The interview to talk about the 20th anniversary of Ames, Iowa-based VenuWorks with company president and founder Steve Peters takes place appropriately enough as he is driving to one of his managed venues in Topeka, Kan. For a company that has built its portfolio and reputation in overseeing secondary and tertiary markets and venues mostly in the Midwest, it is clear that for Peters' home is where the heart(land) is.
"We know that our strengths are in the Midwest in the center of the country,” Peters said. “If we are going to step out into another location outside that, we have to be able to convince ourselves first that we have something to be able to offer. Then, we have to be able to convince the city. Our greatest strength is probably in that center third of the country.”
With venues that the company runs in Kennewick, Wash., and Vicksburg, Miss., among others, it is wrong to assume that VenuWorks operates exclusively in the Midwest. It would be a mistake to try and put the company in such a box. It is a business, after all, whose owner has never been one accused of operating inside the box.
THE BIRTH OF VENUWORKS
Before crossing into the world of private venue management, Peters was no stranger to the public assembly venue industry itself, having started in 1976 managing a small theater in Dubuque, Iowa, after obtaining a Bachelor of Arts degree in theater and a Master of Fine Arts degree in arts administration from the University of Iowa. Peters’ career moved along to Iowa State University and then to Ogden Entertainment in 1988. By 1990, he was the national director of operations for the company and opened the Target Center in Minneapolis before being named an Ogden vice president in 1995.
Along the way, Peters also worked with a number of smaller venues and smaller markets and fell in love with them. He also noticed that those particular markets were receiving less than the lion’s share of attention from the company. If ever a situation presented itself for a business to start and specialize in working with such markets, now was the time, and Peters knew it.
“In the summer of 1996, I went in with a proposal and had a couple of ideas about how our company could maybe reorganize to give better service to the secondary markets,” he said. “I said that, frankly, if you don’t start paying attention to them you are going to lose them. I offered to buy those municipal and university accounts from Ogden, but they were not interested. Shortly afterward, they let me go. I didn’t have any non-compete clause, which must have been a clerical error in my severance agreement.
“So I started my own company in the basement of my home. My brother gave me an old Army surplus metal desk and we got to work, formed a company in November and had a contract for full management of an arena and conference center in Minnesota on Feb. 1. It was one we had been running at Ogden. I had a great deal of involvement from its inception to its design and funding and sort of babied it along. They were at a period where they had an option to end their contract with Ogden, so they exercised that and put out an RFP which I bid on and got. We started up there 20 years ago and here we are today.”
“When I was at Iowa State in 1988 all the big companies bid on our contract,” Peters said. “By the time I started my company eight years later, there was consolidation within these big companies. It wasn’t that nobody was paying any attention to the smaller venues. I had a strong understanding and a strong grounding in running venues in secondary markets. It’s a very, very different thing than running NBA and NHL arenas and stadiums.”
Peters started his company as Compass Facility Management before changing the name to VenuWorks in 2007. He and his wife, Randi, live in the same house they did 20 years ago when the business started. There is consistency in Peters’ personal and professional life.
“We don’t have every account we ever started with, as contracts have matured and venue owners have said we appreciate your work. but we want to take it now ourselves,” Peters said. “We’re always very cooperative in helping that transition with the venue ownership, board, city or nonprofit that made that decision. We’ve never sued a client. We just don’t operate that way.”
It is the perfect segue for Peters to talk about how his company does operate, and it is a philosophy that is backed up by his internal staff, his venue executive directors and his vendors.
“We’re very much relationship driven,” he said. “It is probably contrary to every business or business textbook, but I think we … I do, anyway … have to fall in love with our buildings. The buildings we serve are so important to their communities that you really feel like you’re helping that community reach what it aspired to when it built that building. If it is brand new they’ve got a dream and it’s our job to help them get there. Maybe it’s a 90-year-old theater and it’s kind of lost its way. Maybe nobody has paid much attention to it. It’s our job to come in and dust off the dream and find that goal again and help the community realize its vision for what it wants to be.”
The company now manages more than 50 venues in 20 cities. His business motto is that “we have to believe we can make a difference. We have to believe that with an investment in terms of revenues, increased programming and controlling and containing expenses, they are going to be better off in the end. We have to know that we can do that. We have to have a plan to do that. But it has to be something that we feel like we have some experience in. We wouldn’t bid on McCormick Place or the Moscone Center. That’s not us. That isn’t what we do. We’re darn good in places like Cedar Rapids and Evansville and Burnsville and Brookings. We work good in those markets.”
