Transcripts For CSPAN2 Ed Stack Its How We Play The Game 20240713

On wednesday we will be at the National Constitution center in philadelphia or Harvard Law School professor lawrence a argues our guests dont like government is not representing its constituency. All these events are open to the public and if you are in attendance, take a picture antagonist at booktv on twitter, facebook or instagram. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Welcome to todays distinguished Speaker Series from our Binghamton University form. My name is jake andrews im a very proud superintendent of the Windsor Central School district and this years chair of the form. Today we are delighted to open our program to a number of Members Community members outside of the form for this very special event where we can hear from our own native son ed stack as he highlights the history of Dicks Sporting Goods its how we play the game. Which i was able to get early and read and its a great book, great story and if youve not got a chance to get that yet, i strongly encourage you to do that. We are thrilled to have you here today and welcome you home to share your stories. What to welcome our invited guests to particular i want to draw attention to the abnew Visions Business Academy students. We have students from the districts of our region and we are thrilled to have them here today in particular. For those of you not familiar with the forum, the Binghamton University form is a Membership Organization that brings together people who share a commitment for advancing Binghamton University and our Great Community here in the Southern Tier and strengthening the bond between the two. Our mission is to energize engage and enrich the university and Community Leaders as we work to establish a premier university hood and vibrant community. We welcome any of you that are interested to join our membership, its an Incredible Organization that brings great people together for outstanding events just like this. We are people in the lobby from current members and Staff Members that would be happy to tell you more information if youd like to join. As a courtesy before we get started i ask you to check to be sure your phones are silent and with another quick housekeeping piece we will have the opportunity after mr. Stack speaks to ask questions and at that time we will have microphones that will be available if you raise your hand, our staff will come over and get you the microphone. As you finish your meal and desserts, it is my pleasure to introduce our great president of Binghamton University harvey stenger. President stenger. [applause] thank you jason welcome to all our members and their guests today. Its great to see so many people here. Of course its a great event to be at to hear from one of our longtime supporters of the binghamton area, the Broome County area and Southern Tier, ed stack, what hes done for us over the course of his career in terms of decks open to his company but also the new Distribution Center in conklin and the investments this corporation has made in this area and the belief that this area deserves that Distribution Center i want to thank you ed for all that. Thank you very much. [applause] of course you wont be talking about that, he will be talking about his book today. Its ed its how we play the game. My dog enjoyed mine right there in the corner. Little puppy eating my books. Its been an exciting semester. The last couple weeks at Binghamton University i like to give a quick update. I want to make sure i save most of the time for ed. Did you hear what of our faculty members won the nobel prize . [applause] in chemistry. Stanley wetting him, hes been faculty at binghamton for 31 years and joined the faculty in 1988 after he left exxon where they put them on a management track and took him out of the scientific track and he said had to leave and find a place that would support me, he couldve gone anywhere, support me in my research around Energy Storage and he came to Binghamton University. You will be receiving the nobel prize i think december 10. What a humble man we had an event for him last friday about thousand people he gave his remarks we had the chancellor of the sony system there we had the chairman of the sony system there and his remarks were wonderful but what was really wonderful was afterwards the hundreds of students that came up to him and he did not leave that room until he had signed autographs and taking pictures with every single student. We had to finally tear him away because he had to go to another vet. We took him to the Confucius Institute Chinese Opera performance that night and he gave remarks and stayed on stage after some pictures and shook hands and took pictures with every there. I think he was the last one to leave. Not only is he a brilliant scientist, his great man hes gonna be a great ambassador for Binghamton University and future. Freshman class is all in and accounted for, 2900 freshman a thousand transfer students, 1600 new graduate students. Thats a record for us. We been working really hard to increase our graduate enrollment. We got 91 new students in our Pharmacy Program are doctor of Pharmacy Program which is one student over our goal they now have 231 students in that program. They will bring in the fourth cohort next year and bring them right around 320 to 330 students and graduates first class doctor pharmacy students in the spring of 2021. A Long Time Coming for that but definitely something that is outstanding. A little more than 14,000 undergraduates which is a number we want to maintain release markets. Average sat score 1370 Nine High School gpa of 95. Its a great group of students we have there and they work hard