June 5, 2024 • 40 mins
The Bubbas are back, and it's time to nominate your favorite Key West restaurants, bars, businesses, musicians, artists, attractions and community notables for the 11th annual people's choice awards.
On this episode, publisher Britt Myers, Key West Weekly editor Mandy Miles and advertising director Stephanie Mitchell answer readers' questions about the nominating process.
Nominations are open online through June 16. You can make your picks once per day on keysweekly.com. Only an email address is needed to take part.
Since its inception, more than 1,000 winners have been crowned in nearly 100 categories, and more than $175,000 has been raised for local nonprofits.
This year’s nonprofit recipient is Wesley House Family Services.'
Follow Keys Weekly on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) for updates on the Bubbas and to ask us any questions about nominations and voting.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to another edition of the Florida Keys Weekly podcast.
I know you're on the edge of your seat. You've
missed me. I'm your host, Brett Myers. We've had Gwen
Filosa doing a lot of the podcast. People seem to
like her better than me. I'm ok with that. But
uh they brought me back in today to share some
news with you guys because it is time for the
Bubbas Key West People's Choice Awards and we're getting lots
(00:21):
of questions. Lots of buzz. It's the 11th year in
Key West where people vote is happening right now at
Keys weekly.com.
It's the Bubba's Key West People's Choice Awards. It's one
of the biggest events out there. We've got hundreds of
thousands of voters every year across the globe, across continents.
That is no lie. We love to talk about where
those occur at. Uh It really is a phenomenon we're
extremely proud of and it's the time of the year
(00:42):
we get incredibly busy
and I'd love to come on the show and take
all the credit for the Bubbas and tell you all
the work that I do. But the people who truly
do it are here today, our editor Mandy Miles, our
sales and marketing director, Stephanie Mitchell and of course, Gwen
Filosa is with me as well. So we're going to
talk Bubbas today,
answer a lot of questions. Gwen's got readers uh questions
(01:02):
and those who listen, sending her questions. And so she's
gonna grill me. II, I can kinda see her sheet
of paper but I'm not cheating. She's gonna shoot from
the hip and ask some bubbles questions and we're gonna
answer those questions from the public before we get started.
Uh I want to thank our sponsor, overseas media group.
That's overseas media group.com. That's the local seo social media website.
(01:23):
They do everything that you don't wanna do and they
make it easy, they make it affordable and they give
you that great service you want from a local company
that does all things digital that you need at your business.
So overseas media group.com, check them out, call them today
if you need anything
and they'll take great care of you. I also wanna
thank FM 103.3. You early listeners out there in radio
land for checking this out. Uh You're getting up before
(01:45):
me but hats off to you and for the rest
of you, you can grab this podcast and many more
with many of our celebrities, national and global celebrities to
local celebrities at Keys weekly.com
and any podcast platform on your phone or smartphone. That's Spotify,
Apple Amazon. You name it we're there, the Florida Keys
Weekly podcast. So pull that up. Alright, nice C DS
(02:07):
out of the way. I've got the team here. Uh Mandy,
how you doing today? Doing? Great. Thanks very much Brett
Stephanie Beche Keys Weekly. How you doing?
Fantastic, thanks. Alright. I just wanted y'all to know I
was telling the truth that the ladies are here in
the house. They're the ones that do all the hard
work and I'm not, I'm not just uh blowing smoke
their way, so to speak. Uh This, this time of year,
(02:28):
everyone hunkers down in the Key West Weekly office and
it's basically about 3 to 456 weeks of uh just 1215,
18 hours a day. Don't call hr I don't know
how we're handling that payroll, but uh they're working their
towels off. So I wanna get to the Bubbas.
I wanna talk about how it works, how it began.
I wanna talk race. Uh I wanna talk about the
(02:49):
dates for this year, how you can vote if you're listening,
I'd like to talk about what it means. Uh, for seeding,
we always have people wanting to know about seeding and
why it works the way that works. Uh There's categories,
how do we have the categories that we have, who
can be added? Uh Why, why is my category not
in there? We'll try to give good answers for that
and there's probably some answers we need to examine. So
we'll talk about that.
(03:10):
Uh We'll talk about the event, the, the moments that
take place at the uh Key West People's Choice Awards
every year at the Key West Theater. What else? Stephanie
and Mandy, what else should we talk about in this thing?
Speaker 2 (03:20):
I think we
should probably introduce sort of like just the process that
we're in between the early nominations that are completely up
to the public and our readers versus then the, the
voting final voting for the top three nominees in each
category.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Mouthful. So we have a nomination period and we have
a finals period and that's what Mandy is alluding to
and we'll talk about that and what those dates look like.
And we'll make this a lot more simplified as we
go through it. Um because it is an exciting time.
I mean, the thing I love about the Bubbas in
spite of our be my best efforts, uh I've got
great people around me and this thing went global years
ago when we started doing online voting. I'll talk about
(03:54):
some of the dark days before online voting.
And uh you think the political world's up in arms
about how things get done and hanging chads and paper
ballots and redos and all that. You should have seen
the early days in the Bubbas when we were, oh boy.
Uh that was, that was a lot of fun for
four or five nights till 3 a.m. in the offices.
Uh But you know, it's a testament how popular it is.
(04:16):
You get tons of votes. We get hundreds of thousands
of votes now, online
uh from over six continents and I think over 100
and uh I don't know how many countries back.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
We need somebody
from Antarctica this year just to, to send in some nominations.
That's the only continent we're missing.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
If you have someone taking a trip to Antarctica this year,
it will actually ping. So we have the system that
we use. Um Second Street, a well known system uh
online system. It will actually ping where votes come from
on these contests. So we've had six continents, never Antarctica.
Um And uh
so if someone's taking a trip, there can take a
(04:51):
vote from there that will, that will uh seal the deal.
We'll have all seven and back in 22 I think
this has grown. We had over 50 countries that voted
in the Bubba's Key West People's Choice Awards. I think
that's closer to 6570 countries now. Um Some of those
countries are at war. It's amazing to think what people
stop and do for this thing. We know it's not life-changing,
but hopefully it adds some fun and value to uh
(05:13):
people who vote and to our local businesses, which is
really
what it's all about. The Bubbas uh are, are really
to promote whether you win or not just to keep
people in Key West on your mind. If you want
to travel here, support local businesses. No. You know, it's relative.
Everyone has a favorite something, you know, a key lime pie.
You have a favorite key lime pie place. If you
(05:33):
win the bubba, does it mean
that you're the only, you know, the best of the best.
Everybody has a favorite place, but it puts a spotlight
on Key West, puts a spotlight on our local businesses
and is always for a charity. And Stephanie, how much
have we raised over the last 10 years? For local charities?
Is it over?
Speaker 2 (05:48):
I
think it's over 200
1000 now,
Speaker 1 (05:51):
$100,000 which is, you know, it's not a drop in
the bucket. Um But it's, you know, we know it's
not the greatest thing that's ever happened to nonprofits and charities.
We have a lot of local groups who support. But
um this allows us to do our part and we
get to do it in a fun way and it
gets the entire community involved more so than anything. So,
uh love that about it. We're going to do year 11.
(06:11):
So let's talk a little bit here on this show
on the Key West Florida, Florida Keys Weekly podcast about
uh the Bubba So Mandy,
um you've been at the company at the Keys Weekly
at the editor. I know you've been in Key West
for about 74 years.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
Thanks for that, Brett, 25
Speaker 1 (06:26):
25. And Stephanie, you've been uh with the weekly for
how long
Speaker 2 (06:31):
eight
years? And in Key West for 22.
Speaker 1 (06:33):
So you've seen the progression
of the Bubbas uh from like year two and the
last year, year 10 and you're a big part of
the seating, you're a big part of everything. Um But
you've seen how this thing has changed. What do you
think the biggest change has been since you were sitting
in this seat? You know, since we started this 10
years ago, you came in year two. What's the biggest
change you've seen from, uh from behind the scenes here?
Speaker 2 (06:54):
So I think with everything he's weekly, we certainly have
grown in our digital
realm. Um I was here those years where we were
having the ballots that we had to have in the newspapers,
then pick up, then drop off here and then assemble
(07:14):
a team to spend night after night counting ballots by hand.
So thank goodness for the internet because it's really made
things a lot more simplified
and it's just, it, the fact that it goes globally
now and has the ability to do that and that
we can see where people are voting from is really,
(07:35):
really cool.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
So for those who are just listening and they're like, ok, I've,
I've got to get to work or I'm gonna come
back to this podcast shortly, but they need to vote
right now. Let's cut to the chase real quick because
I want, I want to make sure we don't jump
over that important part. The bubbles are happening right now.
If you can briefly explain where to vote and what
stages we're looking at in this timeline. Um That would
(07:56):
be a good starter just to let people know and
how often can they vote? If you can vote once
a day?
Can they vote from different computers? There's questions, we get
different emails. How does that work? Briefly? Explain that?
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Ok. So right now we are in the nomination portion
that is really dependent on all of you nominating, writing
in who you think has the best of the best martinis,
key lime pie. Marina. The list goes on and on.
We have three
sections, categories.
Yes, we have the businesses, we have the community and
(08:28):
then we have food and drink.
So when you're filling out that ballot, you have to
fill out 50% for it all to count. So 50%
of the entire 90 not in
Speaker 1 (08:42):
one category. So categories fill out half of it and
the ballot counts,
Speaker 2 (08:46):
correct?
Um What was your question? So
Speaker 1 (08:49):
how often can they vote? So if I go, if
I'm Bob, I go in there once today at 10 a.m.
on Monday and vote. Can I vote at 10 p.m.
that night?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
No, you can vote 24 hours later. Unless you have
another email account, then you can vote from your second
email and that's all you need in order to vote
or nominate people is just enter your email account. We
don't need any password from you. You don't have to register.
