to what we do for many, many years. So
Speaker 1: it's great to see that those athletes now their accomplishments
Speaker 1: are actually being recognized on an international level, you know,
Speaker 1: and obviously the Olympics are at the highest level that
Speaker 1: you can compete at. So we're extremely proud to kind
Speaker 1: of see, you know, that our athletes are not having
Speaker 1: a chance to kind of prove themselves. I'm ashamed to
Speaker 1: admit that boulder ring, is that rock climbing that last week,
Speaker 1: that's exactly that's what everybody kind of does. It's amazing
Speaker 1: when you actually kind of see it in personal what
Speaker 1: what do what those people do? It's Uh, those athletes
Speaker 1: are phenomenal in their accomplishments. Let's talk a bit about
Speaker 1: branded entertainment because I think Red Bull really is unique
Speaker 1: in when going back, you know, farther than you were
Speaker 1: even at the company they have, Red Bull has gone
Speaker 1: deeper into this than probably any other company out there.
Speaker 1: I mentioned at the beginning it was kind of a pioneer.
Speaker 1: Has the strategic approach changed, you know, it felt like
Speaker 1: for a time and you mentioned the stratus jump some
Speaker 1: years ago that you couldn't turn on a television and
Speaker 1: watch any sort of actions were and not see that logo. Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 1: the strategic approach actually hasn't changed that much. In the
Speaker 1: beginning or thirty years ago, when the company was created,
Speaker 1: it was a means to the end. It was something
Speaker 1: about a product that nobody really understood. The energy during
Speaker 1: this category was not really well defined, so it's hard
Speaker 1: to communicate actually what the brand was about. But what
Speaker 1: what our founder kind of believed right from the beginning
Speaker 1: was that if you brought people together in communities and
Speaker 1: in this case it was around events, bring people together
Speaker 1: and get to see, you know, the accomplishments of people
Speaker 1: what they can do, driven through maybe Red Bull, then
Speaker 1: you can achieve on a utility basis. So kind of
Speaker 1: you get the boots when you need it within an occasion,
Speaker 1: whether you're studying, your working or you maybe partying um
Speaker 1: and specifically in sports, that you have an opportunity to
Speaker 1: kind of like can perform more and higher. So what
Speaker 1: we did right from the beginning is captured these events,
Speaker 1: capture these athletes, and nothing really has changed. What has
Speaker 1: changed is that now there are a lot more brands
Speaker 1: out there who are following, you know, the same path.
Speaker 1: Traditional media as we know, it's all challenged, regardless of
Speaker 1: the media that you're on, whether that's television, whether that's radio,
Speaker 1: or that's magazines, newspapers. So there's a lot more companies
Speaker 1: over the last eight years. And I don't know whether
Speaker 1: I have the numbers all right, but I think over
Speaker 1: the last eight years, the investment in brand entertainment has
Speaker 1: more than doubled. Obviously very very much focused on video.
Speaker 1: So now what we're seeing is we're not alone anymore,
Speaker 1: kind of in the space that probably twenty thirty years
Speaker 1: ago we still had a much more stronger voice in.
Speaker 1: So for us, what is really important that we kind
Speaker 1: of maintain the relevancy that we built, whether that is
Speaker 1: through sports events or culture events. And what's good for
Speaker 1: us to see is that our audiences, through the strength
Speaker 1: of our stories and through the strength of our events
Speaker 1: and athletes, has been kept growing. So the strategy, to
Speaker 1: your question, hasn't really changed, but it has evolved and
Speaker 1: it's gotten more complex also in the world. Whether it's
Speaker 1: just a lot more content out there, what about your
Speaker 1: relationship to the parent company. I'm wondering how that, if
Speaker 1: at all, has changed. I'm wondering whether it's even necessary
Speaker 1: for your division to be profitable. What are the expectations.
Speaker 1: So the expectations are that we have a dual mandate.
Speaker 1: You absolutely right. The media house sits separately from the beverage.
Speaker 1: But what the one strong mandate is obviously to create
Speaker 1: content around the stories of our athletes and our events.