and they also support the region in so many ways through their volunteer work but also just living here and bringing their money from long island and spending it here too. [laughter] we also celebrated a new name for our decorous school of nursing. Its now will be known as the Decker College of Nursing Health science. Their Board Members from decker today. Decker foundation, thank you so much. With that we will be expanding the college into new programs and adding physical therapy program, Occupational Therapy program and speak and Language Pathology Program into that college. Thats exciting. The construction is still ongoing in johnson city so you have plenty of time to go over there if youre construction geek like im and watch the renovation of the old ej box factory its quite a transformation they are doing to that building. When its done it will be a stateoftheart facility inside one of the original buildings that ej had built. Were constructing an r d building between the building and the Pharmacy Building and weve also acquired 18 park street the old yellow also would building the state has given us funds to renovate that to invite Industry Partners in the pharmaceutical sciences to be coworking spaces with the rest of the university. Ads on 27 jenison avenue we will open up an elder care clinic in partnership with lourdes hospital. Still an anchor supporter of all the uhs activities there but its good to be working with both hospitals. If you look at 4246 athe building is gone at the parking lot for now but we are also holding that in case some universities industry would like to partner with us. Thats all i had to say today my marketing and communications folks have said all stand all the time. Although bell all the time. So we will be talking a lot about it you will hear more about it stan and his great achievements it had a lot of great achievements in the future. Thank you for being here. To introduce him, id like to introduce his sister, kim myers, who is going to introduce ed. [applause] first of all, id like to thank all of you so much for coming here today and im thrilled to be able to introduce my brother ed stack, author of the book its how we play the game. In the words of the great new york yankee catcher yogi berra, id also like to say to ed, thank you for making this event necessary. [laughter] i can promise you you will not be disappointed with what ed has to say about the history of little bait and tackle shop fathered by our dad dig stacked just up a few blocks from his very location. Someone who has known him longer than everyone else in this entire room i want to briefly tell you a few things that he wont. Back when we only had two stores and our stepmom sister tragically died of cancer eddie decided to do something. Dix sponsored a bass Fishing Contest with all the proceeds going to the american cancer society. He will tell you that over 30 years ago when Catholic Charities was trying to feed needy families at thanksgiving he donated over 100 turkeys and when the word went out wasnt enough turkeys donated more. Keep in mind, this was one in the business as my father would say, we were robbing peter to pay paul. He wont tell you about his laser focused on his Incredible Mission to expand the store to manifest destiny and the store being Dicks Sporting Goods because thats the way we refer to it growing up as the store because what other the store was there to be concerned about . s focus was also on the betterment of youth in our communities recognizing the life lessons that being part of the team can instill an individuals. Following our dads example. He decided to do something and he created Sports Matters Foundation that he will tell you more about later. He also wont tell you about the phone call he got from me in 2011 after our area had been hit with the most horrific flood he said to me what do they need . I said, eddie, they need anything and everything weve got. He said, how would you distribute them . Distribute all the items . I said we will go through the schools because they know the families in need. The next day truck after truck after truck came rolling into our area. Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of sneakers, cooks, backpacks, and clothing to help those who had lost everything. He also wont tell you that when the company needed a new Fulfillment Center a Distribution Center to service the northeast quarter of the dix door, binghamton was his first choice for those 400 jobs created in the new stateoftheart Distribution Center now open about 10 miles up the road in conklin. One of the many clichcs my dad would always say to us is, never forget where you came from. He never forgot where he came from. This is where we came from. And yet, another School Shooting happened in parkland florida and what eddie wont tell you is when he called me to tell me of his commitment to do something, what i will tell you is in his voice was not that of ceos of billiondollar corporations, he was just my brother, a kid born and raised on the east side of binghamton. Angry and resolute to do something. Fully aware of the consequences and telling me, kim, this is going to be bad. This will cost us a fortune but i dont care. I have to do something. And boy did he ever. Ladies and gentlemen, lets welcome home my big brother the ceo of Dicks Sporting Goods, ed stack. [applause] [applause] thank you. Thank you. Thank you everyone for allowing me to be here and thank you to my sister, president stanger, everyone else thats here. North Benson University the nobel prize is like awesome. Congratulations. Thats terrific. When my sister, again, kim, thank you for the introduction. For all those who have siblings, brothers or sisters, how