Hometown Hero Outdoors

Fishing for a Cause - Behind the Scenes of MN Made: Stories of Dedication and Camaraderie

• Hometown Hero Outdoors • Season 2 • Episode 10

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Founding HHO Members Tony Thesing , Andy Giraffe, and  Chris Tetrault catch up with Jake Kuchenmeister, the inspiring figures behind Minnesota Made, a thrilling ice fishing league.  Jake, an entrepreneur at heart and a fervent supporter of youth sports,  unwraps his captivating journey with Minnesota Made.  This episode is brimming with stories of hard work, unwavering dedication, and the immense love for both youth sports and the fishing community.

We reveal the behind-the-scenes chaos and fun of organizing the Minnesota Made  Fishing Tournament.  Jake, Tony, and Andy share their experiences and challenges they face while managing 25 teams, 50 vehicles, and trailers. Amidst all the hustle, the camaraderie and excitement of the day are evident as friendships bloom, and sponsors generously shower prizes.

We delve deeper into the impact of the Future Anglers of Minnesota (FAM) and the Minnesota Made Outdoors tournament.   We also pay special attention to the Future Legends program at Home of the Brave and the significant role of mentorship in shaping young minds. Don't miss this episode, where we discuss  character development,  inspiring tales, and the tremendous impact on youth sports and the fishing community.

#veteran
#veterans
#military
#lawenforcement
#firstresponder
#outdoortherapy
#hometownherooutdoors
#newpodast
#outdoorpodcast
#mnmade
#fishing
#futureanglersofminnesota

Produced by Phil Ewert Productions

Theme Music: Hero's Journey
Joel Loopez Tunepocket.com
Licensed by: Phil Ewert Productions

hometownherooutdoors.org

Speaker 1:

MUSIC. Welcome to the Hometown Hero Outdoors podcast. Here is your host, Chris Tatro.

Speaker 2:

MUSIC and welcome back everyone Another Wednesday here on Hometown Hero Outdoors podcast. Today's podcast we actually have three of us board members here. We are here to talk to Jake. Jake, how many is your last name? Again? I was going to let you go.

Speaker 3:

Cook and Meister.

Speaker 2:

I know I was going to kill it, I'm sorry, I tried. It didn't work very well. Jake has a very close relationship with Tony Tessing and Andy Graff. Tony is our social media director for the board. Andy is our event director for the board as well. They all have done a lot of fishing together when it comes to hard water fishing in the winter. So we'll talk about Jake here real quick.

Speaker 2:

Jake has been married for 13 years. He has two children, ages five and three Coach Hockey and Blaine Maple Grove, and over Minnesota, for the last 10 years he started a group called Minnesota Made. We'll get into that a little deeper. This is where they've hosted the event of Home, of the Brave event for Hometown Hero Outdoors Very phenomenal huge fishing tournament where everyone gets to try to get a piece of the pie when it comes to how to fish in the competitive nature. And then recently started the Future Anglers of Minnesota. Currently owns a logistics company and he works for himself. So that's kind of the best job there is working for yourself, jake, so appreciate you being here and everything you've done for HHO. Just want to introduce yourself for a minute. I know we kind of got into it a little bit here, but then we'll go around the horn and we'll hop into the Minnesota Made stuff.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I think you nailed it. That's pretty much my life in a nutshell right there. Outside of being a dad, that's kind of I've always said I don't want to title whether it's business owner or president or whatever it's dad, and then after that it's kind of they kind of don't make any difference anyway after that.

Speaker 2:

So Well, your priorities in the right spot. Being a parent is an awesome thing, and that's an awesome way to look at it too, and I see you're pretty involved with the sports too. So is that mostly for all the youth sports, for hockey?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I started with Blaine doing youth hockey I don't know, I think they were like probably 12, 13 years old, was the first team that I coached and then kind of bounced around from different age groups and Blaine for probably like eight, 10 years and then I went and coached the Maple Grove girl. I had a couple of friends that played for the Gophers women's team when they won the national championships and then coached the Maple Grove high school girls hockey for a couple of years and then kind of quit for a while, a year or two and then we got asked to jump on over to the Andover Association through a friend and me and my buddy went over there and coached the double a badm's for a couple years and I think right now there's one kid in the NHL and six or seven that are playing division one.

Speaker 4:

I felt that was pretty sweet.

Speaker 3:

I just want to get that out there. That was not the coaching.

Speaker 2:

You gotta take a little credit right, a shred of it right.

Speaker 3:

I'll give it to the guy that I was coaching with. He's kind of the guru.