A RICH NICHE
Tom Richter is the executive director of the Swiftel Center in Brookings, S.D., and has been with the company for about 17 of VenuWorks’ 20 years. He knows firsthand about why his venue thrives in a market of 23,000 people with 12,000 students who attend the local South Dakota State University.
“I know that when our city was looking at private management companies in the late ‘90s we looked at all the main ones,” Richter said. “VenuWorks just seemed to fit the situation the best. We’ve since been very successful in Brookings beyond some people’s dreams. The success to that is due to VenuWorks and our relationship with them and all our other (VenuWorks-managed) facilities. We can rely on each other and learn things from each other.”
Sharon Cummins is another VenuWorks veteran who has served as executive director of the U.S. Cellular Center in Bloomington, Ill., since 1999. In addition to the staples of consistency and stability that would seem to describe how any business might turn 20, Cummins sees another reason for the company’s success.
“Flexbility,” she said. “While VenuWorks has its core principles and operating procedures, as a company it also evolves to address the needs of the communities we serve. No two communities are exactly the same. VenuWorks recognizes and respects the nuances of each market and works with the venue staff, contract administrators and community leaders to ensure common goals are identified and achieved.”
As chief executive officer of Aureon HR, Joel Duncan’s company has worked with VenuWorks since August 2010. Duncan sees the longevity of VenuWorks through perhaps a different lens than those who work directly for the company.
“I call it PPT, or People, Process and Technology,” Duncan said. “To not just survive, but thrive, as VenuWorks has for 20 years, you must continually evaluate and respond to changing market conditions, customer demands and competition by evaluating your people and process and technology to assure they are aligned appropriately with the existing and forecasted market. VenuWorks has done that.”
The success of reaching 20 years is likely best summed up by Scott Hallgren, executive director of the Bridge View Center in Ottumwa, Iowa: “It’s all about the basics, the simple principles and life rules we all were taught and know and should live by but, at times, so many choose not to follow. Steve does follow those principles and rules and that is why he is successful.”
IT TAKES A TEAM
The answer from Peters for what he looks for when hiring a venue manager might surprise. Certainly, experience and knowledge are important, but there is more.
“I look for a smile,” Peters said. “I want someone who has high integrity and honesty and wants to be in a small town. I think something that distinguishes us from some big companies is that we specialize in people who want to be in small towns. It isn’t like you get banished to this small town. Do a good job and we’ll send you to Davenport, Iowa. Well, that’s a big town for us. That’s a major market for us. We want to be there and our people want to be there. Not everybody is chasing the brass ring to want to get a bigger spot and a bigger city.
“We’re not in that pack. Our people are not those people. Everybody we serve in Cedar Rapids has been to Chicago. They’ve been to New York City. They know what service should be. There’s no such thing as second-tier service. Even though you are in a smaller market, you’ve got to provide the same kind of service or maybe even better because you don’t have any anonymity in a secondary market. If a guest in Brookings had a bad time or broken seat or hit a pothole in the parking lot, they are going to tell you about it at church the next day or at the next PTA event. It becomes very personal very fast.”
Peters said that there are 18 people on his staff that provide service to all the venues. There are specialists in the areas of human resources, finance, programming, food and beverage, operations and marketing.
“We say it all the time, but the job of our people at the core of the company is to support all the people working at all the buildings,” he said.
As Peters looks forward, he said that any success is predicated on remembering the basics. “We continually look for new ways to utilize technology and better ways to expand the markets we’re in to better serve our customers,” he said. “Whether it’s creating an F&B service or in-house promotions capability or theater producing company. We keep looking for those niches that we can sell.”
Topeka is now within view, but the best question is saved for last about how Peters and VenuWorks plan to celebrate a milestone 20th anniversary. Do you have grandiose plans for celebrating this big event?
“Nah,” Peters said. “The anniversary is important to us, but to the rest of the world I really don’t think so.”
Maybe the answer is not so surprising for a man and company whose legacy is built on the solid rock of family and relationships. Besides, there is now business to tend to in Topeka.