many . If they said they were going to introduce you at a thing like this and you thought about all the things you did to them when you were a kid it would probably make you pretty nervous. Some of the things i did to my poor sister was terrible. I remember one time, she always told me she would get me back for, and she hasnt yet. I thought this was going to be it. Theres two things i did to her that were really like all of you brothers here he was kind of understand this. She was making fun of me one day we had a cottage on page like and she wanted to go water skiing but she had been really busting me, and being like a little sister who could be a pain in the neck. I said i will take you waterskiing. Sure. So she got waterskiing and we used to go around the lake twice. Were going around the lake the second time, there was this huge thing the lily pads and you dont want to go swimming in the lily pad. I took my sister right through these lily pads and as she got right in the middle middle of the lily pads i abdrop that engine and drop my poor sister ready lowly pads. She was yelling and screaming. I hadnt even heard those words before that she was yelling at me. I pulled her back out. I thought that was one thing she could do is tell that story and get back at me. Another thing i thought she might say is we were at an event our kids were all really little and she looked at me and i was always playing tricks on my sister. She looked at me and said, that woman over there, her son goes to school with timmy, whats her name . He looked at her i said, thats mary. She said okay great. Goes running over to talk to her, she comes back, she punches me as hard as she could and said, you are such an ass hole. She said, you dont even know a ai said ive never seen that woman before in my life. [laughter]. Thank you for that, i really thought he could have busted me and you wouldve have every right to do so. I think you for allowing me to be here today and talk a little bit about basically three things, our business and how it got started and how we grew it and then around sports and whats happening in youth sports today. And how important that is for our kids. And then a bit about what we did from a firearm standpoint and why i actually wrote the book but first id like to talk about how this business originally started here in binghamton not far from where we are right now. This is the original story my father started. The way he started the business he was a kid working at him hamburgers not far from here. He was an avid fisherman, his dad was killed in a car accident when he was really young so he spent a lot of time fishing in the rivers with his grandfather. The army surplus was starting to dry up in 1948 or so ab said my father went home put the order together to get into the tackle business and as he told the story, and i talk about this in the book, as he told the story, every year he told the story he stayed up a little bit later. By the time he told the story to my kids he had stayed up all night long and it was only on like two yellow sheets of paper so i have no idea what he was doing all night but he said he stayed up all night. He went back in the next day gave the order to herb her glass and was obviously in a bad mood, told my father was a dumb kid didnt know it is doing and my father grabbed a piece paper from him walked out of the store and never went back went to his grandmothers health. This was a depression written family they really had nothing they had a scrape for everything they had. His grandmother finally said, what would it take for you to do this yourself . He said 300. She got up and walked to the back of the old kitchen into the cookie jar reached into the cookie jar and took out 300 and gave it to him and said go start your own business. He went to start this business and it started really small and we always used to tease him about how small it was because if you look right here, this place was so small that the post office didnt give it a full Mailing Address because its 453. 5 court street. Thats a pretty small place. He ran his business and did well some years, not so well some other years. He actually went out of business. He opened up a second store and went out of business. Six weeks or eight weeks later got back in the business but when he went out of business he made sure nobody lost any money. He made sure he gave all the product he could back to the suppliers he sold his house he sold his car he had to move back in with his mother my mother had just had me and was pregnant with kim, she had to move back in with her parents but he made sure nobody lost any money. About eight weeks later he got back into business and back on court street and always kind of did okay but was always in debt. He had a great story that he would always look at me and say, which i didnt understand at the time, if i had what i owed i truly be a wealthy man. A lot of people feel that way. But he had great empathy for kids. He was a tough guy my father was a real tough old school guy. He was in this warm and cuddly guy on the outside. But he had a really good hard on the inside. He redid how Little League was played in binghamton. He thought that was really that that was not right that more kids should have an opportunity to play. He got together with his buddies within Insurance Agency and put together these this leak and had four teams on each side of town. Instead of 60 kids being able to play Little League, there were 240 kids could play Little League plus they put it firmly together it was about 400 kids playing organized baseball that they had a place to go had a place they were coached they had a place they were mentor they had a place they could go