Speaker 2:

That's all right. No, that's cool. No, it's then. Then we'll talk more about your other endeavors that you have with the, you know, the young or future of the country, here, with the future anglers of Minnesota. But, tony and Andy, do you guys want to introduce yourself, just for our listeners? That might be tuning in for the first time who you are and what you do.

Speaker 5:

Sure, I'm Tony Tessin. As Chris said, I am the board member that manages the social media stuff. I am not a professional but I do my best and I've been here with the hometown hero outdoors since day one. And that's about it for me. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me on social media.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we got three of the four founders here right now.

Speaker 4:

So yeah, cool.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so.

Speaker 4:

I'll just continue. Andy graph, I am on the board as well and, as mentioned, founding member from day one. I handle our events, or try to. I do my best to assist us to our events nationwide, so it's a lot of fun. Like Tony said, not a professional, but doing my best. Also, I'm a Navy veteran and current police officer in a South Metro here in Minnesota. I was in the Navy for almost 10 years and I've been a cop now for almost four, so it's going by quick. And also a dad, just like Jake said also a dad.

Speaker 5:

Yeah, I forgot that. Part Army vet myself and also a dad.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, relatively new dad. Yeah, and you guys have heard me and I'll bought all my kids all the time, so we don't need to go down that road anymore. But Jake probably doesn't know I have seven children, so we have a blended family. So I have three, my wife has three, we have one together. I love every minute of it, nice.

Speaker 3:

My best friend is a cop and has seven kids.

Speaker 2:

It seems like a lot of law enforcement officers out there have a lot of kids.

Speaker 4:

Seriously, I'm stopping at two. I don't want to know.

Speaker 2:

It must be the uniform. That's right. Yeah, now we'll go with that. Yeah, so we'll go into the Minnesota made stuff. So can you guys talk about? Okay, first, jake, let's do it what is Minnesota made and how did you make a connection with Tony and Andy?

Speaker 3:

So Minnesota made outdoors, is a ice fishing league. We normally have around 20 or 30 teams in it. We run for four events each year. Each event has a payout, has big fish, has prizes and sponsors and stuff like that. We're we're very lucky to to kind of hitch our wagons to the clams and the Thorne brothers and the Vex Lars and relevance and and you know, the top of the, the top of the tier of the ice fishing community. So we we had a lot of support on that side of things and we're able to kind of get this off and running and it's been pretty successful through.

Speaker 3:

I think this is going to be your 10 or 11. I don't know, I can't even keep track anymore, but so for me to do that for that long is is kind of a cool deal. We've had a lot of the same guys in it. It's kind of became and gals, it's kind of become like almost like a like a fraternity or kind of like a more of like a brotherhood and sisterhood than it is a nice fishing league. Sure, we, everybody wants to go out there and and when the hardware it's not even really about the track. Our number one rule in our league is don't be a douche bag and everything kind of reverse.

Speaker 2:

Good rule.

Speaker 3:

So, um, yeah, so the uh, I don't know how, I don't even know how. So Dale Lugendale somehow ended up in our league through somebody else or founded on on social media and decided to sign up. Um, he was running a full scale podcast and I probably Tony can probably tell it a little bit better because he was the there for that.

Speaker 5:

So, so, um, at some point we're supposed to have Dale on, but it just didn't work out. We'll get to him eventually. Uh, andy and I um connected with Dale uh on on his podcast the full scale outdoors, and we had a very nice chat about home tone, hero doors, um, waterfall hunting and ice fishing is pretty much what we covered, and I believe it was you and Paul cause only that uh heard that podcast.

Speaker 3:

Yes, yeah, and I think I sent Dale a text saying hey, you need to get us in touch with those guys. And then he did. I think we ended up meeting up at uh moonshine and now now that's kind of our go to spot, that's where we meet every year, and uh, and we kind of just threw something at you guys and thought you know what about this? And and uh, and then all of a sudden it happened.

Speaker 2:

What was the concept or the goal for this first meeting, like what was the brain baby that was born?

Speaker 3:

We kind of wanted to just see what they thought and figure out what, um, what would work and the the whole idea was behind it was we run a tournament, we run it well, and we know how to do that and how. How do we do that with a group of people that may not ice fish or, or maybe they do, and and how do we incorporate our guys and their guys and and and then do something special on top of that for them and put a day like I at that point I had kind of done my research on what you guys were all about and what we wanted to do is have a day where they could come out, feel appreciated and walk away with some really cool stuff. And uh, I think over the years, as a, I mean I don't know how we keep talking about what we can do to make it better. I just don't I mean outside of a live band in the middle of winter out on the ice, which we're still trying. But um, yeah, I mean it's, it's kind of dialed in now to where I mean I was just kind of looking at some of the prizes and it's just insane, some of the some of the stuff.