We just need your email address.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
And one of the funny things I'll point out, uh,
because you've kind of said that in Jest. But yeah,
you can try to manipulate the system if you're bored
and you got four different emails. Uh, if it's from
the same, uh,
different ways, you know, URL S different things that it
can pick up on from computers and so forth. It's
also funny that we can see the uh emails and
people trying to vote multiple times and a lot of
(09:37):
times it'll, it'll look like it goes through and somebody says, oh,
I voted five times and I know it worked. I'm like, no, we,
we see it, it didn't work but appreciate you taking.
So we don't want to waste your time. Don't vote
40 times and have fun with it. Keep it real.
Um We vote every day, the people who really seem
to stand out because the one thing we get a
lot of, and I want to clear this up right now.
Uh Bubba's Key West People's Choice Awards. I say a
(10:00):
lot of, we, we have a lot of love. We
have a lot of support from thousands and thousands I
think for us it's easier to focus on the one
or two haters, you know, complainers here and there, maybe
some trolls out there. Yeah, as Mandy Miles says the
haters will hate no matter what. So a couple of
the hater comments I should say we get uh is,
you know, it's just a popularity contest, you know, it's
(10:23):
just a popularity contest.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
So
the People's
Choice Awards, how
is it not a popularity
contest?
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Newsflash? It is a popularity contest. I don't know how
if there's ever the definition of a popularity contest. This
is probably it. You're voting on your favorite thing, whether
it's best customer service, best LPI, best attorney,
uh you know, best restaurant, best local business, that kind
of thing. It's a popularity contest. You can
Speaker 2 (10:49):
campaign for it, but popularity contests are not, it's not rigged.
And that's the other thing that we hear all the time.
This is rigged. Why would I even put my name
in there? Why wouldn't you put your name in there
and why wouldn't you put it all over your social
media asking every single one of your followers and their
followers to nominate you in whatever category you're asking for?
(11:10):
This is, it is a popularity contest and you're in
charge of your own campaign for it. And you all
have really large email lists, especially the bigger businesses, send
it to everyone.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
There you go. So you're pumping it up. And the
cool thing about it is we've seen a very diverse
group of winners, particularly less, you know, going global, going online.
Um Really took a lot of the stuff in the ballots,
stuff out of it, in the boxes and so forth,
so to do it. Um, now it really takes a
lot of the, it really keeps it more, I guess,
(11:41):
more pure process and we've seen a lot of new
winners every year more, you know, you see a diverse
group of winners and
Speaker 2 (11:48):
even new nominees that aren't, you know, it's not always
just the usual suspects of the same nominees.
So
Speaker 1 (11:54):
kind of staying on track here. So you bring up
the nominees stan you talked about the nominee period, which
is taking place right now. That is a period where
you can just write in. It says, what is your favorite?
You know, uh local cup of coffee and from that category,
you're just right, there's not a choice, not ABC or D,
you're just writing in your favorite place. You know, if
you misspell it,
(12:15):
if you write the person's name, plus the place, we're
gonna figure it out. The system picks all that up,
put it, you know, it's all there. We're, we're, you know,
spending hours and hours calculating and tabulating and putting it together.
But that's the nominee period. You write in your in
from that, from that, let's say best cup of coffee.
We take the top three places
and those top three make it to the finals and
(12:36):
in the finals period, that's where you vote on between
those three,
your favorite. So yes, it's a popularity contest just like
every election, an online voting system is, it is a popularity.
So we're busted. You got us, if you're one of
those three every year, that points, we know who you are.
If you're one of those three every year, it's a
popularity content. You got it. It's uh next you're gonna
(12:59):
go into the JFK mysteries. So,
Speaker 2 (13:01):
but how cool that, now that it is digital,
we have so many people who travel here every year
that they also get to have a say on who
their favorites are. So you've made an impact. It is.
They've got their own best bartender, their favorite fishing captain,
their favorite, you know, restaurant for customer service. And it's amazing.
You don't have to live here to have had a
(13:21):
fantastic Qs experience with somebody or some place and that
Qs makes us all very popular.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Well, it, it is great. So, like I said, we've had, um,
so the voting will come out. We've had,
you know, I think the last one I, I have
to go back and look at the numbers. Uh But,
you know, we had hundreds of thousands of votes when
you look at the daily votes by the end, by
the time, by the time you do the nomination period
into the finals, hundreds of thousands of votes from over
six continents, 65 to 70 countries. Um It's a great
(13:50):
spotlight on Key West regardless. We're proud of that. The
great thing about it is uh we have an event
that culminates this voting process and we celebrate the winners
and we celebrate the nominees. Let's not forget,
I don't know how many times we get nominees who
are like a little, hey, I didn't win and they,
they talk it up as a loss and I'm like, look,
only three people were nominated as best of something in
Key West and Key West has a lot of great stuff.
(14:12):
So if you're nominated in the top three of something
in Key West, it's quite an honor. It's an honor
just to be nominated. It really is. And so just
to be nominated and make it at that stage and
have enough people think enough of your business, enough of you,
your popularity. Uh No, to really think enough of you
um to, to give you that, that nod, that ride
of passage to say, hey, I was nominated by my peers,
by my community, by the visitors, people who come here
(14:35):
to be a nominee at that point. I'm not trying
to make lemonade. I feel like you're a winner. I mean,
I would use that and say, hey, I was nominated,
I'm one of three. I'm one of three in a
broad vast category of stuff to be nominated. So it's
a big deal just to be nominated.
So from there, uh
Speaker 2 (14:51):
now wait a second, we
have to tell them that they can nominate through June 16th. Sunday,
June 16th, once a day at Keys weekly.com. That's when
the nomination period closes at midnight
on Sunday, which is also something we've talked and talked
about for years.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Well, it's highly publicized. It's on Keys weekly.com where you vote,
you'll see the dates, um, and you can vote daily.
We'll try to pick up your URL what you're voting
from if you want to manipulate, I'm sure in a
world where the CIA can be hacked, you can do
some things to get an extra vote or two in
there of you fancy bot farms out there, right? But
uh we encourage you not to have fun. Keep it real.
(15:28):
Uh We see
most of that stuff, we see irregularities. We've got a
system in place. I won't go into much detail about
that because I don't want people to know what we use.
But we do see, we do see the irregularities. We
do see some things that pick those up and uh
toss out uh repetitive or attempts to manipulate the system. So,
so far, knock on wood. We've been very successful at that.
We've kept us very pure also
Speaker 2 (15:47):
to talk about the repetitive names and things like that.
I know that Britt touched on that a minute ago,
but to best DJ,
it comes to mind because there are a lot of
different ways to spell and put people's names in there. Brit,
stop me if I'm jumping ahead in our
Speaker 1 (16:03):
now, you've got Sonos and Jimmy's attention right now. Yeah,
Speaker 2 (16:06):
I
know. Ha ha. Um, but Jimmy Cooper is the one that, like,
pops into my head because it's DJ. Top, Jimmy, Jimmy Cooper. This,
that and the other. Don't worry, Jimmy, they all go
to the one person. Top
Speaker 1 (16:19):
Jimmy. Well, that applies to everybody. So if someone says,
you know, best Barber and I'm sure it's
Gwen's gotten from the public, we'll hit on that more,
but we're, we're not just nonchalantly going over these lists and,
and it's all great because it's digital. We got systems
now and the more that, you know, before A I
kills us all in the Terminator style movie, it has benefits,
we've got systems that can go in here and populate
(16:41):
alphabetical order, pick up keywords and we know that, hey,
if you put in like, you know, Kermit Kermit's, uh,
you know, guy in Green Hat, it's gonna pick it up.
So
Speaker 2 (16:52):
they all all funnel into the right place. We promise.
And this is whenever I terminate or kick Britt's door
open and make sure that he's in here and locked
away.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
So it all leads up to the final night, which
is what June, July 20th at the Key West Theater,
we'll talk about seating because it is, people say, well, man,
why don't you go to a bigger place? Uh, because
the Key West Theater is awesome. They're a great partner
of ours and I'll talk about some of our partners
here shortly.
But, um, they, they've been there since day one, since
11 years ago and opened their doors to us. And
(17:23):
the reason why it's so important to us, to partner
with them. A, the theater's a great spot. It keeps
it intimate. It keeps the excitement going. We've got comedy,
we've got shows. We've got, uh, winners. We've got a
lot going on. It's a fun night. But every ticket,
every dollar spent that night, every ticket sold, every sponsorship
goes to a nonprofit for the past 10 years. We've go,
we rotate between three nonprofits, which are the Bahama Village
(17:46):
music program. Wesley House Family Services in Samuel's House. Um
Those are three nonprofits. We love, we support them doesn't
mean we don't love others. We do a lot of
stuff for other nonprofits. We get people calling and saying,
why don't you support our nonprofit? We do the Bubbas
just have always been between those three and we've enjoyed,
uh taking those bubba sponsorships and promos. Uh with a
few years of the Key West rotary pitched in and
(18:07):
helped us do those before we had digital, helped us
voting at night.
They got a little bit of the proceeds. And I
think after putting them through that voting process of hen
ballots till 3 a.m. for four nights in a row,
they said, you know what, just give it all to
Samuel's house. Uh So I'm in that club. I'm, I'm
being facetious, but it, it was a lot of work. So,
um but that's, that's really why we do it at
the Qs theater over the years, the way we do
(18:29):
and why it's so important to partner with them. And
I know it's limited seating. Now, the seats, there's this
question that Gwen will get to, I'll save that for her.
We'll talk about that as well. But uh for those
voting just know
the nomination period's happening now and then we'll have the
finals period and then July 20th to culminate the winners
and we'll, we'll release the winners shortly after that. But
it's a fun night. It really is a fun night
(18:49):
at the Bubba as it gets crazy. It's sort of,
I always like to explain it as what the, what
the correspondents dinner used to be in DC. And, uh
you can really roast, there's no political party affiliation. There's
nobody who's safe uh for picking on you and roasting
you it because we love you. But um it is
a very uh unbiased, it's open game
(19:09):
there and we like to have a lot of fun
with our elected officials, local celebrities, our winners and try
to get everyone included as much as we can and,
and stan you, you take the brunt of the seating.