and stay out of trouble. He did that with one prework is it that prerequisite was that ab he started Little League and it was just, i dont know how many thousands and thousands of kids came through the Little League there now and we are redoing the field up there and its so great to be able to go back to that field today and see the place that we grew up and had so much fun with. My father loved binghamton he always felt he had to really the community had to do well in order for him to do well. He told me when i was 13 years old he was going to put me to work because he was going to teach me responsibility. So when i was 13 years old i went to work in the store when i was 15 i started working full time and summer vacations and christmas vacations and i had to do that all through high school and i can tell you right now, honestly, i hated every minute of it. I wanted absolutely nothing to do with that business. I got ready to go off to college and im thinking, im never going back to that business. I remember my father and donna drop me off at school we had the National Lampoon vacation station wagon. With the wood on the side and ours was white as opposed to green but i remember watching them leave because i hated that business, i didnt want anything to do with it. I wanted to do Something Else. I remember watching them drive away and i remember the only thing that came into my mind was Martin Luther kings famous speech of free at last, free at last, thank god im free at last. I never have to go back to that place. Has he not ready to get out of my freshman year i got a job as a law clerk i was so proud of it i came back and told my father i said, going to work at abim going to be a law clerk which is really like a gophers gofer but i was going to be there i was so excited. He looked at me and he said, i cant tell you exactly what he said. But he said you are working in this store this is what puts food on the table, this is whats getting you to be able to go to college. He said you are working right here. So i worked there. Worked there again and tim by this time abi still hated every minute of it. As i get ready to get out of college i have no interest in coming back into the business but my dad got really sick he had a double bypass operation back in 1975 and he never quite made it back emotionally or physically from that experience. So all the time im thinking of going off to go to work at coopers own Price Waterhouse i want to go to law school and i found myself having to come back in the business to help my father who was really sick. I was the oldest of five i was back into these Little Stores in binghamton new york and something happened i dont know if it was six months, eight months, nine months but at some point i fell in love with the business. Its a love affair i talk about that still is on fire today. I still love getting up in the morning going to work i love this business i love the people i work with and i love that he gives us an opportunity to try to make a difference in some things in this world whether in the sports piece or firearms piece. When you work in retail im going to tell you, you get to see people at their very best. You get to see people at their very best and one of the times you can see people at their very best is at christmas time. I remember it was like around 4 00 p. M. In the afternoon on Christmas Eve and this woman comes barreling into the store and i saw her i said can i help you . She said i have to find a gift for my sisterinlaw i said no problem, we got these woolrich sweaters i took her over of these woolrich sweaters we had just marked down. I said we got the sweaters, she looked at them and she looked at me and she said, those of the ugliest sweaters ive ever seen. [laughter] i said yes they are thats why we are marking them down. But right over here weve got some other sweaters. I looked over at her and she Still Standing at these other sweaters. I walked back over and i said, got some other ones over here. She picked up the sweater, the ugliest of the bunch. She picked up the sweater and said i will take this one, my sisterinlaw, biggest ai ever met. [background laughter] i said Merry Christmas and off she went. A couple things, going to embarrass a couple people today. Im going to tell you a couple stories about the people in binghamton who had a real impact on my life. Katie madigan here . Grady abstand up a second. [applause] i wasnt the best student in the world. Katie when i told her we talked a few years ago and i kinda thought she would say, you werent that bad, just like me she said you really worked. Edited apply myself as much as i should have. So i was taking french from katie we were getting ready for the regions final and she said, she looked at me and said eddie youre not in the past the final. I said i know. Shes a listen, if you write a paper on the french author, french artist, anything french, threepage paper. She said i will exempt you from the final. I said, kate thats great she said wait, theres one more stipulation, what is it . But i will write the paper she looked at me and said, the last stipulation is not to promise me you will never take another french class. [laughter] i never took another french class. And katie is the one who pushed me to go to st. John Fisher College she was a big impact and i think teachers are realized the impact they have on kids when they are having the impact on them. I know i talk about mr. awho was a teacher at north high im not sure whatever happened to him but he had a big impact on my life in a public speaking class and i think teachers are so underrated underpaid and underappreciated and one of my favorite movies is mr. Hollands opus. The teacher had no idea