Meet Wendy Blackshaw, the driving force behind Minnesota Sports and Events as its President and CEO. Wendy has steered Minnesota towards a remarkable era, attracting an unprecedented variety of world-class events. Her leadership has brought renowned events like the NCAA Women’s Final Four and the record-breaking 2023-2024 Big 10 Women’s Basketball Tournament to Minnesota's doorstep. And there's no stopping there; upcoming highlights included the 2024 Olympic Gymnastics Trials and the 2026 IIHF World Juniors Hockey Championships. Wendy stands as a staunch advocate for women in sports leadership, embodying the spirit of empowerment and excellence.
Meet Wendy Blackshaw, the driving force behind Minnesota Sports and Events as its President and CEO. Wendy has steered Minnesota towards a remarkable era, attracting an unprecedented variety of world-class events. Her leadership has brought renowned events like the NCAA Women’s Final Four and the record-breaking 2023-2024 Big 10 Women’s Basketball Tournament to Minnesota's doorstep. And there's no stopping there; upcoming highlights included the 2024 Olympic Gymnastics Trials and the 2026 IIHF World Juniors Hockey Championships. Wendy stands as a staunch advocate for women in sports leadership, embodying the spirit of empowerment and excellence.
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Wendy Blackshaw:My favorite headline was during women's final four when The New York Times had the headline Minneapolis is a mecca of women's basketball and it was like that's amazing. Can't buy that kind of exposure.
Bill Von Bank:Welcome to the growing destinations podcast. Where we take a deep dive into destination development and focus on a wide range of topics, from tourism and entertainment, to economic development and proneurism and much more. I'm your host, Bill Von Bank. Meet Wendy Blackshaw, the driving force behind Minnesota sports and events as its president and CEO. For Wendy, this role isn't just a job. It's her passion realized. And she has steered Minnesota towards a remarkable era, attracting an unprecedented variety of world class events. This feed is particularly notable amidst the backdrop of a global pandemic as the hospitality and tourism industry strives to recover. Wendy's leadership has brought renowned events like the NCAA Women's Final Four and the record breaking twenty twenty three, twenty twenty four Big Ten Women's basketball tournament to Minnesota's doorstep. And there's no stopping there. Upcoming highlights include the twenty twenty four Olympic gymnastics trial and the twenty twenty six IIHF World Junior's Hockey Championships. Beyond the economic boost for Minnesota, These mega events leave a lasting impact through community initiatives bolstering the state's reputation on local, national, and global stages. Wendy stands as a staunch advocate for women in sports leadership, embodying the spirit of empowerment and excellence Wendy Blackshelf welcome to the growing destinations podcast.
Wendy Blackshaw:Thank you so much for having me, Belle.
Bill Von Bank:Wendy has president and CEO of Minnesota Sports and Events unier team have been busy of late hosting some major sporting events and pitching others. Before we learn more about Minnesota sports and events, Share with us your background and your work history.
Wendy Blackshaw:I always tell people that this is my dream job, and it really is. I grew up watching the Green Bay packers. Sports was in the background of my home growing up. My dad was every sports fan, like every kind of sports. So I wish I wouldn't have gotten to this job quite so late in my career because it would have been fun to do with the entire career, but I've been really fortunate. I've had some pretty amazing jobs all have really helped to prepare me for this. I started out in radio and TV sales and worked for rollerblade. I worked the Minnesota North Stars, and it was really at the North Stars where I kind of fell in love with sports and working in sports, but then they moved to Dallas. So I went to Mall of America where I spent probably nine years as VP of Marketing, and then went to Sun Country Airlines, which was and interesting experience. We went through a number of owners. The last of whom was Tom Petters, who I'm not sure if anyone any of your listeners who would remember. But Ponzi scheme, let's just leave it at this time.
Bill Von Bank:I do remember.
Wendy Blackshaw:So that was interesting. And after that, I worked for the Super Bowl and was during the Super Bowl that I met the people from the NFL and really got exposed to kind of this whole world of sports commissions and raising money for sporting events and really became focused on the value that boarding events can bring to our state. And so after the Super Bowl when Melvin Tennant and
Bill Von Bank:For Meet Minneapolis.
