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December 18, 2023 14 mins
In this episode of "Behind The Curtain," John Maples and Livestock Influencer Will Meadows contrast and compare the Denver National Stock Show to the Cattlemen’s Congress in Oklahoma.

Will describes why he has 90K followers on TikTok!

Reach John Maples at 334-703-0923 (he says texts work great for him). Or find him on Facebook. (He is the one pictured with his family and a goat).Denver National Stock Show
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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Welcome to Behind the Curtain. Inthis podcast, show cattle expert John Maples
from Alabama gives his unique perspective andtakes a look behind the curtain and everything
behind the scenes from the show CattleWorld. Reach John with questions at three
three four seven zero three zero ninetwo three, or find him on Facebook.

(00:24):
Find details in the show notes foreach podcast and now, John Maple
Behind the Curtains producer Shelby aka Buttonshere with mister John Maples. And this
part of the podcast is what wecall coffee talk. That's what I need
from SNL as the lady going coffeetalk. Now, it's time for coffee

(00:45):
talk. We gotta find that Okay, we'll find that one. But actually
this is exciting for coffee talk.We've been talking about this guy probably the
last couple few podcasts and he's sobusy, but he's finally available. All
I know is his name is WillMeadows, and I found an intro bed
for him, and the intro bedis called big Cow. Here it is,
that's the intro music for Will Meadows. It's called big Cow because he's

(01:07):
a big deal. But John,why don't you introduce Will and explain why
Will is a big deal. Ineed to know why he has so many
followers on TikTok from what I understand, Oh gras Will Meadows. My first
time meeting Will was. I guessnow. Will does say there is a
phone call he tried to buy acaf from me. I guess that's true.

(01:30):
I don't really remember that. Ido remember getting a phone call from
Will. I'm wanting to come helpfit groom kind of learn the business for
the Christmas Classic show. It's actuallyis, you know, first weekend in
December, and I said, yeah, come on, you know, and
yeah, And from that month andon, I've known Will and he's drove

(01:52):
me crazy, He's made me laughed, he's ticked me off. But at
the end of the day, Will'sa really good guy and he kind of
blew up on TikTok. What yousay, Will, Yeah, well,
I would say, so, youknow, I remember, you know,
making that text message at phone callto go to you know, the Christmas
Classic asking if you need any helpand stuff like that. It kind of
flew from there, especially after goingto that show there in January and Perry

(02:15):
Georgia. I remember going to thatone too, and after that you started
calling more and more in terms ofTikTok man. I just I got bored.
I did. I started seeing alot of videos and stuff like that
about agriculture, about cattle, aboutpeople feeding calves and stuff like that,
Like, man, I'll give thata shot. So I started videoing.
I started doing the voiceovers and stufflike that. That's what I knew to

(02:38):
do because I was like, man, I guess this has got to be
perfect. I started noticing my videosthat were not as perfect for the funnier
ones were the more comic ones andthe more well liked ones. So I
started that about two springs ago.I'm not really sure on an exact date.
I did that, and you know, really kind of just went from
there. I had a lot ofpeople start to really like it. I

(02:59):
branched out and started doing just allthings, not just feeding cow, but
starts going places and doing things andshowing what it kind of looks like to
do stuff in the industry, youknow, going from show to show,
going to bull cellar, bullseell.And now I got folks coming up to
me wanting to know what's really behindthat open line of Well, folks,
I love that. That's that's prettyamazing. Where can people find you,

(03:21):
Will real quick if they're wanting tosee? Absolutely so, I'm on all
social platforms in terms of TikTok,Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter as
well, all of those. Youcan I've got a link tree type deal
too. You can go to myTikTok at Will Meadows ten and click on
it there and see all the othersocials there. I just got that fix.
The other day. I had avoice showing me how to do that.

(03:43):
I think that's kind of slick,but good job. You know.
It's one of those bills and startedbranching out from all different social platforms.
Excellent, let's hear it for aWill. Nice job. He's got an
advantage over me. He loves heloves to reach out and go, go,
go and talk talk talk, andsometimes I can be a little a
little drawn back and inclusive and yeahcrouchy. There you go. Okay,

(04:09):
so Will, since you're you're theyouth and the energy on this podcast right
now, but you have enough ofan opinion because you've been doing this for
a while, even though you werea young go getter, that John has
selected you for this particular topic.Do we want to dive in, John,
Yeah, dive in. I thinkyou know, just a little more
of the in depth report, kindof a outside lines I thought, comparing

(04:31):
and contrasting and just the history ofthe relationship, or you know, you
pair these two together, the twodifferent shows Denver, the National Western Stock
Show and the Cattleman's Congress, andhow that all kind of played out.
You know, is there room forboth of them? What's the differences?