the impact he had on those kids until long after they all graduated and he was ready to retire. Katie, thank you very much. Glenn small, where is glenn . I will tell you that if it werent for glenn small Dicks Sporting Goods wouldnt be here today. We lost our banking relationship with First City National bank years ago. Kind of round the savingsandloan crisis 1987 were the regulars got really tough and binghamton First City National bank said we cant bake you anymore. We never missed a loan payment we were never late, we cleaned up our line at the end of 30 days all the time but they said you got 60 days to get another loan, we cant bank any longer. We were always we always had drawn like we were always in debt to be able to fund our inventory and all that. Larry sure said to me, theres a guy at Binghamton Savings Bank name glenn small he should probably talk to him. Maybe you can help out. I went and talked to glenn we sat down and told him what was going on and glenn and bill rinker from abstepped up to provide us a line of credit in order for us to stay in business. If it hadnt been for glenn, Binghamton Savings Bank taking a chance on us we would not be here today. Glenn, thank you very much, we appreciate it. [applause] my father taught me a great lesson about how important sports were to kids. That lesson was taught to me a kid had come into the store stolen a baseball glove and bolted out. One of the guys at the store grabbed it brought the kid back and he was probably nine years old and you could tell he came from a family who didnt have an awful lot. The guy was talking to him, like you shouldnt be stealing, ripping on him my father walked over and said, got it, put his hand on this young mans shoulder and started talking to him and i was standing maybe 15 to 20 feet away watching this. Im thinking, i wonder what hes going to say and what hes going to do because i knew exactly what he would do to me if i had done that. So i was watching him he put his hand on this young mans shoulder and said, why did you steal the glove . The kid looked up at him at these big crocodile tears coming down his face and use looked at my father and said, i just want to play baseball. I just want to be able to play baseball. My father gave him a couple life lessons about you cant steel you need to be good you shouldnt do that then he put his arm around this kid walked him to the little baseball aisle and said, pick out a glove, pick out a back to cardi ball. Go play baseball and stay out of trouble. We dont ever know what happened to that kid but i suspect thats one of the things like these teachers i bet you do that had a big impact on that kid and he went and played baseball and so weve always been really focused on kids. Whether it was what my father did with Little League and then teenage baseball similar thing with muni lake. What he did with the young man on that stool the baseball glove. We always felt that sports were so important. There are so many things going on for us sports standpoint today that these kids cant play. There are so many budget cuts and budgets, theres been roughly 4 billion in budget cuts over the last number of years in youth sports programs where the kids can play. We started what we call our Sports Matter Foundation because we think sports really matter in a kids life. Kid needs a place to go to feel like they belong and so we did a couple years ago we went up to alaska to this Girls Hockey League that was going to go defunct. These girls were to be able to play hockey any longer. We went to alaska because, for one reason and one reason only, similar to what my father said about you couldnt start the equipment from Little League from our store we went to alaska to do this because we have exactly zero stores in alaska. We didnt want anybody to think we were doing this to drive our business. Going to show you this video is about four minutes long about these girls in alaska who just love to play hockey and how important that is to them. Can we roll the video please . Hockey and intergalactic is unique. Were all born on skates just about. Rex have always looked up to the girls and the high school teams. My whole team as my family. [cheering] the funding just disappeared overnight. We had to approached by the community and help salvage the program. We salvaged it for three years but finances are concerned. The girls had been using the same jerseys for at least four seasons. I feel like nobody really cares about girls hockey is much. By the end of the season will probably be in the red. Unfortunately we are thinking were enough to shut the Girls Program down. The idea that we couldnt find another funder is devastating for them socially, devastating academically and i think devastating for the personal growth. The girls have College Scholarships on the horizon sending a terrible message. These young women and 47 years will be working professionals and we are telling them theyre not equal. I feel like i failed them. Hi, everyone. My name is frank. We felt like we had to do something. Names just like yours all across the country are not be able to play because of lack of funding. That is a problem. We believe all kids get a chance to play. I can tell it is important to your community. [cheering and applause] wanting to give you a special present. [cheering and applause] another special surprise for you guys. [inaudible] i thought this was going to be my last year. I am so thankful for you guys. I just cannot explain how happy i am. [cheering and applause] these programs are so important to these kids. Kids need a place to go after school. They need a place where they can be with their friends. They need a place where they belong. A place where they