Wendy Blackshaw:For Meet Minneapolis finding Carlson from Bloomington CVP and Terry Matson at the time from visit St. Paul. Came to me and said, you know, we are the only city state that does not have a permanent sports commission. And what we were doing is we would send up the bid. And then if we would win the right to host an event, we would hire a whole slew of people. And then as soon as the event was over, it would disband, and we would start over and do it again. And that made no sense. So Finally, the three came to me and said, hey, would you be interested in doing this? And of course, I said I would be thrilled, not really understanding at the time was that what I was getting into. It's been amazing and it's been challenging. It's been much more so than I would have anticipated, but it's been great. And now finally, we're seeing some of the fruits of our labor.
Bill Von Bank:So let's take a dive into your dream job and tell us more about Minnesota Sports and Events and its mission.
Wendy Blackshaw:Really, we took about six months before we stood the organization up and became a full fledged five zero one six and looked at best practices from around the country. And what we found is that sports commissions that had obviously the mission is to bring these events because they bring significant economic impact. So Super Bowl, four hundred and thirty five million dollars in economic impact. An event like gymnastics, which is happening in in less than two months, will probably bring somewhere in the neighborhood of seventy million dollar economic impact. It's really important now because coming out of the pandemic and also the other challenges that the Minneapolis St. Paul areas had, the hospitality industry is still coming back. And so that economic impact is really important. But beyond that, we also have a mission around every single event that we bring here will have a community initiative. So what are we giving back to the community as a part of these events? There's always that legacy piece. And then finally, reputational impact again, really important coming out of a difficult period of time for our state. There was a time when front page headlines were primarily about you know, George Floyd, you know, things that were difficult that we were dealing with. And and so it's great to have these sporting events to sort of change the topic back never to forget all the important things that happened, but to also remind people, hey, this is a great place to live, work, and play. It's a great sports market. My favorite headline was during women's final four when The New York Times had the headline Minneapolis as a mecca of women's basketball and it was like that's amazing. Can't buy that kind of exposure.
Bill Von Bank:Exactly. Under your leadership, Minnesota Sports and Events has brought numerous world class events to the state, including, as you mentioned, the NCAA Women's Final Four, and Big Ten tournaments, what factors contribute to the success in attracting easy bets?
Wendy Blackshaw:Yeah, it's a great question. It's a little bit of a two part answer. So when we started, again, we were the only city state that was funded, funded these events wholly through corporate sponsorship. Super Bowl. That was my job as I did the fundraising, and we had to raise fifty five million dollars. So I spent three years going to every single corporation, every business, every one I could think of, to raise that money. And it was it was challenging. It was a lift. So when I came into Minnesota Sports and Events, we knew based on how challenging that had been. And we got there, but it was it was not easy. We knew that eventually we were going to have to create some sort of public private partnership. So most cities have some sort of public funding mechanism. Whether that's a yearly appropriation, whether that's a hotel tax, whether that's revenue from sports betting. There's there's as many funding mechanisms as there are sports commissions. So we knew that we were gonna have to figure that piece of it out. That wasn't immediate. The first couple years, we continued to have to raise money through corporate sponsorship and that was challenging. And once the pandemic hit and especially after things started opening up again, what we realized is we were no longer going to be in competition with these other cities if that's how we had to raise money. Because an event now wants to know upfront that you have the money. You can't say, hey, you know what? Don't worry about it. We've got this. Call us in a year, and we'll have the five million dollars to pay for this event. It doesn't work that way anymore.
Bill Von Bank:Did the relationships you built during your time working for the Super Bowl host committee help you in this role?
Wendy Blackshaw:Oh, a hundred percent. Especially that first year when we didn't have public funding because we had to raise the money for women's final four. I will tell you, the fifty five million I had to raise for Super Bowl versus the four million I had to raise for women's panel four, so much harder to raise the for because it was a different time. It was after the pandemic. Luckily, we created a really great platform to sell to local partners, but it it was difficult. But, yeah, it was very helpful that I had that experience.
Bill Von Bank:Let's keep talking about your success because we recently posted the big ten women's basketball championship to record attendance. Tell us your perspective from that event, why it broke records. I'm sure Caitlin Clark had something to do with that, but obviously, hosting an event like that, you still need the hospitality community onboard and infrastructure onboard?