Speaker 1: That will never change. We now do over twelve hundred
Speaker 1: events a year. We have, as I mentioned, seven d
Speaker 1: fifty plus athletes, and that sounds expensive. Well, it's less
Speaker 1: that it's about expensive. It's much about that they have
Speaker 1: so many great stories to tell. I mean, our athletes
Speaker 1: are just phenomenal individuals who are performing at the highest
Speaker 1: level every day. And what we see now in this
Speaker 1: world is that audiences around the world are much much
Speaker 1: more interested about what the stories are behind. Of course
Speaker 1: there's still interested in the results and in the competitions,
Speaker 1: but really the narrative around this and so everybody these
Speaker 1: days is talking about storytelling and narratives. But what we've
Speaker 1: been seeing is that the access that we have to
Speaker 1: those events athletes made fascinating stories. So yes, we are
Speaker 1: creating more content than we've ever done before and that
Speaker 1: and again in return, supports the brand. That being said,
Speaker 1: we're also standalone media house that has the expectation to
Speaker 1: perform and create content at the highest level and for
Speaker 1: that will require the best writers, producers, uh and directors,
Speaker 1: production partners, other students that we work with. And so
Speaker 1: for us, it is really really important that we kind
Speaker 1: of keep that quality up and in some cases that
Speaker 1: not necessarily relates back to the brand. So there we go.
Speaker 1: We create feature films. That's where we kind of go
Speaker 1: out create serialized content. We're still in print media. We
Speaker 1: have local print media that we're pursuing. Again for us,
Speaker 1: localization it's really really important, and so building media capability
Speaker 1: in the times of two thousand, two thousand and twenty,
Speaker 1: where the world is changing rapidly and how people consume
Speaker 1: is really important. So we do have those tool mandates
Speaker 1: and we kind of working with them. On the profitability side,
Speaker 1: we have a vast portfolio. We have everything from RepU
Speaker 1: records and record music publishing, to red both films all
Speaker 1: the way to our magazine and book publishing business. So
Speaker 1: we look at all of them individually on a profitability basis.
Speaker 1: But the big advantage that we have is we are
Speaker 1: a private company, so we have the opportunity to invest,
Speaker 1: we can try new things, we can be out there,
Speaker 1: and we take a longer term view on the investment
Speaker 1: as it comes back, including innovation because as we all
Speaker 1: know of technology is exploding, so we're trying to see
Speaker 1: how it can harness that both our production but also
Speaker 1: in making our athletes being better athletes. Give me an
Speaker 1: example that what's the way that you might be innovating
Speaker 1: with athletes using technology. So one of the things we're
Speaker 1: looking at right now is how can we use uh
Speaker 1: mind controlled activity around gaming, not just to actually think
Speaker 1: about how we make E sports athletes better, but how
Speaker 1: can we also kind of improve mental responsiveness for physical
Speaker 1: athletes Because us the games, everything that people do, everything
Speaker 1: goes faster, the demands from the athletes are getting harder,
Speaker 1: so physical on that, we have made a lot of
Speaker 1: progress over the last decades on really improving physical fitness. Um,
Speaker 1: so the idea about improving mental fitness is now also
Speaker 1: being seen as a key ingredient, not just for the
Speaker 1: sports athletes obviously who have to be extremely alert, but
Speaker 1: also for other sports where if you can improve reaction
Speaker 1: time exactly, then you are a much better position to
Speaker 1: improve performance. So this is kind of where we're working
Speaker 1: with our athletes, and that is something of great interest
Speaker 1: to us. That's so interesting. So for instance, you mentioned,
Speaker 1: you know, random example here Anthony Davis. You can sit
Speaker 1: him down with a game that you will create and
Speaker 1: a helmet or some sort of head apparatus in which
Speaker 1: he will control the game without using his hands, and
Speaker 1: this will help develop his agility. I mean, that's mind blowing,
Speaker 1: so to speaking, to speak literally, well hopefully not literally,
Speaker 1: not blowing mind but no, but you're right. I mean again,
Speaker 1: everything is just a tool. Everything is just an experiment.
Speaker 1: So and you know, and this is not where like finally,
Speaker 1: I mean, somebody who's performing a level like like an
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis obviously is already at the pinnacle of things.