It's a pretty wild night. I know, but it's a
lot of fun once everyone's in house and setting and,
and getting down, that
Speaker 2 (19:25):
is
Speaker 1 (19:25):
the
Speaker 2 (19:25):
friskiest hour and a half of my year,
not counting the weeks and weeks where I have to
remind Britt that it's only two seats. Not seven bri.
Bri promises everybody 10 seats when it's completely sold out.
Just know that I deal with gatekeepers all year. I'm
the gatekeeper
on this one.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
We sound uh sound
a little uh spicy today on the podcasts only because
we have fun with this. So we, we hear a
lot of these questions, but it's important that we answer them.
It's important that people understand it. We're not, we're not
a big company of saying no, we try to say
yes to everything. Hey, how do I get my category?
We'll look at it next year. We added a ST Stephanie,
we put something out last year. We heard people say
(20:05):
uh at a category we put, so we put it
to a vote. We will said, hey, if you want
to see more categories, we have over 9090. At one point,
we had about 100 and 20 talk about a long night,
a lot of counting. And we noticed that on some categories,
there wasn't a ton of activity on it. It wasn't
a knock on them as a person or a company.
It's just that general general brand, that category of business
(20:26):
or whatever it might have been was not getting a
lot of traction.
So we removed those over the years and then the
ones that people really wanted to see, we still listen,
we still add stuff here and there. This year is
what we added a new category this year. Burger burger.
I want Gwen Filosa to take over because that was
really the, one of the main agendas for this podcast
was to talk about
(20:48):
some of the misconceptions and common questions we get and
some of the questions I'm sure are very, very much
needed to answer for people trying to understand the Bubbas.
Uh as we do that, I wanna think about the people.
I wanna just quickly think the people who make this happen.
I mentioned it supports nonprofits.
And back when we started this 11 years ago and I,
(21:08):
you know, we were the Keys Weekly. We'd been around
about 678, you know, we're a 20 year old company,
locally owned company now, but 11 years ago, there was
no best of in Key West anymore. No one was
doing it. Um We had somebody try to do it
right when we started like, oh, surprise, I just came anyway.
Um but, you know, at the end of the day
to do it, right? Takes a lot of work, takes
a great team. So 11 years ago when we first
(21:29):
started it up, so people say, oh, this won't work
in Key West people, people won't get into this thing
and it, it took over and we were surprised it
was nothing to do with how smart or clever we
were Key West. Just needed the best of it needed
a People's Choice Awards. And 11 years ago, we kicked
it up, but to go to people at that time
now we have people calling and saying, hey, how do
I sponsor this? And again, I hate saying no, but
(21:50):
we've kept the sponsorships limited to keep that value for
the sponsors there.
Uh, and, and certain partners and people say, well, why
did you choose that sponsor? And not me? Well, 11
years ago, when I needed sponsors to give to these
nonprofits and make this thing worthwhile. Uh A lot of people,
not in a negative way, just thought, I don't know
what this is, it's new. Um Like, like a lot
(22:12):
of businesses would do and with a good reason, this
is new. I don't know about this. Uh I'm not
sure there are some who said yes,
say no more. We'll be a part of it. Here's
a check and we've been very loyal to those, those
brands and those companies just to say, thank you, thanks
for making it happen. So, a lot of those were
still sponsors today, um which was now Chevrolet, which was
(22:35):
purchased and turned into war and Henry and Keys O here,
you know, our, our friends here across the Keys who are,
who are sponsors. Um
And I don't even think if I have the sponsorship
last year, I know we have Harran Law who's done
it over the years. Us
Speaker 2 (22:48):
Butterfly and Nature
Conservatory, uh
Speaker 1 (22:50):
Doc Guzman, uh uh family dentistry. Uh Everyone loves doc.
We've had uh Berkshire Hathaway, Bascom grooms the butterfly conservatory.
George Fernandez is amazing. Uh First State Bank uh waste management.
Of course, I mentioned
uh our friends over at the Key West Theater and
I think Darren and Jess Horan didn't use the law
firm this year. They used their business. Uh uh the
(23:11):
Treasure key West treasures, catered
Speaker 2 (23:14):
affairs. Thanks to Bill and Amy
LA.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
Yeah. So just a lot of people pitch in. I,
I make sure I'm not missing someone this year. I probably,
I don't want to misspeak. But if I there's is
out there everywhere, we make sure to thank our sponsors. So,
um I didn't wanna make that the theme today, but
I want to make people understand. There's the sponsorship list
really goes back to a lot of appreciation for them
being there. Uh When we didn't have a lot of
people to step up and they just said yes. And
(23:37):
they said, you know, the Hemingway House people like that,
our friends uh just stepped up and said, yes, you know, here's,
here's the, here's the check and go at it. So
thank you to them.
So, with that, with that in mind, without further ado,
let's get to the reason for this. We talked Bubbas,
we got Gwen Filosa. Gwen, you reached out to readers
and people on your podcast platform um and listeners and
(24:00):
you took emails, you get these by email. How did
you get questions for the Bubbas that I know you
brought with you today?
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Oh, I used Instagram and Facebook and just said, well,
ask us anything about the Bubbas, ask us anything. I'm
not gonna use any names. But if it says best chiropractor,
best dentist, if I put a name in there or a,
a business name, will they get counted? I think they're
concerned as to whether or not they, they need to
(24:27):
put in the individual chiropractor slash doctor's name
or if they have, you know, if they're called QS
chiropractic center versus doctor. So, and so we will find
that out print just correct me if I'm wrong, but
we will match those up, aggregate them so that we
can match them up. If there's a specific barber that
works at a specific barbershop you can put in both,
you know. So and so Eddie at wherever, you know,
(24:50):
Eddie's cuts, we will find that out. So we,
well, we'll absolutely look at those and make sure everything
gets funneled to the right place all
Speaker 1 (24:57):
the way down to misspellings. Like Mandy, my editor knows
I can't spell and so I'm not making fun of
or giving anyone a hard time out there who doesn't
spell well, I, I sound like Zoolander. Uh so uh
I don't spell well, so or speak well,
Speaker 2 (25:13):
but we're talking to you
Landon Bradbury.
Speaker 1 (25:17):
We've never spelled his name right. I did.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
I did.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
So you can misspell a company a name as long
as it's close and it's somewhat identifiable as, oh, I
bet they're talking about this person or that place or
as a teacher where they put Sally over at Hob or,
you know, Bob over at Gerald Adams. We got a
pretty good idea based on the volume of who Bob
(25:40):
or Sally is and we're gonna find that, you know,
and so that we will pick it up, we're gonna
pick it up and that replies to businesses, people, places.
Uh We are in 2024. We do use technology. We
uh we have Gwen here who's a techno technological whiz
uh handles our social media and digital marketing. We're gonna
pick it up in our platform, our friends over at
Second Street.
(26:00):
Uh It's a great platform that we use and not
to them. It's going, it makes life a lot easier
for us. So to answer your question, we'll pick that up.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
We
just try to remember. There's one M in Hemingway two
T in Buffett as my editor, I put my editor
hat on. Also, there are human eyes on it before
we get to the top three. So it's not all technology.
We've still got a little hand on it. Thank you.
And that, that was really most of the questions. The
other one that we got a few times from
(26:27):
readers is um this is a key West centric event.
We have best of marathon. Best of Upper keys. Uh,
how far away from Key West can people? So Square
Grouper is always in there, I would say up to
Big Pine. Is that right?
Brett? Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:42):
You know, because Big Pines, sort of, even when we
deliver papers, you know, throughout the Florida Keys with our
three different publications, we have sort of a cut off
area where the Key West Paper, for example,
will stop in the marathon. Paper goes to Big Pine
is pretty much our blended area of sort of where
the marathon paper stops and the Key West Paper stops
(27:04):
so we can meet each other there. So there's places
in Big Pine where you'll find the marathon Weekly or,
you know, and you'll find the Key West Weekly, both
our publications. So for voting, I think marathon, we've decided
that Key, you know, Big Pines really,
the cut off area. We haven't had a lot of
Big Pine and winners, but one that comes up a
lot as well. Lynn Bell and the Square grouper. Well, they,
(27:26):
they vote, they get into it
and, you know, she doesn't really, she has a square
grouper in Amara. She has a square grouper here, uh
and uh Lower Keys and probably a new one coming.
But that question comes up a lot. I use her
as an example because that comes up. And yes, we
do have winners that come out of Summerland. Sugarloaf, uh, Ramrod,
(27:47):
that kind of area. Um, all the way down to
Big Cope and Dinky West.
So that's, that's the blend. That's the area. Once you
get in the marathon, we're cutting that out because there
is a best of marathon. There's a place for those winners,
uh Big Pine North Marathon, uh, going up to, you know,
grassy Key in that area for those, those, those folks.
So that's, that's the threshold. Um We try to be
(28:08):
subjective objective um and look at everything but there is
a cut off period, cut off time, but we're, we
don't have the, the good thing is
most questions come with the exceptions that we have the
most 98% of things are smooth and, and pretty transparent.
Most questions come around from that 2%. I gotcha loophole. Oh,
wait a minute. What if the, you know if it's
(28:29):
the eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth?
What if I turn the other cheek? We get that
on the 2% of stuff that we just have to
be uh thoughtful about. And we're always trying to listen
to the questions like this and listen to recommendations and
we make changes accordingly. But that's, you know, we, we
wanna be fair and we wanna include as many as
we can
and, you know, at the end of the day, a
lot of people from Key West drive up to these
places and, and dine and eat and use those businesses
Speaker 2 (28:51):
so well. And again, this is nominations. This is not
us deciding this is all in your hands. So if
you love something that is not in Key West proper
Stock Island, for example too, this is all in your hands.
You guys are the ones who are making these nominations.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
We
Speaker 2 (29:07):
get a lot
Speaker 1 (29:07):
of
Speaker 2 (29:08):
winners from Stock Island. Regular nominees and
winners. Yeah,
Speaker 1 (29:10):
we talk about the Bubba's Key West People's Choice Awards
going on right now at Keyes week
dot com. I don't want to cut you off Mandy.
