We were lucky to catch up with Gary Pillette recently and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Gary thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?
My wife and I started our Monroe Pop Fest 11 years ago. Our mission was to create an afordable pop cuture expirience for our community and provide an avenue to raise money for different local charities. My son and I just returned home from a large comic-con and after realizing how much money we spent wondered if we could do something similar but on a smaller scale to broaden the scope of fans and families available to attend this kind of event. We’ve been blessed with our communities and the pop culture communities support allowing us to create an Arts & Creative Studies Scholarship at our high school alma mater as well as help local charities through funraising efforts.
Another reason for the Pop Fest and the Insane Wrestling Revolution pro wrestling promotion I co own with pro wrestling superstar Rhino is to give fans a place to create memories for them and their families.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I am a 26 year Ford Motor Co employee who has a passion for pop culture and brininging the community together. I’ve been married to my wife Dawn for over 32 years and have two sons Drake and Bryce. One of the most rewarding parts of what i do is seeing families and friends together enjoying somehting we’ve put on for them to enjoy. What makes me different as a promoter is I truly enjoy getting out in the surrounding communities to promote our shows and talk one on one with potential fans of the shows. There’s a certain passion involved when you get to talk to people about what your trying to do in the community.
We’d love to hear about you met your business partner.
My partner in The Insane Wrestling Revolution and Terry & Gary’s Low Expectations Podcaast is former ECW, WWE and current Impact Wrestling Superstar Rhino aka Rhyno. Years ago I invited him to do a small sports card show to help raise money for the homeless and he came and met with fans all day afetr leaving an event the night before. He was very personable with his fans and my little sister who was suffering from stage four cancer and from then on always lent a hand at our chartity events until one day he asked me to run a wrestling promotion with him and i figured it was a no brainer,
Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?
I think my most effective startegy for growing our clientele is just to be present in the community, honest and display your passion for what youre doing while also listening to others passions. Also don’t be affraid to help others who may be trying to do something similar to what you’re doing. It’s not a competition, it’s a family.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.monroepopfest.com
- Instagram: the_monroe_pop_fest
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/monroepopfest
- Twitter: @MonroePopFest
- Youtube: @iwrworld2021