(04:55):
And course I'm a CLUBCF guy,so I have my own spend and take
on things. But just kind offrom will I know you've gone to the
Catleman's Congress a pile of times,and uh, I think you know some
of the history of why it poppedup, and just let you kind of
take the floor and roll. Absolutely. I'll first start off by saying both
of the shows are extremely cold,depending on the gear, so I can

(05:17):
kind of go from that. Butso Caman Congress kind of popped up,
you know, in that COVID yearand stuff like that. Denver was not
allowed to do it for SAE.I think that's the easiest way to put
that. Catman's Congress stepped in ina big way and they kind of made
a platform for people to go tothat first year was awesome, you know,
had a lot of people show upto that. I think it was

(05:39):
you know, during that COVID year, everybody simply wanted to go to a
show. I've been to the Cantleman'sCongress every year that they've had it,
and it is extremely nice, youknow, in the way that they have
that set up. You know,it's a lot of good things, a
lot of good kind of cattle,good kind of stock out there, and
stuff like that. In terms ofDenver, I think, you know,
the history behind that one's really trulyamazing to me. You know, all

(06:00):
the many things there, that beingthe oldest of them, and really just
you look at the mountains and yousee everything out there. That's a truly
incredible place. But you know,really and truly, I surely like Cadman's
Congress. I think that's an awesomeshow. They've done a great job with
it. I wasn't sure that itwas going to be as big as it
is now, just simply because Ithought it was going to be like a

(06:23):
year saying, maybe a two yearthing. And they've made an awesome,
awesome job out of that. Ithink it's going to stay here. For
a while. You know, John, you talked about is there room for
both? I think it all dependson where you live out in the country.
You know, people that are fromCalifornia have people that are from Idaho
may find that Denver's a shot betterfor them, a shot closer. But

(06:43):
for folks like you and me inthe southeast corner of Alabama, I think,
really truly that Denver's a shot farfor people to make that long haul
and have to stay over several nightsat different places in different states. I
think Oklahoma City is a shot moreyou know, feasible for people like us
that's on the southern side of thestate. Well, I mean they are

(07:05):
just so it's hard to have.It's hard to do both because I mean
there's a week or two a part. They overlap each each other, overlap.
And there you did bring up onepretty important thing. There is so
many show cattle on the east sideof the country. And I don't care

(07:26):
where you are, if you're inOhio, if you're in Iowa, if
you're in Mississippi, if you're inNorth Carolina, if you're in if you're
in Michigan, Oklahoma City's a lotcloser and they that is such an advantage.
Now, I'll be honest, Iwas so upset when Denver canceled it.

(07:48):
I mean when they start canceling showsbecause you know, contracts or whatever
got pulled from them and they couldn'thave it at that facility and this and
that for the code year. Imean when I say that affected me,
I mean mentally, like truly didaffect me. I was kind of like,
you're basically trying to pull someone's livelihoodaway from them. And then when

(08:11):
Oklahoma City stepped up, it waslike, Okay, Denver, like you
obviously you're telling me you can't dothis, and Oklahoma City can do it.
I mean, the just the personwhere you make your living doing this,
that aspect of me. I becamea huge Oklahoma City fan. Like
you know, it was just allin for me. It was like,

(08:35):
Okay, they understand it. Butthen I'm a CLUBCAF guy. And yet
it's closer for me and that's moreconvenient and I can get there easier in
traveling and whatnot. However, whenI look at this, I just remember
all the all the years of goingto Denver with my family, with my
father, with my wife, flyingout to Denver seeing the mountains in the

(08:58):
background and then looking at bull Alliand back in the day, bull Ally,
you know, just not gonna cutyou know, not gonna cut corners
or anything. Bull Alli was PhilLautner. Bull Alli was seeing the next
group of bulls that Phil Lautner puton display. And what I have struggled
from a guy that is obsessed withclub calbs, what I have struggled with

(09:22):
with Oklahoma City is just the lackof participation. Me and you went to
Oklahoma City last year and there was, if I recall right, there was
one Club CAF bull on display andit was one Phil Lautner had brought,
and I think it was trustworthy andin God would trust son. And then