But if somebody just checked in on the podcast or radio,
just kind of filling you in on what we're talking
about here in case you in case you weren't listening
before
Speaker 2 (29:23):
answering all your questions.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
What else do you have?
Speaker 2 (29:26):
It's a Bubba's advice column.
It is a Bubba's advice column. I've got some advice
and I wanted to say that there's so much excitement
on social media about the Bubba Awards. It just makes
people happy. Um I've been nominated, that's how I met Stephanie.
No, we were both nominated for best local celebrity and,
and I campaigned and lost and that's ok. That's how
(29:49):
I met Stephanie. She emailed me with like you're sitting
in general admission and I was like, I was like, I'm,
I'm just at least you had a seat. I was
just excited that I was allowed to come. I wasn't sure.
But um again, we're still in the nominations. We just
jumped into nominations. It's a simple ballot. And if you
have questions, just, uh, we live here, you'll see us
(30:12):
at Publix,
Facebook, ask us anything. I've always said. I think my
cell phone number is written on the wall, the bathroom.
So
Speaker 1 (30:21):
miles
Speaker 2 (30:22):
your names a lot, a lot of
Speaker 1 (30:24):
broom walls
Speaker 2 (30:25):
for another.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
That's how Stan Haines met Mandy. Miles. Um, the, uh,
one thing I will clarify and, you know, this one's
worth talking about because for 11 years it's gotten much better,
but for 11 years, I've heard this,
um,
Speaker 2 (30:43):
Brett don't give people any more
tickets.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
Uh Well, no, the ticketing, but this comes up a lot.
So we've had radio, you know, we have radio partners.
One's been a radio partner for years and that's Rick
Lopez and his team at Florida Keys Media. Uh, great
radio team. There's us and we're promoting this and this
year we have Michael Stapleford and, uh, party, you know,
party 105 FM and those guys helping us out. Uh,
so we have good radio partners. There's us.
(31:09):
This comes up. Well, uh, and this is how people talk,
by the way. Well, uh, it's just your advertisers who win.
So it's, it's rigged. It's just advertisers. There's two things
about that that I always find interesting one. It's very
deflating when, uh,
and again, I'm only talking about like, maybe 0.5% of
(31:29):
somebody haters that we get. This stuff from
Speaker 2 (31:31):
people who don't win
or advertise,
Speaker 1 (31:33):
you know, but
Speaker 2 (31:33):
at the end of the day, you just marketing yourself
two ways
Speaker 1 (31:36):
to address that. This one's deflating to those that want
to believe that. And the great thing about it is
we can prove it. I don't know if this is
good or bad because in a way, I kind of
wish this wasn't the case. Uh because I wish everyone
advertised with us but of the winners, I did some
math because I get this question a lot. I think
I did it even up to last year of the winners.
(31:57):
No more than 25 to 30% advertise with us. Now,
that doesn't sound good for the weekly. We have a
lot of advertisers but there's a lot of businesses out there,
a lot of, you know, people, places and things to,
uh of course, we want more to advertise with us.
That's what we do. But the Bubbas are not geared
around that. It's not centered around that. This is a key,
you know, key west wide voting people, places, things that
(32:18):
kind of thing. Only about 30% advertise of our hundreds
and hundreds of advertisers.
In fact, sometimes it hurts us more than it helps
us because our advertisers are saying, why don't we win? We,
we're not in charge of that. The voters are, uh
we don't want to upset our advertisers, but you know,
this is an event that we put on that we,
that we orchestrate. And so it's pure to the public,
(32:38):
it's transparent, it's voting and so only about 30%
or so of our advertisers. Now that does not make
those who say and again, this is how they talk.
It's just your advertisers, yours on the radios and went, well, that,
that kind of deflates that one. And b it is. Well,
how about the 30% that do win that are advertisers
or getting nominated?
Well, those are people who understand marketing and advertising, advertising works,
(33:02):
you know. So they're my favorites. They, they typically have
a good social media presence. They typically have a good
community presence. They typically have great customer service. They typically
care what people think about them. They're reaching out and
that's what popularity is more than just, hey, I like
that person because of the way they, they look or talk.
I like them because of the way they make me
feel when I show up.
I like the service they give, I like that. They
(33:23):
remember my name. I like, they've been here and they've
been local and they give back to other local nonprofits
that they get involved locally and they show up at
things that I show up at and I see them
out there and they support me and I, that's what
it's all about. That's what it puts a focus on.
And those are the people that you regularly see nominated
and winning this category, not advertising. Although advertising is a
symptom of something that they understand and get because
(33:45):
matters and promotion matters. But it's people who really put
that kind of time and effort into the community that
get these types of votes
Speaker 2 (33:52):
and Brett, all of those opportunities are out there for
anyone who's interested in doing it. We send out tons
of bubble logos so that people can brand themselves. I
can think of quite a few that I've seen on
social media right now who don't advertise with us, but
we're not stopping you from
promoting yourself. Trust me, this is my, you're on my
prospect list now, but it's open to anyone. All you
(34:16):
ever have to do is reach out to us and
we're not a hard sell used car salesman. Like we're
the opposite of that. We want
everybody to pay. I know
Speaker 1 (34:24):
some good used car salesmen. So
Speaker 2 (34:26):
me
too and I know some really great sales people. So
Stephanie at Keys weekly.com.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
So, so that's where we, but you know, we do
give someone calls up and says, hey, I know I
don't advertise with you guys at Keys Weekly or one
of the radio partners. But could I have that logo? Yes, that's,
and that's where, that's where we talk in that voice.
They do it over to us with us, but we
got to give them the logo. But no, we do.
And uh we're happy to because you're putting the word out.
(34:52):
And again, at the end of the day,
um is raising money for, you know, no matter who
spends advertisers, friends, partners, grandmas, moms, dads, whoever out there
is voting, it all builds up and builds a common goal,
a common cause for the local nonprofits that, that benefit
from the bubbas and we all get to have fun
doing it. So again, today seems like a little,
a bit of a um I, I wanna be careful
(35:14):
about this podcast today and say this on the podcast.
We're covering the very minute small percentage of object objections
or maybe concerns and some are very natural and some
are very typical if you're not used to it and
you come into it, you just moved here two years ago.
Why does it work this way? Why does it, we,
we're constantly reminding, but I don't wanna come across as
a facetious sort of coy podcast here because we love
(35:36):
doing this. We're very thankful of everybody who's involved with it.
Uh We appreciate everyone who supports it. Everyone who votes,
everyone who nominates everyone who sponsors. Uh can't be more
like we're overwhelmed literally with appreciation and just gratitude to
those who make this happen, including this team right here.
So thank you. Is the, the what I really wanna say,
(35:57):
but we are covering some of the concerns that we
typically get and wanted to uh sh up any um
any uh mystification or maybe not quite sure how this works.
Hopefully this does. And if you have more questions
and you're listening to this, you know, how do I
get involved or how do I sponsor or can we
don't say no? We, we wanna hear it and a
lot of times we make adjustments and we do some
things different so you can email us, Stephanie at Keys
(36:21):
weekly.com with those questions and concerns. Uh That's Stephanie with
a Ph at Keys weekly.com. Uh Do people spell it differently?
I don't know. Um So uh yeah, email her and
we'll address your question. I promise we'll get back to
you
and uh be happy to not just hear your concern
and give you a mouthpiece answer, but actually think about
(36:42):
it because we do make changes
Speaker 2 (36:43):
every single year. And so just to give the timelines
one last time voting or nominations, excuse me, are happening
now through Sunday, June 16th.
Then in the June 20th, which is on a Thursday
when our print editions are out in circulation that will
(37:05):
start the actual top three round of voting that will
begin at noon again. You can vote once a day
um during that portion and voting will end on Sunday,
Monday, July 7th at midnight. Then we have a couple
of weeks where we get all of our ducks in
a row, mostly that seating chart. And the event is
(37:27):
then on July 20th, Saturday, July 20th. Now, and I
made sure that this was ok with Britt for me
to say. But if you,
if you, I get a lot of questions. Do I
need a babysitter? Do I need a new dress? We
in the nicest way possible. I wish that I could
sell 1000 tickets in Key West Theater because I would
(37:48):
already be sold out as well. But if, if you
need to be there, you will hear from me. We
Speaker 1 (37:56):
do have a waiting list. I just wanna make that
clear if, if you do want seats, that same email,
Stephanie at Keys weekly.com, the waiting list typically doesn't work.
But if there's something does come up and let's say you,
you weren't a winner because we wanna make room, make
that clear. We wanna make room for the winners to
be there and get their award that night. And then
(38:16):
we've got our dignitaries and those shown Brandenburg's the police
chiefs of the world and we got mayors and commissioners
and in an election year, an election year. So we
get a lot of that coming in. So we make
room for the for the evening.
But if we do have some who don't, are not
winners are, are necessarily I'm doing quotes dignitaries um that
do show up and we, we do have spaces, but
(38:39):
there is a waiting list and it's certainly not a guarantee.
So it's not like, well, I was on the waiting
list and I didn't get in. Well, you probably probably
a good chance you won't because we have limited seats
that evening. Um I don't wanna make promises on the
podcast we're working on maybe making this a
at least Facebook live stream, um, for, for maybe this
year in the future. So everyone can take part and
(39:00):
see it and see who won and, and uh, no
promises there, but we're working on that. But again, um,
the seating is Stephanie is, has to hold, hold that
55 le with 10 fingers and try to plug them
and make it all happen. So it
Speaker 2 (39:14):
changes up until five o'clock the day of the event.
So I have now nominate, nominate, nominate at Keys weekly.com
through June 16th.
Good talk. Everybody. Thanks for Mandy, Stephanie Britt. Thank you.
Uh It's all about having fun raising money for Wesley
House this year and again, just, uh send your questions
(39:34):
to us. We're, we live here. We're everywhere you're gonna
see us and uh we have the answer.
Thanks for tuning in to Florida Keys Weekly podcast, uh Keys, weekly.com.