can find their selfesteem. A place where they can be mentored by these coaches. A lot of these times these coaches have more of an impact on these kids to get their homework done and do all those things. They make the decisions that are most important to these kids. That is who gets to play on friday night. So hard to grow up today, i think. Much harder to be between 13, 16, 17, 18 years old today than back when a lot of us were growing up. They absolutely need to find a place where they can find their selfesteem. A lot of places where we are having these issues, they probably will not find their selfesteem in the classroom. They will find it because they can shoot a basketball, hit hit a baseball, sing in a school play. It is so important to be able to have a place for these kids to go. This video is a little bit old, but 27 of the public high schools in this country that do not have a sports program. They get out of school at 230 in the afternoon. Where are they going to go . What are they going to do . We did a movie about the doomsday budget in philadelphia. So many extracurricular programs , laid off so many teachers and combined schools. They combined to schools. These two rival schools were put together. This teacher who is 26 years old that was laid off came back to coach these kids from a football standpoint. He knew how important it was for these kids to be able to play. One of his best friends was killed by gunfire when he was 16 years old. He came back to coach these kids we film these kids everyplace. We filmed them in the streets. We filmed them at games. You watch these kids be mentored by this coach that love these kids. You watch these kids at practice and you think, they are not a practice, what is is going on. It is so important for these kids to have a place to go. I was shocked they let us into the board of education. One of these kids who played football said, without a football team, im not coming to school. If you think about that, what that does to kids to leave school because there is not a sports program, being part of a group that in a gang, think about what that does to the country 1015 years from now. You cannot get to a good place. These programs are so important. If a team needs funding, they can sign up and if they raise half of what they need through bake sales, car washes, whatever they need to do, we will fund the other half. A lot of teams that dont get what they need. We find them anyway. We have touched 1 million kids that are still being able to play sports that would not have been able to without this. We have our partners focusing on this right now. I have always felt that our kids are our countrys most precious precious natural resource. We dont spend enough time on them. We dont spend enough money on them. The kids, not to be corny or cliche, but our kids are our future. A rural area, suburban area, area, innercity, we have to keep our kids at school. One ways to help keep these sports programs going. The other thing we have talked about is what we have done from a firearm standpoint. Move that along, please. Firearm standpoint, parkland had in unbelievable impact on me. We have been in the gun business since i can remember. After tackle was the firearm business. Ive been around ive been around guns my entire life. Guns were always kind of Second Nature to me. Gun violence in this country with these kids, we decided to take all of the assault style weapons out. [applause] we got a lotta blowback from that. A lot of people upset with us. It did not compare to what happened after parkland. I will show you a video that we did that was for internal use only. Only showing to the people that work in the company. About how we feel and the stance we took. I will talk a little bit more about it. I will show you this video on our thoughts on the gun violence piece. Roll the video. When we say we are part of the communities we serve, what do we mean. We mean there are stories we want to be part of. There are stories we want not to be part of. We did everything by the book that we were supposed to do. Somehow this kid was still able to buy a gun from us. We dont want to be a part of this story any longer. 100 students taking their fight to the capital. This is something that can be stopped. The country failed our children. Gotten used to saying it is what it is. People continually end up dead. We took a stand that demonstrated leadership knowing there would be controversy. Staying true to a vision that has made our country different. Our commitment to the youth in our communities. We are taking out of all of our stores permanently. We can be brave enough. Our community is responding. I want to thank your dad for what he did. They wont sell assault weapons at all. A similar move. Under pressure about the negative impact. They will be turning their back on a fair amount of the market. It is not saying you can have your guns, it is saying we have to do better. Dicks Sporting Goods announced this morning. Assault rifles pulled from shelves at Dicks Sporting Goods. Pleased others and angered many. That announcement not sitting well with the nra. How do you like it now . We hope the congress will come together with the intent of finding the solution to this problem. What it takes to make communities as safe as possible. Today and for generations to come. [applause] i still have a hard time talking about this. We said that we would not sell assault style rifles in any store ever again. We have taken them all out. No hype capacity magazines. No guns to anyone under 21 years old. We made that announcement. We were invited by the families and parkland to come down. To meet with them. I promised i would not do this. Talk about an emotional