Speaker 1: But what we can see is whether their improvements. And again,
Speaker 1: in some cases, when you see ski races which we
Speaker 1: get decided among the top five within five hundreds of
Speaker 1: a second, you know that every little bit counts. So
Speaker 1: what we're just doing is trying to find other ways,
Speaker 1: as we've done over the years, trying to improve the
Speaker 1: environments in which athletes can perform for them to just
Speaker 1: get better. So it's just one experiment. It might it
Speaker 1: might not work, But to your point about profitability. As
Speaker 1: the company that we are, we have committed ourselves to
Speaker 1: give wings two people to get better in what they're
Speaker 1: doing and their ideas. And this is just one example
Speaker 1: where we think that, hey, maybe that's another piece and
Speaker 1: if it's not, I'm going to try something else. And
Speaker 1: that is our commitment back to the athlete community, but
Speaker 1: also to the artist community out there, just to kind
Speaker 1: of become better than where they are today, because that's
Speaker 1: what they're striving for. Okay, Well, I mean you talked
Speaker 1: about the many and I mean many different places Red
Speaker 1: Bull is active today in terms of media and platforms.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about a few. I mean, what strikes me
Speaker 1: about on the film side is I've seen some of
Speaker 1: the things you guys have done in recent years and
Speaker 1: that doesn't even seem to have the Red Bull as
Speaker 1: prominently branded as you might be, say on television. So
Speaker 1: what's the point. Well, the point is two folds. First
Speaker 1: of all, we're really starting with the story in mind.
Speaker 1: And and with this story comes, especially these days, a
Speaker 1: huge expectation what authenticity is concerned. Um. The audience is
Speaker 1: out there, extreme, discriminating and they understand what they see.
Speaker 1: So for us, it's important to tell the story first.
Speaker 1: There are stories that are environments, that events where branded
Speaker 1: environment absolutely makes sense. But if we tell an emotional story,
Speaker 1: if we tell, for example, Rebecca Russia's story in The
Speaker 1: Black Road last year, uh, a great great film won
Speaker 1: an Emmy. Uh, it's an amazing story about commitment, it's
Speaker 1: about endurance, it's about closure. I mean, there's so many
Speaker 1: emotions in there. You have to allow stories like that
Speaker 1: to breathe. And if there is a place for a brand, fantastic.
Speaker 1: If not, we would like to put this story first.
Speaker 1: What it doesn't return for us is that we get
Speaker 1: credibility back also in the marketplace for creating credible stories.
Speaker 1: And again by coming back to what it is we do.
Speaker 1: We are not in the business of creating branded commercials. Yes,
Speaker 1: we're branded product environment that we're operating, but we're first
Speaker 1: and foremost like to tell our stories and if those
Speaker 1: stories should be told, well, you need really really good
Speaker 1: people to do that. And so for us, we really
Speaker 1: kind of balance out when there's a place for the
Speaker 1: brand to be involved and then where's a place where
Speaker 1: maybe we just tell a story and let that story breathe.
Speaker 1: And I think we've done a good balanced job and
Speaker 1: trying to kind of move that forward. But we're looking
Speaker 1: again further forward where we think that as a standalone
Speaker 1: media house, we do have the opportunity now with the
Speaker 1: credibility that we built in the marketplace, to actually also
Speaker 1: take the next steps. So what might be the next
Speaker 1: step in the film space for Red Bull? So the
Speaker 1: next step would be, first of all, to do more
Speaker 1: and what we've been doing, we've been extremely selective and
Speaker 1: limited in the releases we've been doing. I think we
Speaker 1: have the opportunity to tell more stories and be out
Speaker 1: there not just on uh documentary features, but also serialized content.
Speaker 1: And the other thing we're now looking at is actually
Speaker 1: to get into a scripted feature development. What would that
Speaker 1: look like? What? What? What? What? What exemplifies a Red
Speaker 1: Bull scripted movie? Um, that's a really good question because
Speaker 1: that's where in the development for right now but um,
Speaker 1: you know, for us, anything that's aspirational. I mean if
Speaker 1: you watch if you watch a film and it just
Speaker 1: kind of makes your you know, it lifts your heart,
Speaker 1: if lives your spirits. If it's just something about where
Speaker 1: somebody overcomes something or achieve something that um, you wouldn't
Speaker 1: really think about them maybe achieving. At the outset. There
Speaker 1: have plenty of positive stories out there, and and we
Speaker 1: live for those positive stories. We live with someone who's
Speaker 1: out there, has an idea, goes for it and then
Speaker 1: achieves that that goal. So I think there are stories
Speaker 1: that we can get ourselves behind that are extremely in
Speaker 1: the spirit of what we believe is red bull um
Speaker 1: and fits to what we do. And if we can
Speaker 1: tell those stories in a scripted environment, I think sometimes
Speaker 1: that's a lot more impactful than our documentary side. So
Speaker 1: so that is something we would like to kind of explore.