Check us out on, on, on all the social apps, Facebook, Instagram.
We're even on X which I, which I call Twitter.
I haven't been on since the nineties.
(39:56):
I would like, I would like that joke for my
stand up. So
Speaker 1 (40:00):
why it actually means bathroom walls,
Speaker 2 (40:04):
triple X miles. We're out of here. Good talk.
See you, July 20th.
Welcome to another edition of the Florida Keys Weekly podcast.
I know you're on the edge of your seat. You've
missed me. I'm your host, Brett Myers. We've had Gwen
Filosa doing a lot of the podcast. People seem to
like her better than me. I'm ok with that. But
uh they brought me back in today to share some
news with you guys because it is time for the
Bubbas Key West People's Choice Awards and we're getting lots
(00:21):
of questions. Lots of buzz. It's the 11th year in
Key West where people vote is happening right now at
Keys weekly.com.
It's the Bubba's Key West People's Choice Awards. It's one
of the biggest events out there. We've got hundreds of
thousands of voters every year across the globe, across continents.
That is no lie. We love to talk about where
those occur at. Uh It really is a phenomenon we're
extremely proud of and it's the time of the year
(00:42):
we get incredibly busy
and I'd love to come on the show and take
all the credit for the Bubbas and tell you all
the work that I do. But the people who truly
do it are here today, our editor Mandy Miles, our
sales and marketing director, Stephanie Mitchell and of course, Gwen
Filosa is with me as well. So we're going to
talk Bubbas today,
answer a lot of questions. Gwen's got readers uh questions
(01:02):
and those who listen, sending her questions. And so she's
gonna grill me. II, I can kinda see her sheet
of paper but I'm not cheating. She's gonna shoot from
the hip and ask some bubbles questions and we're gonna
answer those questions from the public before we get started.
Uh I want to thank our sponsor, overseas media group.
That's overseas media group.com. That's the local seo social media website.
(01:23):
They do everything that you don't wanna do and they
make it easy, they make it affordable and they give
you that great service you want from a local company
that does all things digital that you need at your business.
So overseas media group.com, check them out, call them today
if you need anything
and they'll take great care of you. I also wanna
thank FM 103.3. You early listeners out there in radio
land for checking this out. Uh You're getting up before
(01:45):
me but hats off to you and for the rest
of you, you can grab this podcast and many more
with many of our celebrities, national and global celebrities to
local celebrities at Keys weekly.com
and any podcast platform on your phone or smartphone. That's Spotify,
Apple Amazon. You name it we're there, the Florida Keys
Weekly podcast. So pull that up. Alright, nice C DS
(02:07):
out of the way. I've got the team here. Uh Mandy,
how you doing today? Doing? Great. Thanks very much Brett
Stephanie Beche Keys Weekly. How you doing?
Fantastic, thanks. Alright. I just wanted y'all to know I
was telling the truth that the ladies are here in
the house. They're the ones that do all the hard
work and I'm not, I'm not just uh blowing smoke
their way, so to speak. Uh This, this time of year,
(02:28):
everyone hunkers down in the Key West Weekly office and
it's basically about 3 to 456 weeks of uh just 1215,
18 hours a day. Don't call hr I don't know
how we're handling that payroll, but uh they're working their
towels off. So I wanna get to the Bubbas.
I wanna talk about how it works, how it began.
I wanna talk race. Uh I wanna talk about the
(02:49):
dates for this year, how you can vote if you're listening,
I'd like to talk about what it means. Uh, for seeding,
we always have people wanting to know about seeding and
why it works the way that works. Uh There's categories,
how do we have the categories that we have, who
can be added? Uh Why, why is my category not
in there? We'll try to give good answers for that
and there's probably some answers we need to examine. So
we'll talk about that.
(03:10):
Uh We'll talk about the event, the, the moments that
take place at the uh Key West People's Choice Awards
every year at the Key West Theater. What else? Stephanie
and Mandy, what else should we talk about in this thing?
Speaker 2 (03:20):
I think we
should probably introduce sort of like just the process that
we're in between the early nominations that are completely up
to the public and our readers versus then the, the
voting final voting for the top three nominees in each
category.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Mouthful. So we have a nomination period and we have
a finals period and that's what Mandy is alluding to
and we'll talk about that and what those dates look like.
And we'll make this a lot more simplified as we
go through it. Um because it is an exciting time.
I mean, the thing I love about the Bubbas in
spite of our be my best efforts, uh I've got
great people around me and this thing went global years
ago when we started doing online voting. I'll talk about
(03:54):
some of the dark days before online voting.
And uh you think the political world's up in arms
about how things get done and hanging chads and paper
ballots and redos and all that. You should have seen
the early days in the Bubbas when we were, oh boy.
Uh that was, that was a lot of fun for
four or five nights till 3 a.m. in the offices.
Uh But you know, it's a testament how popular it is.
(04:16):
You get tons of votes. We get hundreds of thousands
of votes now, online
uh from over six continents and I think over 100
and uh I don't know how many countries back.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
We need somebody
from Antarctica this year just to, to send in some nominations.
That's the only continent we're missing.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
If you have someone taking a trip to Antarctica this year,
it will actually ping. So we have the system that
we use. Um Second Street, a well known system uh
online system. It will actually ping where votes come from
on these contests. So we've had six continents, never Antarctica.
Um And uh
so if someone's taking a trip, there can take a
(04:51):
vote from there that will, that will uh seal the deal.
We'll have all seven and back in 22 I think
this has grown. We had over 50 countries that voted
in the Bubba's Key West People's Choice Awards. I think
that's closer to 6570 countries now. Um Some of those
countries are at war. It's amazing to think what people
stop and do for this thing. We know it's not life-changing,
but hopefully it adds some fun and value to uh
(05:13):
people who vote and to our local businesses, which is
really
what it's all about. The Bubbas uh are, are really
to promote whether you win or not just to keep
people in Key West on your mind. If you want
to travel here, support local businesses. No. You know, it's relative.
Everyone has a favorite something, you know, a key lime pie.
You have a favorite key lime pie place. If you
(05:33):
win the bubba, does it mean
that you're the only, you know, the best of the best.
Everybody has a favorite place, but it puts a spotlight
on Key West, puts a spotlight on our local businesses
and is always for a charity. And Stephanie, how much
have we raised over the last 10 years? For local charities?
Is it over?
Speaker 2 (05:48):
I
think it's over 200
1000 now,
Speaker 1 (05:51):
$100,000 which is, you know, it's not a drop in
the bucket. Um But it's, you know, we know it's
not the greatest thing that's ever happened to nonprofits and charities.
We have a lot of local groups who support. But
um this allows us to do our part and we
get to do it in a fun way and it
gets the entire community involved more so than anything. So,
uh love that about it. We're going to do year 11.
(06:11):
So let's talk a little bit here on this show
on the Key West Florida, Florida Keys Weekly podcast about
uh the Bubba So Mandy,
um you've been at the company at the Keys Weekly
at the editor. I know you've been in Key West
for about 74 years.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
Thanks for that, Brett, 25
Speaker 1 (06:26):
25. And Stephanie, you've been uh with the weekly for
how long
Speaker 2 (06:31):
eight
years? And in Key West for 22.
Speaker 1 (06:33):
So you've seen the progression
of the Bubbas uh from like year two and the
last year, year 10 and you're a big part of
the seating, you're a big part of everything. Um But
you've seen how this thing has changed. What do you
think the biggest change has been since you were sitting
in this seat? You know, since we started this 10
years ago, you came in year two. What's the biggest
change you've seen from, uh from behind the scenes here?
Speaker 2 (06:54):
So I think with everything he's weekly, we certainly have
grown in our digital
realm. Um I was here those years where we were
having the ballots that we had to have in the newspapers,
then pick up, then drop off here and then assemble
(07:14):
a team to spend night after night counting ballots by hand.
So thank goodness for the internet because it's really made
things a lot more simplified
and it's just, it, the fact that it goes globally
now and has the ability to do that and that
we can see where people are voting from is really,
(07:35):
really cool.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
So for those who are just listening and they're like, ok, I've,
I've got to get to work or I'm gonna come
back to this podcast shortly, but they need to vote
right now. Let's cut to the chase real quick because
I want, I want to make sure we don't jump
over that important part. The bubbles are happening right now.
If you can briefly explain where to vote and what
stages we're looking at in this timeline. Um That would
(07:56):
be a good starter just to let people know and
how often can they vote? If you can vote once
a day?
Can they vote from different computers? There's questions, we get
different emails. How does that work? Briefly? Explain that?
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Ok. So right now we are in the nomination portion
that is really dependent on all of you nominating, writing
in who you think has the best of the best martinis,
key lime pie. Marina. The list goes on and on.
We have three
sections, categories.
Yes, we have the businesses, we have the community and
(08:28):
then we have food and drink.
So when you're filling out that ballot, you have to
fill out 50% for it all to count. So 50%
of the entire 90 not in
Speaker 1 (08:42):
one category. So categories fill out half of it and
the ballot counts,
Speaker 2 (08:46):
correct?
Um What was your question? So
Speaker 1 (08:49):
how often can they vote? So if I go, if
I'm Bob, I go in there once today at 10 a.m.
on Monday and vote. Can I vote at 10 p.m.
that night?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
No, you can vote 24 hours later. Unless you have
another email account, then you can vote from your second
email and that's all you need in order to vote
or nominate people is just enter your email account. We
don't need any password from you. You don't have to register.
We just need your email address.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
And one of the funny things I'll point out, uh,
because you've kind of said that in Jest. But yeah,
you can try to manipulate the system if you're bored
and you got four different emails. Uh, if it's from
the same, uh,
different ways, you know, URL S different things that it
can pick up on from computers and so forth. It's
also funny that we can see the uh emails and
people trying to vote multiple times and a lot of
(09:37):
times it'll, it'll look like it goes through and somebody says, oh,
I voted five times and I know it worked. I'm like, no, we,
we see it, it didn't work but appreciate you taking.