Wendy Blackshaw:Absolutely. So I I think back to twenty twenty two when we hosted the NCAA Women's Final Four. The Woman Who runs that program for the NCAA that point in time shared with us her vision for women's basketball. And I remember she had these lofty goals about taking women's basketball the next level. Now, I'm a big women's basketball fan, so I was like, yeah, that's great. But women's basketball wasn't at the point, even then, that's only a few years ago, that it is now. And I think part of the reason it has grown so much is there are people like Lynn Holzman, with the NCAA who really believe in women's basketball, who see that this sport is just growing by leaps and bounds. Here in Minnesota were a great women's basketball community, and so that's one of the reasons we won the bid for big ten, won the NCAA Women's Final Four. Because the links have a great fan base. The golfers have a great fan base. We have more girls playing high school sports here than any other state in the country.
Bill Von Bank:And Minnesota Aurora.
Wendy Blackshaw:And Minnesota Aurora above their soccer.
Bill Von Bank:Right.
Wendy Blackshaw:But you're right. I mean, women's sports, we support women's sports. I'm gonna look at the hockey, the new hockey, women's hockey team.
Bill Von Bank:Right.
Wendy Blackshaw:So we knew that basketball did really well here. And when we bid on big ten and women's final four, we use that as sort of the reason, like this is a great fan base. We'll have a lot of fans. Ben, we had big ten last year women's in twenty three. Caitlin Clark wasn't as much of a phenom as she was this year, but she was still a big deal. And so we saw that momentum last year this year, I mean, just blew it out of the water.
Bill Von Bank:Didn't it double attendance?
Wendy Blackshaw:Oh, yeah. I mean, we sold out at first time ever that the big ten tournament has sold out. That excitement in that building literally was one of the most fun sporting events I've ever been to. And watching those three shots, I mean, She's incredible. I could watch her all day long.
Bill Von Bank:Me too.
Wendy Blackshaw:Incredible. This thing is after they won the tournament, She stayed on the court for like an hour and a half signing autographs for kids, and she talked about the fact that she remembers when she was that age and doing that. And so Those are the kind of role models and why I love my job. Like, that's an amazing thing.
Bill Von Bank:Class Act?
Wendy Blackshaw:Yeah. Yeah. Very much so.
Bill Von Bank:More to talk about the upcoming twenty twenty four US Olympic team gymnastics trials, and the twenty twenty six world junior hockey championships. Those are big.
Wendy Blackshaw:They're huge. So gymnastics was a, I love gymnastics. And so, occasionally, bid will come across my desk, and I'll be like, that's one I really would like. So we worked hard to get that also because having an Olympic trials here is huge. It's basically, you know, four or five nights on NBC prime time, which again, you can't buy that kind of exposure. So every time you cut from a commercial go back after a commercial. Here we are in beautiful Minneapolis at Target Center. Talk about Minneapolis. They'll show images of Minneapolis. That's part of what is so wonderful about these events. You know, the economic impact reputation, all of that, but also We just get all this exposure from those kind of events. The gymnastics trials is going to be probably more popular more competitive than the actual Olympics because you've got such an amazing crew of gymnast. Now on the men's side as well that people are more familiar with women's some on Biles, our own Sunil Lee, Jordan Childs, and then there's a lot of up and coming gymnasts who are really incredible. So really excited about this. In addition to just the trials happening in Target Center, we have a FAONFAST that's going to be outside of Target Center. And then we're doing a promenade du Nord, down Nicholas Mall with retail shops and pop ups and music and food trucks and a lot of things just completely taking over downtown and it's the same weekend as pride. So we will have hundreds of thousands of people coming downtown. And again, that's the reason that we do these things because we need people to come back downtown. We need to revitalize these businesses we need people to sleep in our hotels, to eat in our restaurants, shop in our retail in these kind of events, draw that kind of families.
Bill Von Bank:Creating an experience.
Wendy Blackshaw:And that's part of the secret sauce for us. So when we send out a bid, we're not just putting on the event. You know, we're not just making sure that people buy tickets to watch a basketball game or a gymnastics meet. We also know that there are going to be all of these other ancillary events that will draw people, attract people, give people things to do, they will keep people downtown longer. We also always do something with Mall of America. There's always some sort of an event out of Mall of America. And so you know, it's multi faceted. It's not just that game. It's all the other things around it as well. We have gained a reputation for putting on some of the best events in the country.
Bill Von Bank:Competition among cities to host major events has intensified as you ever already mentioned, especially in the wake of the pandemic How does Minnesota sports and events navigate this competitive landscape, particularly when facing cities with public funding sources?