Speaker 1: So currently we have a few things in development and
Speaker 1: maybe in a year or so we can talk about
Speaker 1: some of them being in production. And I want to
Speaker 1: pry about specific titles. I'm just curious how you're going
Speaker 1: about this. Are you now at festivals looking to buy acquisition?
Speaker 1: Is is always an opportunity but I think ideally with
Speaker 1: some of the ideas we have, finding co production partners,
Speaker 1: finding studios who might kind of share our passion for
Speaker 1: really really good stories, and then having that opportunity to
Speaker 1: partner up and co produce, I think would be also
Speaker 1: a pass with that would go down. I gotta mine
Speaker 1: when you first said this, the first thought I had
Speaker 1: was comparing read what red Bull might do to say
Speaker 1: what Lego does or what Angry Birds does do like
Speaker 1: an animated character that's a red bull or something with wings?
Speaker 1: I mean, are you thinking anything like that or a
Speaker 1: like off the reservation? I'm not sure that animated animation
Speaker 1: would be the first step of what we're doing. I
Speaker 1: think there are some real people out there who have
Speaker 1: really provided inspiration and to the world and what's left done,
Speaker 1: And I think if we kind of picked some of
Speaker 1: those stories and tell those stories, I think that would
Speaker 1: be the first step, right, But you know, you never know.
Speaker 1: Animation has had a really good run over the last
Speaker 1: few years. But I think we're gonna stay staying the
Speaker 1: staying on the un the scripted side without animation first.
Speaker 1: And does this tell us anything in terms of your
Speaker 1: commitment to unscripted documentaries, I assume that's still very much
Speaker 1: in play. Yes, absolutely, and h I'm always excited about
Speaker 1: the documentary we do. I mean these documentaries have proven
Speaker 1: not just ourselves because you know, obviously we love the
Speaker 1: stories that we tell, that's what we do them. But
Speaker 1: also I think if we're looking out to kind of
Speaker 1: how the audience are responding and how the industry is
Speaker 1: responding to it as well. So if we look at
Speaker 1: the movie that we've had recently at the p g
Speaker 1: A Awards nomination with The Dawn Wall has been a
Speaker 1: tremendous success for us. I think it tells an extremely
Speaker 1: inspiring story. Um. So for us to stay committed to
Speaker 1: those kind of stories, absolutely, and we just want to
Speaker 1: tell more stories. Um Also, as I mentioned, you know, serialized,
Speaker 1: it's just a lot of opportunities tell stories that just
Speaker 1: take a little bit more time that maybe kind of
Speaker 1: explode the frame of of our and a half to
Speaker 1: our feature. So for us, any kind of stories really
Speaker 1: remain at the core of what we do. I guess
Speaker 1: we should all be raising ourselves for a red Bull
Speaker 1: oscar perhaps in the future. Uh, you know, if if
Speaker 1: we were so lucky to get recognized for anything we do.
Speaker 1: We were always appreciative, but I think it is a
Speaker 1: story first that comes out there, and hopefully with either
Speaker 1: alone or with some of the partners, we're gonna get
Speaker 1: to tell some story. Is absolutely so let's also talk
Speaker 1: about music. I know you guys have been in that
Speaker 1: space for a while, but more recently the publishing business.
Speaker 1: Why music publishing, Well, in my opinion, the music industry
Speaker 1: is really based on the I p of those who write,
Speaker 1: who produce, who compose, um. That is really the origin.
Speaker 1: It's the nucleus of everything that creates music. Uh. I
Speaker 1: don't want to diminish anything after talent successes of those
Speaker 1: who actually perform, who sometimes are the same people are not.