So we don't want to waste your time. Don't vote
40 times and have fun with it. Keep it real.
Um We vote every day, the people who really seem
to stand out because the one thing we get a
lot of, and I want to clear this up right now.
Uh Bubba's Key West People's Choice Awards. I say a
(10:00):
lot of, we, we have a lot of love. We
have a lot of support from thousands and thousands I
think for us it's easier to focus on the one
or two haters, you know, complainers here and there, maybe
some trolls out there. Yeah, as Mandy Miles says the
haters will hate no matter what. So a couple of
the hater comments I should say we get uh is,
you know, it's just a popularity contest, you know, it's
(10:23):
just a popularity contest.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
So
the People's
Choice Awards, how
is it not a popularity
contest?
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Newsflash? It is a popularity contest. I don't know how
if there's ever the definition of a popularity contest. This
is probably it. You're voting on your favorite thing, whether
it's best customer service, best LPI, best attorney,
uh you know, best restaurant, best local business, that kind
of thing. It's a popularity contest. You can
Speaker 2 (10:49):
campaign for it, but popularity contests are not, it's not rigged.
And that's the other thing that we hear all the time.
This is rigged. Why would I even put my name
in there? Why wouldn't you put your name in there
and why wouldn't you put it all over your social
media asking every single one of your followers and their
followers to nominate you in whatever category you're asking for?
(11:10):
This is, it is a popularity contest and you're in
charge of your own campaign for it. And you all
have really large email lists, especially the bigger businesses, send
it to everyone.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
There you go. So you're pumping it up. And the
cool thing about it is we've seen a very diverse
group of winners, particularly less, you know, going global, going online.
Um Really took a lot of the stuff in the ballots,
stuff out of it, in the boxes and so forth,
so to do it. Um, now it really takes a
lot of the, it really keeps it more, I guess,
(11:41):
more pure process and we've seen a lot of new
winners every year more, you know, you see a diverse
group of winners and
Speaker 2 (11:48):
even new nominees that aren't, you know, it's not always
just the usual suspects of the same nominees.
So
Speaker 1 (11:54):
kind of staying on track here. So you bring up
the nominees stan you talked about the nominee period, which
is taking place right now. That is a period where
you can just write in. It says, what is your favorite?
You know, uh local cup of coffee and from that category,
you're just right, there's not a choice, not ABC or D,
you're just writing in your favorite place. You know, if
you misspell it,
(12:15):
if you write the person's name, plus the place, we're
gonna figure it out. The system picks all that up,
put it, you know, it's all there. We're, we're, you know,
spending hours and hours calculating and tabulating and putting it together.
But that's the nominee period. You write in your in
from that, from that, let's say best cup of coffee.
We take the top three places
and those top three make it to the finals and
(12:36):
in the finals period, that's where you vote on between
those three,
your favorite. So yes, it's a popularity contest just like
every election, an online voting system is, it is a popularity.
So we're busted. You got us, if you're one of
those three every year, that points, we know who you are.
If you're one of those three every year, it's a
popularity content. You got it. It's uh next you're gonna
(12:59):
go into the JFK mysteries. So,
Speaker 2 (13:01):
but how cool that, now that it is digital,
we have so many people who travel here every year
that they also get to have a say on who
their favorites are. So you've made an impact. It is.
They've got their own best bartender, their favorite fishing captain,
their favorite, you know, restaurant for customer service. And it's amazing.
You don't have to live here to have had a
(13:21):
fantastic Qs experience with somebody or some place and that
Qs makes us all very popular.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Well, it, it is great. So, like I said, we've had, um,
so the voting will come out. We've had,
you know, I think the last one I, I have
to go back and look at the numbers. Uh But,
you know, we had hundreds of thousands of votes when
you look at the daily votes by the end, by
the time, by the time you do the nomination period
into the finals, hundreds of thousands of votes from over
six continents, 65 to 70 countries. Um It's a great
(13:50):
spotlight on Key West regardless. We're proud of that. The
great thing about it is uh we have an event
that culminates this voting process and we celebrate the winners
and we celebrate the nominees. Let's not forget,
I don't know how many times we get nominees who
are like a little, hey, I didn't win and they,
they talk it up as a loss and I'm like, look,
only three people were nominated as best of something in
Key West and Key West has a lot of great stuff.
(14:12):
So if you're nominated in the top three of something
in Key West, it's quite an honor. It's an honor
just to be nominated. It really is. And so just
to be nominated and make it at that stage and
have enough people think enough of your business, enough of you,
your popularity. Uh No, to really think enough of you
um to, to give you that, that nod, that ride
of passage to say, hey, I was nominated by my peers,
by my community, by the visitors, people who come here
(14:35):
to be a nominee at that point. I'm not trying
to make lemonade. I feel like you're a winner. I mean,
I would use that and say, hey, I was nominated,
I'm one of three. I'm one of three in a
broad vast category of stuff to be nominated. So it's
a big deal just to be nominated.
So from there, uh
Speaker 2 (14:51):
now wait a second, we
have to tell them that they can nominate through June 16th. Sunday,
June 16th, once a day at Keys weekly.com. That's when
the nomination period closes at midnight
on Sunday, which is also something we've talked and talked
about for years.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Well, it's highly publicized. It's on Keys weekly.com where you vote,
you'll see the dates, um, and you can vote daily.
We'll try to pick up your URL what you're voting
from if you want to manipulate, I'm sure in a
world where the CIA can be hacked, you can do
some things to get an extra vote or two in
there of you fancy bot farms out there, right? But
uh we encourage you not to have fun. Keep it real.
(15:28):
Uh We see
most of that stuff, we see irregularities. We've got a
system in place. I won't go into much detail about
that because I don't want people to know what we use.
But we do see, we do see the irregularities. We
do see some things that pick those up and uh
toss out uh repetitive or attempts to manipulate the system. So,
so far, knock on wood. We've been very successful at that.
We've kept us very pure also
Speaker 2 (15:47):
to talk about the repetitive names and things like that.
I know that Britt touched on that a minute ago,
but to best DJ,
it comes to mind because there are a lot of
different ways to spell and put people's names in there. Brit,
stop me if I'm jumping ahead in our
Speaker 1 (16:03):
now, you've got Sonos and Jimmy's attention right now. Yeah,
Speaker 2 (16:06):
I
know. Ha ha. Um, but Jimmy Cooper is the one that, like,
pops into my head because it's DJ. Top, Jimmy, Jimmy Cooper. This,
that and the other. Don't worry, Jimmy, they all go
to the one person. Top
Speaker 1 (16:19):
Jimmy. Well, that applies to everybody. So if someone says,
you know, best Barber and I'm sure it's
Gwen's gotten from the public, we'll hit on that more,
but we're, we're not just nonchalantly going over these lists and,
and it's all great because it's digital. We got systems
now and the more that, you know, before A I
kills us all in the Terminator style movie, it has benefits,
we've got systems that can go in here and populate
(16:41):
alphabetical order, pick up keywords and we know that, hey,
if you put in like, you know, Kermit Kermit's, uh,
you know, guy in Green Hat, it's gonna pick it up.
So
Speaker 2 (16:52):
they all all funnel into the right place. We promise.
And this is whenever I terminate or kick Britt's door
open and make sure that he's in here and locked
away.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
So it all leads up to the final night, which
is what June, July 20th at the Key West Theater,
we'll talk about seating because it is, people say, well, man,
why don't you go to a bigger place? Uh, because
the Key West Theater is awesome. They're a great partner
of ours and I'll talk about some of our partners
here shortly.
But, um, they, they've been there since day one, since
11 years ago and opened their doors to us. And
(17:23):
the reason why it's so important to us, to partner
with them. A, the theater's a great spot. It keeps
it intimate. It keeps the excitement going. We've got comedy,
we've got shows. We've got, uh, winners. We've got a
lot going on. It's a fun night. But every ticket,
every dollar spent that night, every ticket sold, every sponsorship
goes to a nonprofit for the past 10 years. We've go,
we rotate between three nonprofits, which are the Bahama Village
(17:46):
music program. Wesley House Family Services in Samuel's House. Um
Those are three nonprofits. We love, we support them doesn't
mean we don't love others. We do a lot of
stuff for other nonprofits. We get people calling and saying,
why don't you support our nonprofit? We do the Bubbas
just have always been between those three and we've enjoyed,
uh taking those bubba sponsorships and promos. Uh with a
few years of the Key West rotary pitched in and
(18:07):
helped us do those before we had digital, helped us
voting at night.
They got a little bit of the proceeds. And I
think after putting them through that voting process of hen
ballots till 3 a.m. for four nights in a row,
they said, you know what, just give it all to
Samuel's house. Uh So I'm in that club. I'm, I'm
being facetious, but it, it was a lot of work. So,
um but that's, that's really why we do it at
the Qs theater over the years, the way we do
(18:29):
and why it's so important to partner with them. And
I know it's limited seating. Now, the seats, there's this
question that Gwen will get to, I'll save that for her.
We'll talk about that as well. But uh for those
voting just know
the nomination period's happening now and then we'll have the
finals period and then July 20th to culminate the winners
and we'll, we'll release the winners shortly after that. But
it's a fun night. It really is a fun night
(18:49):
at the Bubba as it gets crazy. It's sort of,
I always like to explain it as what the, what
the correspondents dinner used to be in DC. And, uh
you can really roast, there's no political party affiliation. There's
nobody who's safe uh for picking on you and roasting
you it because we love you. But um it is
a very uh unbiased, it's open game
(19:09):
there and we like to have a lot of fun
with our elected officials, local celebrities, our winners and try
to get everyone included as much as we can and,
and stan you, you take the brunt of the seating.
It's a pretty wild night. I know, but it's a
lot of fun once everyone's in house and setting and,
and getting down, that
Speaker 2 (19:25):
is
Speaker 1 (19:25):
the
Speaker 2 (19:25):
friskiest hour and a half of my year,
not counting the weeks and weeks where I have to
remind Britt that it's only two seats. Not seven bri.
Bri promises everybody 10 seats when it's completely sold out.