day. I think today, in the the country, rational people argue their point your rationally. Rational people argue their point irrationally. My wife and i went down and talk to those families who lost a child or a spouse. Not one of them said and the guns. Not one of them said guns had to go. All they said was we need to find reasonable gun reform so what happened to my child never happens to anybody else. Now, that actually gave me some hope that we could get something done in washington. If there was ever a group of people who are rational people who have the right to argue this position irrationally, it was this group of people, and they did not do that. I went to washington and sat down with senators and congressmen. You want to talk about National People arguing irrationally, it was so disappointing, surprising, and maddening that we cannot get anything done on this particular issue. They should talk to the woman that i talk to and had breakfast that day we sat and talked. If you are a parent, you cannot even imagine what this has to be like. I sat with this woman who looked at me and said, it has been a month since my son was killed. I go in his room every night and said in his bed and talk to him. Imagine that. And washington cant even do background checks. 90 of the people in this country agree there should should be background checks. We have to do something about this. I tried to talk to congress about the inconsistencies and gun laws. A lot of the response was, are you sure . Yes, senator, i am sure. Yet to be 21 years old to buy handgun from a licensed dealer like us. You can buy that assault style weapon, you can buy that at eight teen. It makes no sense. You need to have a background check if you want to buy a gun on the internet interstate. I live in pittsburgh. If i want to bite over the internet from somebody who lives in philadelphia, no background check. Just by the gun. Off you go. We need to change some of these inconsistencies. One of the things, i asked when i left that morning, a day i will never ever forget, i asked, what would you like me to do . They said, we would like you to to keep this conversation going. Wed like you not to give up. I promised that i would do that. Whenever i get an opportunity to talk like this, i take it to try to talk about this. Three reasons why wrote the book. One was to talk to entrepreneurs who are starting a business that your business will not go in a straight line. Its your business or your career. Your career nor your business will go in a straight line. You will have ups and downs. You will have good days and you will have bad days and you will have really bad days. And you will have some of those moments that you are going, what am am i doing . I am just worn out. You have to keep it going. One of the reasons i wrote the book is because sam walton, a number of books about sam walton, he was very honest. Some people talk to me about this book and said, you are really honest. You were really open. I cant believe some of the things you talked about. Talking about the ups and downs that he had. I think you started this business three times before he finally got it right. That, in a way, was inspirational was inspirational for me. We almost went out of business twice. Another time we moved to pittsburgh anger the business really fast. The reason we almost went out of business was because i was stupid. We grew too fast. I wrote it so that other people might have that inspiration to stick with it, if they can the second reason was around this sports matter piece. How important this is to our kids. That alaskan hockey league, those girls were not going to be able to play the next year. The league is still going. The next year, both girls went to the national championship. Imagine that. [applause] they would not have been able to go to the national championship. The last thing was the firearm peace and what we need to do from a gun standpoint to get reasonable gun reform to try to stop some of this senseless killing. People have said to me, you know, some of you have heard me say this with a couple of interviews i have had. If we do what you want to do, it will not stop these mass shootings. The answer is, you are right. That kid and parkland could have never bought a gun. He was too young. It may not stop all of these mass shootings, but i firmly believe if it saves one life, it is all worth it. We have to find a way to get that done. Part of the reason to write this book was fulfill that commitment to those families and parkland who lost their child. That we would keep this conversation going. With that, i think there is one last video i will show around the sports matter piece and then we will open it up for questions, if there there is still time. The foundation put this together to talk about what is happening. Taking these sports away from these kids. They have no place to go. Roll the last video, please. You guys played your hearts out. You played your hearts out all season. Unfortunately, we have a bit of bad news. Due to budget shortfalls, the panthers Baseball Program basketball. We regret to inform you that due to budget shortfalls. Indefinitely suspended. [inaudible] i wish it wasnt so. To whom it may concern. To whom it may concern. To whom it may concern. To whom it may concern. To whom it may concern. [applause] i think we would all agree that every kid deserves a chance to play and we should do that. Thank you very much. [applause] if you have a question, if you would raise your hand. We have some microphones we will bring around to you. Just a few questions before we send you back to the rest of your day. Questions. Right here in the front. In the back. My name is susie. I am from you new york. So