Wendy Blackshaw:Now, it's a great question. So last year at the legislature, we were able to secure six million dollars for gymnastics and then another thirteen million of unrestricted funds for other events that we're bidding on. And that was a huge step for us because event organizers and leagues are no longer willing to agree to a promise of funding for an event, you need the funding upfront. What was happening to us in terms of competition with other cities is that we would get into a bid situation, we would submit the bid, and we would hear, this is amazing. We we want to be there. And we can't because you don't have the funding. An example, we bid on the U. S. Olympic team trials for swimming. And we had this incredible bid. We were building three pools in US Bank Stadium. It was amazing. They wanted to come here, but we did not have public funding at that point in time, and we lost it to Indianapolis. Without that public funding, we won't get events just isn't is impossible for the corporate community. And the corporate community basically came forward and said, listen, we love being a part of this, but we can't carry the water for this. We have had amazing corporate partners who have come forward to help us. The other part of of the other component of partners that we have is community partners. And we work a lot with community partners, with nonprofits, with different organizations because it's really important for us to get back to the community as part of these events. So we are always working with organizations like Santa Foundation, the why. We've got a lot of nonprofit partners we work with. World Junior's Hockey, we are just kind of figuring out right now what we are what what that community initiative is gonna be. And I keep on having this dream that I'd love to give every kid in Minnesota the opportunity to get on a pair of skates. Every time I say that, like my whole team, like, yeah, some girls' eyes, like, are we gonna do that? Because I say it, and then they have to figure that out. But I I have not You have
Bill Von Bank:some time.
Wendy Blackshaw:Not done that. Yeah. That's right.
Bill Von Bank:As an advocate for women in sports leadership, how do you see the role of women evolving in the sports industry, particularly in leadership positions?
Wendy Blackshaw:I think that we need more women in sports leadership definitely. It it is expanded. There are more women getting into sports, but I will tell you that oftentimes there are fewer women at the table than there are men. And I think probably sports is one of those industries that's just taking a little bit longer to attract or bring on more women. But I think as I I do a lot of mentoring. We have an internship program. Right now, our interns, they're all women. And actually seventy five percent of our staff is women. And I I love that because I do think that we do a great job, you know. And and I think that with the rise in popularity of women's sports, it only makes sense that there's more women in this industry. So anything that I can ever do to promote women and really introduce them to this industry, especially college kids who are thinking about what they're gonna do next. It's a great field. It really is.
Bill Von Bank:Now about you. First of all, congratulations on being awarded the Wise Women of Inspiration Executive of the Year. And the Twin Cities Trailblazer Award. How do these accolades inspire you to continue your efforts in advancing sports and events in Minnesota?
Wendy Blackshaw:Well, I'm so taken aback by them. I'm so honored. And as I said, And I talked about this when I spoke at the trailblazer award. It feels sometimes a little bit odd to take an award for something that is a passion for me. I wake up in the morning and I'm really excited about what we have to do what what is ahead, all that we can do, but it's humbling. It's definitely humbling. One, we talked about women in sports, one of the things that I have talked about publicly is that we want to become the number one city to host women's events. And so one of our pillars going into twenty twenty five is going to be how do we become that market? How do we become the first market that the NCAA or that the Big Ten or that FIFA or that World Rugby Cup. They say, we've got to be in Minneapolis because in Minnesota, because they've got a great, great women's sports programs, they've got great support. So that inspires me. The other thing that really inspires me is I love Minnesota. And this is as we come out of the pandemic and as we continue to kind of rebuild, it feels like this is an important thing for us to do. Just one of many things, but it feels like we're bring we're bringing people back downtown. During big time, It was amazing to see the streets full of black and yellow clad people cheering for Caitlyn Clark. Because we knew that they were spending money here, and that that brings jobs, that brings taxes, it brings all things back that we need especially for downtown Minneapolis. And so that's really inspiring to me that I can just give a little bit back to this place I love.
Bill Von Bank:And we know that it's not just Taylor Swift that can drive economic impact downtown.
Wendy Blackshaw:Absolutely. Although she is she's big one.
Bill Von Bank:Massive as well for sure. Wendy Blackshaw, this has been a great conversation. Congratulations on all your success and continued success with Minnesota Sports and Events, and thanks for being our guests. On the growing destination's podcast.
Wendy Blackshaw:Thank you so much, Valerie.
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