Just know that I deal with gatekeepers all year. I'm
the gatekeeper
on this one.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
We sound uh sound
a little uh spicy today on the podcasts only because
we have fun with this. So we, we hear a
lot of these questions, but it's important that we answer them.
It's important that people understand it. We're not, we're not
a big company of saying no, we try to say
yes to everything. Hey, how do I get my category?
We'll look at it next year. We added a ST Stephanie,
we put something out last year. We heard people say
(20:05):
uh at a category we put, so we put it
to a vote. We will said, hey, if you want
to see more categories, we have over 9090. At one point,
we had about 100 and 20 talk about a long night,
a lot of counting. And we noticed that on some categories,
there wasn't a ton of activity on it. It wasn't
a knock on them as a person or a company.
It's just that general general brand, that category of business
(20:26):
or whatever it might have been was not getting a
lot of traction.
So we removed those over the years and then the
ones that people really wanted to see, we still listen,
we still add stuff here and there. This year is
what we added a new category this year. Burger burger.
I want Gwen Filosa to take over because that was
really the, one of the main agendas for this podcast
was to talk about
(20:48):
some of the misconceptions and common questions we get and
some of the questions I'm sure are very, very much
needed to answer for people trying to understand the Bubbas.
Uh as we do that, I wanna think about the people.
I wanna just quickly think the people who make this happen.
I mentioned it supports nonprofits.
And back when we started this 11 years ago and I,
(21:08):
you know, we were the Keys Weekly. We'd been around
about 678, you know, we're a 20 year old company,
locally owned company now, but 11 years ago, there was
no best of in Key West anymore. No one was
doing it. Um We had somebody try to do it
right when we started like, oh, surprise, I just came anyway.
Um but, you know, at the end of the day
to do it, right? Takes a lot of work, takes
a great team. So 11 years ago when we first
(21:29):
started it up, so people say, oh, this won't work
in Key West people, people won't get into this thing
and it, it took over and we were surprised it
was nothing to do with how smart or clever we
were Key West. Just needed the best of it needed
a People's Choice Awards. And 11 years ago, we kicked
it up, but to go to people at that time
now we have people calling and saying, hey, how do
I sponsor this? And again, I hate saying no, but
(21:50):
we've kept the sponsorships limited to keep that value for
the sponsors there.
Uh, and, and certain partners and people say, well, why
did you choose that sponsor? And not me? Well, 11
years ago, when I needed sponsors to give to these
nonprofits and make this thing worthwhile. Uh A lot of people,
not in a negative way, just thought, I don't know
what this is, it's new. Um Like, like a lot
(22:12):
of businesses would do and with a good reason, this
is new. I don't know about this. Uh I'm not
sure there are some who said yes,
say no more. We'll be a part of it. Here's
a check and we've been very loyal to those, those
brands and those companies just to say, thank you, thanks
for making it happen. So, a lot of those were
still sponsors today, um which was now Chevrolet, which was
(22:35):
purchased and turned into war and Henry and Keys O here,
you know, our, our friends here across the Keys who are,
who are sponsors. Um
And I don't even think if I have the sponsorship
last year, I know we have Harran Law who's done
it over the years. Us
Speaker 2 (22:48):
Butterfly and Nature
Conservatory, uh
Speaker 1 (22:50):
Doc Guzman, uh uh family dentistry. Uh Everyone loves doc.
We've had uh Berkshire Hathaway, Bascom grooms the butterfly conservatory.
George Fernandez is amazing. Uh First State Bank uh waste management.
Of course, I mentioned
uh our friends over at the Key West Theater and
I think Darren and Jess Horan didn't use the law
firm this year. They used their business. Uh uh the
(23:11):
Treasure key West treasures, catered
Speaker 2 (23:14):
affairs. Thanks to Bill and Amy
LA.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
Yeah. So just a lot of people pitch in. I,
I make sure I'm not missing someone this year. I probably,
I don't want to misspeak. But if I there's is
out there everywhere, we make sure to thank our sponsors. So,
um I didn't wanna make that the theme today, but
I want to make people understand. There's the sponsorship list
really goes back to a lot of appreciation for them
being there. Uh When we didn't have a lot of
people to step up and they just said yes. And
(23:37):
they said, you know, the Hemingway House people like that,
our friends uh just stepped up and said, yes, you know, here's,
here's the, here's the check and go at it. So
thank you to them.
So, with that, with that in mind, without further ado,
let's get to the reason for this. We talked Bubbas,
we got Gwen Filosa. Gwen, you reached out to readers
and people on your podcast platform um and listeners and
(24:00):
you took emails, you get these by email. How did
you get questions for the Bubbas that I know you
brought with you today?
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Oh, I used Instagram and Facebook and just said, well,
ask us anything about the Bubbas, ask us anything. I'm
not gonna use any names. But if it says best chiropractor,
best dentist, if I put a name in there or a,
a business name, will they get counted? I think they're
concerned as to whether or not they, they need to
(24:27):
put in the individual chiropractor slash doctor's name
or if they have, you know, if they're called QS
chiropractic center versus doctor. So, and so we will find
that out print just correct me if I'm wrong, but
we will match those up, aggregate them so that we
can match them up. If there's a specific barber that
works at a specific barbershop you can put in both,
you know. So and so Eddie at wherever, you know,
(24:50):
Eddie's cuts, we will find that out. So we,
well, we'll absolutely look at those and make sure everything
gets funneled to the right place all
Speaker 1 (24:57):
the way down to misspellings. Like Mandy, my editor knows
I can't spell and so I'm not making fun of
or giving anyone a hard time out there who doesn't
spell well, I, I sound like Zoolander. Uh so uh
I don't spell well, so or speak well,
Speaker 2 (25:13):
but we're talking to you
Landon Bradbury.
Speaker 1 (25:17):
We've never spelled his name right. I did.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
I did.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
So you can misspell a company a name as long
as it's close and it's somewhat identifiable as, oh, I
bet they're talking about this person or that place or
as a teacher where they put Sally over at Hob or,
you know, Bob over at Gerald Adams. We got a
pretty good idea based on the volume of who Bob
(25:40):
or Sally is and we're gonna find that, you know,
and so that we will pick it up, we're gonna
pick it up and that replies to businesses, people, places.
Uh We are in 2024. We do use technology. We
uh we have Gwen here who's a techno technological whiz
uh handles our social media and digital marketing. We're gonna
pick it up in our platform, our friends over at
Second Street.
(26:00):
Uh It's a great platform that we use and not
to them. It's going, it makes life a lot easier
for us. So to answer your question, we'll pick that up.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
We
just try to remember. There's one M in Hemingway two
T in Buffett as my editor, I put my editor
hat on. Also, there are human eyes on it before
we get to the top three. So it's not all technology.
We've still got a little hand on it. Thank you.
And that, that was really most of the questions. The
other one that we got a few times from
(26:27):
readers is um this is a key West centric event.
We have best of marathon. Best of Upper keys. Uh,
how far away from Key West can people? So Square
Grouper is always in there, I would say up to
Big Pine. Is that right?
Brett? Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:42):
You know, because Big Pines, sort of, even when we
deliver papers, you know, throughout the Florida Keys with our
three different publications, we have sort of a cut off
area where the Key West Paper, for example,
will stop in the marathon. Paper goes to Big Pine
is pretty much our blended area of sort of where
the marathon paper stops and the Key West Paper stops
(27:04):
so we can meet each other there. So there's places
in Big Pine where you'll find the marathon Weekly or,
you know, and you'll find the Key West Weekly, both
our publications. So for voting, I think marathon, we've decided
that Key, you know, Big Pines really,
the cut off area. We haven't had a lot of
Big Pine and winners, but one that comes up a
lot as well. Lynn Bell and the Square grouper. Well, they,
(27:26):
they vote, they get into it
and, you know, she doesn't really, she has a square
grouper in Amara. She has a square grouper here, uh
and uh Lower Keys and probably a new one coming.
But that question comes up a lot. I use her
as an example because that comes up. And yes, we
do have winners that come out of Summerland. Sugarloaf, uh, Ramrod,
(27:47):
that kind of area. Um, all the way down to
Big Cope and Dinky West.
So that's, that's the blend. That's the area. Once you
get in the marathon, we're cutting that out because there
is a best of marathon. There's a place for those winners,
uh Big Pine North Marathon, uh, going up to, you know,
grassy Key in that area for those, those, those folks.
So that's, that's the threshold. Um We try to be
(28:08):
subjective objective um and look at everything but there is
a cut off period, cut off time, but we're, we
don't have the, the good thing is
most questions come with the exceptions that we have the
most 98% of things are smooth and, and pretty transparent.
Most questions come around from that 2%. I gotcha loophole. Oh,
wait a minute. What if the, you know if it's
(28:29):
the eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth?
What if I turn the other cheek? We get that
on the 2% of stuff that we just have to
be uh thoughtful about. And we're always trying to listen
to the questions like this and listen to recommendations and
we make changes accordingly. But that's, you know, we, we
wanna be fair and we wanna include as many as
we can
and, you know, at the end of the day, a
lot of people from Key West drive up to these
places and, and dine and eat and use those businesses
Speaker 2 (28:51):
so well. And again, this is nominations. This is not
us deciding this is all in your hands. So if
you love something that is not in Key West proper
Stock Island, for example too, this is all in your hands.
You guys are the ones who are making these nominations.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
We
Speaker 2 (29:07):
get a lot
Speaker 1 (29:07):
of
Speaker 2 (29:08):
winners from Stock Island. Regular nominees and
winners. Yeah,
Speaker 1 (29:10):
we talk about the Bubba's Key West People's Choice Awards
going on right now at Keyes week
dot com. I don't want to cut you off Mandy.
But if somebody just checked in on the podcast or radio,
just kind of filling you in on what we're talking
about here in case you in case you weren't listening
before
Speaker 2 (29:23):
answering all your questions.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
What else do you have?
Speaker 2 (29:26):
It's a Bubba's advice column.