Speaker 1: But for us, as successful as we've been in some
Speaker 1: of the performing arts on the recording side, I feel
Speaker 1: like that with all the things that we do, have
Speaker 1: a much greater opportunity to serve the community on the
Speaker 1: writers and the producers side, um, very much as we
Speaker 1: do it on the athletes side, where we have much
Speaker 1: more experience. I think with the Redwood Music Festivals, the
Speaker 1: Redwood Music Academy, the record music studios that we have
Speaker 1: all over the world, we do have a really, really
Speaker 1: great infrastructure where we can invite writers and producers to
Speaker 1: come in to fulfill their dreams, their ideas um and
Speaker 1: again that's all what we're always about, and there has
Speaker 1: not really been a good reason why we haven't done
Speaker 1: that more on the music publishing side. So now ramping
Speaker 1: it up and kind of getting more artists in u
Speaker 1: to Red Bull Um to be part of our family
Speaker 1: part of that infrastructure, I think will provide a really
Speaker 1: great opportunity over the next few years to have some
Speaker 1: really good music kind of coming out of those who
Speaker 1: are signing with us on a local level. And I mean,
Speaker 1: are their ambitions in terms of other parts of the
Speaker 1: music business that you're looking to get into. Well, Actually,
Speaker 1: as as as I started alluding to, we already a
Speaker 1: lot of parts of the We we do our music
Speaker 1: festivals around the world. We have an educational music program
Speaker 1: that we've been pursuing for the last fifteen twenty years.
Speaker 1: We've had to Red Bull Records for a while, we
Speaker 1: have Red Bulk Music Publishing for a while. We have
Speaker 1: a music portfolio company, and we create music content. Also,
Speaker 1: again back to the documentary piece, we've done featured documentaries
Speaker 1: about the artists and musicians. Um so we've already been
Speaker 1: pretty holistically present within the music industry, but I do
Speaker 1: believe that we haven't really putting all the pieces together
Speaker 1: to grow our relevance in there, and I think that
Speaker 1: was what we have to offer. It really provides a
Speaker 1: great opportunity for for young inspiring artists who out there again.
Speaker 1: We will always start with those who are still looking
Speaker 1: to find their wings a little bit like the people
Speaker 1: who who are nornestly talented. And we've seen enough talent
Speaker 1: shows out there on television over the last few years
Speaker 1: to know that there's amazing talent out there, and we
Speaker 1: just want to have our part and kind of bring
Speaker 1: some of that talent um to shine. So, you know,
Speaker 1: we've talked about video and film and music. The thing though,
Speaker 1: that strikes me when I think about my own impression
Speaker 1: of Red bull and where I where I feel it's
Speaker 1: impact most social media, and I would imagine that also
Speaker 1: drives a lot of the other momentum in some of
Speaker 1: these other parts of the business. Red Bulls built a
Speaker 1: pretty significant footprint in social media. How did it get there?
Speaker 1: Because that's not easy to do, especially because essentially you
Speaker 1: are a beverage brand. First and foremost. Yeah, uh, it's
Speaker 1: it's a very good point. I think the reason that
Speaker 1: we had the opportunity to build a social footprint again
Speaker 1: goes back to the enormous talent that we're just surrounded with.
Speaker 1: I think if we would put the brand first, which
Speaker 1: we are not, I think it would have been a
Speaker 1: much very different story. I also don't think it would
Speaker 1: have been as universally accepted. Um. So for us, it's
Speaker 1: not about putting the brand first at all. But if
Speaker 1: you do put the athletes and their accomplishments, if you
Speaker 1: do put the events and and and the uniqueness of
Speaker 1: the events that we do around the world, and then
Speaker 1: if you take the stories that kind of combine all
Speaker 1: of those and you allow those stories to put forward,
Speaker 1: you know, you get a much much just response out
Speaker 1: there in the social world. Um and again even socialist
Speaker 1: highly you know, uh, ambiguous now right, it's not any
Speaker 1: more one channel, it's multip channels. And how you communicate
Speaker 1: through those channels. And if you take the stories and
Speaker 1: you make them appropriate to the audience that are out there,
Speaker 1: and you let the stories tell, and if you have
Speaker 1: the athletes or the artists tell their stories and you
Speaker 1: give them a platform for expression. I mean, for us,
Speaker 1: the greatest thing we can do is use everything that
Speaker 1: we have from an asset and infrastructure perspective and make
Speaker 1: them a platform for expression for those who are part
Speaker 1: of the family. And then you really really see how
Speaker 1: people respond because they don't want to hear the red
Speaker 1: bull stories, but they want to hear is the story
Speaker 1: of the athletes and of the events and the things
Speaker 1: that are happening out there. And so we're providing a
Speaker 1: lot of freedom to everyone to just tell their stories.