(09:43):
of course there was breeding bulls leftand right, and there was maternal bulls
and main bulls and semi bulls andangus bulls. But then for somebody that
loves the show steer, there wasone bull. And back in the day
when Denver was around, you know, Phil would have five, six,

(10:03):
seven bulls on display. And Philwas not afraid to display the bulls.
And really, truly that was whatmade the event. People bought plane tickets
to see that event. In person. People bought plane tickets and plan their
year around Martin Luther King weekend.When bulls were going to be on display

(10:24):
in Denver. They might throw aski trip in there with it too.
I was guilty of that, meand Laura. However, that was something
you circled and I went with mydad year in, year out. And
things have just changed. You know, the big a lot of the big
dogs. They're not displaying bulls anymore. You know, you can display them
at Cadaman's Congress, you can takethem back to Denver to display them.

(10:46):
And I've hit I've heard chatter,and I know there's gonna be some some
guys dragging bulls out to Denver thisyear on the club caf scene. I
would love to see it get backto what it once was and what it's
is still is a magical place.I always just for some reason I've I've
kind of here recently, Oklahoma Cityis a big heafer show. Don't know

(11:09):
your thoughts of that. I thinkof Oklahoma City as being a big heafer
show. Denver was was what itused to be. And what's your thought
with just that one thing about whenI make that statement Oklahoma City is a
big heafer show, kind of likeLouisville. You know, I completely agree
with that, but I kind ofwant to touch on something right quick that
you mentioned. You said livelihood,you know, make taking away folks livelihood,

(11:31):
you know, talking about the bigseals that you had out there in
Denver, the embryos on snow,you know, the different breed cells and
stuff. I think Okahoma City donea great job of incorporating that. I've
been on to several of those myself, and I really truly loves sitting in
those and hearing the prices go andseeing a lot of happy families that are
able to get in on the partof that, you know, selling either

(11:52):
embryos or selling live doc In termsof it being a half for show,
I completely agree. You know,there's a lot of good kind of heifers
that I've seen walk through there.I've actually been able to get on some
of those and dress some of thoseas well. So yeah, I think
it's more geared towards the heifer show. You know, there's a lot of

(12:13):
really good ones. I do thinkhowever, in the future, maybe here
in the next couple of years,you'd start to see it branch out more
to be in say a bullshell moreprevalent in that area, or you know
Steers especially you're a big Steer guy. So hopefully we'll see a lot of
hard hitters in terms of Steers show, and that'd be a good paying gig
to get more folks interested in that. Yeah, I would it would be

(12:35):
nice to see both of them besuccessful, and then it would be it
would be nice to It would benice to see. I mean, I
can't get off the aspect. Iwould love all the big dogs to display
their bulls somewhere. Pick one ofthem, pick both of them, I
don't care. You'd love to justkind of get back to that. I
mean, that was that was justfamily memories for me, and I would

(12:56):
love to see that happen, andyou know, you know, would love
and I'm sure working hard at makingthat happen again. I sure agree with
that too, you know, onboth scenes, both different shows. I
think, you know Denver to thenew facilities that they've built, I think
that will really have a lot todo with that. You know that a
lot of places that they're going tohave, the new cell ring, the

(13:18):
new barns and facilities. I thinkyou're going to start to see more people,
especially out on the West coast,start to go to that, you'll
see more bullets go there. Butlike you're saying, the nostalgia about it,
Yes, that's what we all missas those bullets sitting there and just
walks around with it in however coldit is that particular year and going out
and seeing some good quality stock.Both of them can be pretty chilly to

(13:41):
the ball and I've been miserable withboth. I don't like to wash rack
in Oklahoma City when it's like negatives. Well, that was not a ton
of phntography. No, no,anybody can agree. Well will man,
I appreciate it, and just kindof pulling back and looking at the details
of both of those, pulling thatcurtain back and thank you for coming on

(14:03):
absolutely. Will you want to giveeverybody your info one more time about how
they can reach you if they wantto find you or find out more information
about you. Sure thing. Myname is Will Meadows. You can find
me on all social platforms. Lookup my name Will Meadows and you can
find me there. Thanks so much, thank you. This has been Behind

(14:26):
the Curtain hosted by John Maples,produced and edited by Shelby Mitchell. Views
expressed in this podcast are not necessarilythose of the producer, management, or
iHeartMedia. Reach John Maples at threethree four seven zero three zero nine two
three or find them on Facebook.You can also find details in the show
notes for each podcast. Thanks forlistening to Behind the Curtain.
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