It is a Bubba's advice column. I've got some advice
and I wanted to say that there's so much excitement
on social media about the Bubba Awards. It just makes
people happy. Um I've been nominated, that's how I met Stephanie.
No, we were both nominated for best local celebrity and,
and I campaigned and lost and that's ok. That's how
(29:49):
I met Stephanie. She emailed me with like you're sitting
in general admission and I was like, I was like, I'm,
I'm just at least you had a seat. I was
just excited that I was allowed to come. I wasn't sure.
But um again, we're still in the nominations. We just
jumped into nominations. It's a simple ballot. And if you
have questions, just, uh, we live here, you'll see us
(30:12):
at Publix,
Facebook, ask us anything. I've always said. I think my
cell phone number is written on the wall, the bathroom.
So
Speaker 1 (30:21):
miles
Speaker 2 (30:22):
your names a lot, a lot of
Speaker 1 (30:24):
broom walls
Speaker 2 (30:25):
for another.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
That's how Stan Haines met Mandy. Miles. Um, the, uh,
one thing I will clarify and, you know, this one's
worth talking about because for 11 years it's gotten much better,
but for 11 years, I've heard this,
um,
Speaker 2 (30:43):
Brett don't give people any more
tickets.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
Uh Well, no, the ticketing, but this comes up a lot.
So we've had radio, you know, we have radio partners.
One's been a radio partner for years and that's Rick
Lopez and his team at Florida Keys Media. Uh, great
radio team. There's us and we're promoting this and this
year we have Michael Stapleford and, uh, party, you know,
party 105 FM and those guys helping us out. Uh,
so we have good radio partners. There's us.
(31:09):
This comes up. Well, uh, and this is how people talk,
by the way. Well, uh, it's just your advertisers who win.
So it's, it's rigged. It's just advertisers. There's two things
about that that I always find interesting one. It's very
deflating when, uh,
and again, I'm only talking about like, maybe 0.5% of
(31:29):
somebody haters that we get. This stuff from
Speaker 2 (31:31):
people who don't win
or advertise,
Speaker 1 (31:33):
you know, but
Speaker 2 (31:33):
at the end of the day, you just marketing yourself
two ways
Speaker 1 (31:36):
to address that. This one's deflating to those that want
to believe that. And the great thing about it is
we can prove it. I don't know if this is
good or bad because in a way, I kind of
wish this wasn't the case. Uh because I wish everyone
advertised with us but of the winners, I did some
math because I get this question a lot. I think
I did it even up to last year of the winners.
(31:57):
No more than 25 to 30% advertise with us. Now,
that doesn't sound good for the weekly. We have a
lot of advertisers but there's a lot of businesses out there,
a lot of, you know, people, places and things to,
uh of course, we want more to advertise with us.
That's what we do. But the Bubbas are not geared
around that. It's not centered around that. This is a key,
you know, key west wide voting people, places, things that
(32:18):
kind of thing. Only about 30% advertise of our hundreds
and hundreds of advertisers.
In fact, sometimes it hurts us more than it helps
us because our advertisers are saying, why don't we win? We,
we're not in charge of that. The voters are, uh
we don't want to upset our advertisers, but you know,
this is an event that we put on that we,
that we orchestrate. And so it's pure to the public,
(32:38):
it's transparent, it's voting and so only about 30%
or so of our advertisers. Now that does not make
those who say and again, this is how they talk.
It's just your advertisers, yours on the radios and went, well, that,
that kind of deflates that one. And b it is. Well,
how about the 30% that do win that are advertisers
or getting nominated?
Well, those are people who understand marketing and advertising, advertising works,
(33:02):
you know. So they're my favorites. They, they typically have
a good social media presence. They typically have a good
community presence. They typically have great customer service. They typically
care what people think about them. They're reaching out and
that's what popularity is more than just, hey, I like
that person because of the way they, they look or talk.
I like them because of the way they make me
feel when I show up.
I like the service they give, I like that. They
(33:23):
remember my name. I like, they've been here and they've
been local and they give back to other local nonprofits
that they get involved locally and they show up at
things that I show up at and I see them
out there and they support me and I, that's what
it's all about. That's what it puts a focus on.
And those are the people that you regularly see nominated
and winning this category, not advertising. Although advertising is a
symptom of something that they understand and get because
(33:45):
matters and promotion matters. But it's people who really put
that kind of time and effort into the community that
get these types of votes
Speaker 2 (33:52):
and Brett, all of those opportunities are out there for
anyone who's interested in doing it. We send out tons
of bubble logos so that people can brand themselves. I
can think of quite a few that I've seen on
social media right now who don't advertise with us, but
we're not stopping you from
promoting yourself. Trust me, this is my, you're on my
prospect list now, but it's open to anyone. All you
(34:16):
ever have to do is reach out to us and
we're not a hard sell used car salesman. Like we're
the opposite of that. We want
everybody to pay. I know
Speaker 1 (34:24):
some good used car salesmen. So
Speaker 2 (34:26):
me
too and I know some really great sales people. So
Stephanie at Keys weekly.com.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
So, so that's where we, but you know, we do
give someone calls up and says, hey, I know I
don't advertise with you guys at Keys Weekly or one
of the radio partners. But could I have that logo? Yes, that's,
and that's where, that's where we talk in that voice.
They do it over to us with us, but we
got to give them the logo. But no, we do.
And uh we're happy to because you're putting the word out.
(34:52):
And again, at the end of the day,
um is raising money for, you know, no matter who
spends advertisers, friends, partners, grandmas, moms, dads, whoever out there
is voting, it all builds up and builds a common goal,
a common cause for the local nonprofits that, that benefit
from the bubbas and we all get to have fun
doing it. So again, today seems like a little,
a bit of a um I, I wanna be careful
(35:14):
about this podcast today and say this on the podcast.
We're covering the very minute small percentage of object objections
or maybe concerns and some are very natural and some
are very typical if you're not used to it and
you come into it, you just moved here two years ago.
Why does it work this way? Why does it, we,
we're constantly reminding, but I don't wanna come across as
a facetious sort of coy podcast here because we love
(35:36):
doing this. We're very thankful of everybody who's involved with it.
Uh We appreciate everyone who supports it. Everyone who votes,
everyone who nominates everyone who sponsors. Uh can't be more
like we're overwhelmed literally with appreciation and just gratitude to
those who make this happen, including this team right here.
So thank you. Is the, the what I really wanna say,
(35:57):
but we are covering some of the concerns that we
typically get and wanted to uh sh up any um
any uh mystification or maybe not quite sure how this works.
Hopefully this does. And if you have more questions
and you're listening to this, you know, how do I
get involved or how do I sponsor or can we
don't say no? We, we wanna hear it and a
lot of times we make adjustments and we do some
things different so you can email us, Stephanie at Keys
(36:21):
weekly.com with those questions and concerns. Uh That's Stephanie with
a Ph at Keys weekly.com. Uh Do people spell it differently?
I don't know. Um So uh yeah, email her and
we'll address your question. I promise we'll get back to
you
and uh be happy to not just hear your concern
and give you a mouthpiece answer, but actually think about
(36:42):
it because we do make changes
Speaker 2 (36:43):
every single year. And so just to give the timelines
one last time voting or nominations, excuse me, are happening
now through Sunday, June 16th.
Then in the June 20th, which is on a Thursday
when our print editions are out in circulation that will
(37:05):
start the actual top three round of voting that will
begin at noon again. You can vote once a day
um during that portion and voting will end on Sunday,
Monday, July 7th at midnight. Then we have a couple
of weeks where we get all of our ducks in
a row, mostly that seating chart. And the event is
(37:27):
then on July 20th, Saturday, July 20th. Now, and I
made sure that this was ok with Britt for me
to say. But if you,
if you, I get a lot of questions. Do I
need a babysitter? Do I need a new dress? We
in the nicest way possible. I wish that I could
sell 1000 tickets in Key West Theater because I would
(37:48):
already be sold out as well. But if, if you
need to be there, you will hear from me. We
Speaker 1 (37:56):
do have a waiting list. I just wanna make that
clear if, if you do want seats, that same email,
Stephanie at Keys weekly.com, the waiting list typically doesn't work.
But if there's something does come up and let's say you,
you weren't a winner because we wanna make room, make
that clear. We wanna make room for the winners to
be there and get their award that night. And then
(38:16):
we've got our dignitaries and those shown Brandenburg's the police
chiefs of the world and we got mayors and commissioners
and in an election year, an election year. So we
get a lot of that coming in. So we make
room for the for the evening.
But if we do have some who don't, are not
winners are, are necessarily I'm doing quotes dignitaries um that
do show up and we, we do have spaces, but
(38:39):
there is a waiting list and it's certainly not a guarantee.
So it's not like, well, I was on the waiting
list and I didn't get in. Well, you probably probably
a good chance you won't because we have limited seats
that evening. Um I don't wanna make promises on the
podcast we're working on maybe making this a
at least Facebook live stream, um, for, for maybe this
year in the future. So everyone can take part and
(39:00):
see it and see who won and, and uh, no
promises there, but we're working on that. But again, um,
the seating is Stephanie is, has to hold, hold that
55 le with 10 fingers and try to plug them
and make it all happen. So it
Speaker 2 (39:14):
changes up until five o'clock the day of the event.
So I have now nominate, nominate, nominate at Keys weekly.com
through June 16th.
Good talk. Everybody. Thanks for Mandy, Stephanie Britt. Thank you.
Uh It's all about having fun raising money for Wesley
House this year and again, just, uh send your questions
(39:34):
to us. We're, we live here. We're everywhere you're gonna
see us and uh we have the answer.
Thanks for tuning in to Florida Keys Weekly podcast, uh Keys, weekly.com.
Check us out on, on, on all the social apps, Facebook, Instagram.
We're even on X which I, which I call Twitter.
I haven't been on since the nineties.
(39:56):
I would like, I would like that joke for my
stand up. So
Speaker 1 (40:00):
why it actually means bathroom walls,
Speaker 2 (40:04):
triple X miles. We're out of here. Good talk.
See you, July 20th.
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