Speaker 1: And I think the more authentic you are about that
Speaker 1: where people on the other side and they're like, well,
Speaker 1: this feels not authentic, it doesn't feel real, et cetera.
Speaker 1: The more you do this and then have people tell
Speaker 1: each other the stories, the more successful you are in
Speaker 1: social And so we're extremely lucky that we're in a
Speaker 1: position where we have all these athletes, we have all
Speaker 1: these influences who are telling with passion. There are stories,
Speaker 1: and you know, we're just you know, lucky that we're
Speaker 1: in a position to support them and telling those stories.
Speaker 1: So is there anything here? I mean, it's funny because
Speaker 1: we've covered so much ground here, it's hard for me
Speaker 1: to say, well, what's next? What else is there to do?
Speaker 1: Because it feels like you're going in so many different directions,
Speaker 1: But there are there things that and beyond that we
Speaker 1: should be looking at. Well, I think there's a lot
Speaker 1: more to do. The world is changing so so quickly. Um.
Speaker 1: I mean, if we would have had this conversation a
Speaker 1: year and a half ago and you would say, hey,
Speaker 1: what's what's what's ahead? What do you think is happening?
Speaker 1: You know, we could have talked about a million things,
Speaker 1: but probably you know, um, having formed a new relationship
Speaker 1: with Ninja, who's you know, one of the top not
Speaker 1: the top Fortnite play out there, and even fortnitely two
Speaker 1: years ago, we would have not had a conversation about
Speaker 1: it because it wouldn't have even existed. Now it's the
Speaker 1: largest game in the world. And now if we see
Speaker 1: the influence that someone like Ninja has also as part
Speaker 1: of being part of full Is, it's just something that
Speaker 1: it's not something we could forecast. So for us, we
Speaker 1: do look proactively and how we can do all these
Speaker 1: things that we do, our events, our athletes, how we
Speaker 1: can do all of that better. Do we get into
Speaker 1: other sports or do we go deeper in some sports.
Speaker 1: I mean for us, again, we talked about the Olympics
Speaker 1: for next year. Three versus three basketball, just take that
Speaker 1: that's a very different animal, despite the fact that basketball
Speaker 1: has been in the Olympics stuff for quite a while.
Speaker 1: I think we have great opportunities kind of see and
Speaker 1: the you know, the role we can play. I mean again,
Speaker 1: three verses three is one of the old man urban
Speaker 1: sports that we've had that we've been involved in, very
Speaker 1: much like skateboarding and others. So how can we make
Speaker 1: sure that our athletes will have the right opportunities so
Speaker 1: we will continue to do the things that we're doing.
Speaker 1: I think we're really going to in nineteen and twenty
Speaker 1: focus on the audiences that are out there and what
Speaker 1: they want to hear, what they want to see, how
Speaker 1: they want to engage with us. I mean, relevancy and
Speaker 1: engagement is the new currency, and so for us, it
Speaker 1: is about how we can enhance that in any opportunity
Speaker 1: comes to us, either directly because we might have the
Speaker 1: idea of some people and and uh from the athletes,
Speaker 1: I might have the ideas, but also our partners. You know,
Speaker 1: if partners come to us or people have ideas out
Speaker 1: there and say hey, I have an idea. Can you
Speaker 1: help me kind of maybe give this idea wings? Can
Speaker 1: we do this together? Can we co produce? Can co create? Um?
Speaker 1: That is what excites me. What's happening in n I
Speaker 1: think creativity is at an ultimate high. People see that
Speaker 1: they have enormous opportunity out there to express how they feel,
Speaker 1: what they want to do, the stories that they have,
Speaker 1: and if we can just play a small part in that,
Speaker 1: I think, you know, we're in a really good place.
Speaker 1: We don't have a lot of fun time doing. We're
Speaker 1: all looking forward to seeing what Red Bull does in
Speaker 1: and beyond. Garrett, thanks for coming in and talking to me. Oh,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for having me and much appreciated.
Speaker 1: This has been another episode of Strictly Business. Tune in
Speaker 1: next week for another helping, acintillating conversation with media movers
Speaker 1: and shakers, and please make sure you subscribe to the
Speaker 1: podcast to hear future for songs.