mi. Ive lived in texas for years i was a kid with no money. I went to your dad store and i saw advertising for the press. He said no. I would go every week for a year he said why dont you quit calling on me and i said i cannot. You have to advertise in the paper. The moral of this story is, dont ever give up. [applause] i agree. Thank you. Thank you very much for the work you are doing to help kids. My name is rick. By way of providence, chicago and baltimore, sports was such an important factor in my familys life growing up and going to college and sort of forming my values so i can really identify with what you are doing and the importance. The issue of where our institutions are spending money, not on sports, but on Something Else, not on education, but Something Else is pervasive. I think the issue of the people who are supposedly rational talking irrationally about sports are doing the same thing on a bunch of other issues. It seems like this whole funding issue of sports in schools is a much deeper issue in society. I was wondering if you could comment a bit on your thoughts on that. How we may reverse that trend. In my perspective, i dont know if anybody else shares this, but the world that you and i grew up and is totally different. I think maybe not as good today as it was then. Thank you. I think that it is a real issue. I think that part of the solution is that we we have to find a way to have a Public Sector in a private sector come together to solve these problems. We have the Public Sector that wants to do a, b and c and they dont want to talk to the private sector. If we can find ways to put them together to solve some of these problems, we can get a lot of these problem solved. Companies like us, nike, other companies that want to focus, not everybody is an athlete. Some of them will find their selfesteem because they can sing in the school play. They just need a place to go after school. I think we have to stop this big divide between the Public Sector and the private sector that they cannot come together. Their businesses out there that really want to help. We cannot find a way to get a partnership between the public and private sector. I think thats a big answer to what this issue is here that is confronting us. Not as good now as it was when we were growing up, i dont know know. You might be right. The point is we should not resign ourselves to that fact. What are we going to do to make it better. What are we going to do to educate our kids. If we dont educate our kids, weve got a big problem. I have always felt that income inequality is one of the biggest issues we have in the country today. I think that it is misdiagnosed. The root cause of income inequality, i believe, is educational inequality. Until we fix the Education System across the entire system, we will not get there. The root cause of this is inequality in the public and private sector needing to come together to solve a problem. We will grab a microphone for you. Thank you. Does morality have a part in your equation . I think that we should all be moral. Something that we all need to be aware of. I think we did the right thing. I dont think its hard to do the right thing. Sometimes the consequences you have to deal with, there can be consequences you have to deal with, but i think its always easy to do the right thing. Based on these issues we have raised, we are doing the right thing. We feel we are doing the right thing. If we had a mole again to do it all over again around the gun issue, we would do it all over again and never think twice. Final question. My name is kathy williams. It is not really a question, it is just a comment on behalf of all the mothers in the room, i want to thank you for your courage and for doing what we call service above self. I want to pledge that anything that we can do to help you in making a decision that was not necessarily the best financial for you, you earned so much more a lot of that is our respect. We are so proud of you and your family. Thank you very much. I want to thank them for being here. More importantly, for your leadership. You have a lot of educational leaders in the building. In this room. Certainly, this could be a super intense conference as we talk about these issues. It is great to have the chief executive officer of this Great Corporation be one of those who is concerned. We thank you for that. Also, i want to thank all of you for being here today. If you have not gotten a chance to pick up your copy of the book, please do so outside. All of the proceeds, this may not surprise you, all the proceeds from the sale go to the foundation. Go to the Sports Matter Foundation. We do have some left in the lobby. Also, if you are interested in memberships, we encourage you to think about the University Forum our next event, those invitations are in the mail. Student theater production a man of no importance. That is what it is. We hope you are able to join us for preshow production and a preview from the director of the play. Thank you all for being here today and thank you again to add thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. [applause] the new cspan online store now has book tv products. Go online to check them out. See what is new for book tv and all the cspan products. Book tv afterwards, former Harvard Law School questions whether forgiveness and amnesty can strengthen the american justice system. She is interviewed by law professor and former federal prosecutor. Weekly Interview Program with relevant test hosts interviewing topknot fiction authors about their latest work. All programs are also available as podcasts. Full disclosure, you and i go way back. You were my law professor at harvard. You taught law