Speaker 3:

Again, like we have a very large group of of really good people um in Minnesota made. So that's the reason we're able to do these things is because of those people. I mean we have to get 25 volunteers just to pair them up um with each team that HHO provides. And then we got all these prizes. I think there's 50, 50 prizes. Everybody goes home with a prize and then we have a raffle where you get what is it? Bear hunt, turkey hunt, iz80 stay in play. There's, I mean, federal.

Speaker 4:

There's usually some golf. I mean, there's so many unbelievable prizes. Yeah, and you know, that's my favorite thing is people who are first timers. They've never gone. This is going to be our fourth year, which is hard to believe, um, but like hey, you guys have no idea what's in store. And I remember the first year Tony was like hey, we're going to keep all these prizes like super, super kind of secretive until we get the final list, and then we just, you know, bombarded them with just all this excitement and all this, just like, oh, bear hunts, turkey hunts, stay in plays, like you know, vex, lars, for the winners you know, I think there was a mount at some point is just unbelievable amount of prizes.

Speaker 3:

Coolers. Blackfish gift cards. Guided pheasant hunt yeah.

Speaker 5:

And a lot, of, a lot of these prizes are coming from um Minnesota maids members, and one of the things that I found very unique about Minnesota maids, specifically their members, is the diverse background Everybody comes from, um like I. You have guys that work at federal cartridge, you have, uh, loan officers, realtors, doctors um my contract my contractor who just did all my work on my house.

Speaker 4:

Uh, john my too Great dude.

Speaker 5:

Yeah, um, all these guys managed to organize all these prizes for our members, and it's there's no way to really thank every last one of these guys. It's, it's quite special.

Speaker 2:

You know, and I think it speaks really largely too, because planning these things I mean they're not easy. I mean, show up in fishing is one thing, but all the background work that comes with, you know, gathering all the prizes and how the structure of the day is going to go into work, so to have another organization just kind of come to HHO and say, hey, we just need bodies, come fish and have some fun, it's pretty cool. So very much appreciate that, jake, and all that hard work. Do you guys, can you talk a little bit about the background? Like, how do you guys go about and find these prizes or those things to give away for everyone?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I mean just going through the list here, kind of I would say that the majority of the prizes that are going to the 50 Fisher people are kind of our sponsors. So when we ask we have eight events, when we we don't ask for eight prizes from each one of them, we ask for 10 so that we have a couple extra to throw into the HHO thing. And now our sponsors are sending us 12.

Speaker 3:

So, when you do yeah, when you do something good, people like to be a part of it in any way they can. So, besides that, we got like our members are like. Our members are going out and grabbing prizes for it, and our members wife makes these really cool custom mugs that are painted.

Speaker 4:

Those are sweet.

Speaker 3:

The one that said like IE crayons or something was pretty good, everybody loved it.

Speaker 4:

We'll dig it Marine.

Speaker 3:

So yeah, and then yeah, and then it's just kind of our members kind of go out and we just say, hey, ask, ask. Now we got a list. Now, once you've done it a year or two or three, you kind of just go back through your list and say, hey, I see you got these three prizes. Can you reach out to them again? So it's just coordinating it, they're doing it. And then I'm just kind of the puppet behind asking people to do the things. And then yeah, and then it's just kind of. I think last year we kind of had a little bit of a hiccup with the food. Normally Traeger has came out there, and that's the other part of this. Like that might have been actually like year one.

Speaker 4:

That probably was my favorite part, that food was so good it was and it was such a nice day. First year I was wearing a hoodie, running around doing just fine Right.

Speaker 5:

And that was in.

Speaker 4:

February.

Speaker 5:

Yeah, t-shirt, while they're pretty much pulled pork like mac and cheese.

Speaker 3:

They were cooking like, hey, these pizzas on the traggers.

Speaker 4:

They did breakfast pizzas, yeah.

Speaker 3:

They did like season goldfish, like my kid's favorite snack. They were like seasoning it, like it was so good and then so like, just just to give you an example, like last year they couldn't make it. They had, like one of the guys had a wrestling tournament for his kid. Now there was out of town. None of them was going to be there to be there. And Diane, who fishes in our league, was like well, my company can sponsor the food. So she went out, paid for it all, picked it all up, came there with her husband and cooked it all. And like it was a little bit stressful last year trying to figure out what we were going to do, and like it's kind of just runs by itself Cause somebody's going to step up and do something.

Speaker 2:

Yeah Well, that's phenomenal. So how much work do you get to do, tony or Andy, when it comes to helping with any of this?

Speaker 5:

It's always the initial question what do you need from us? And we it's kind of a wait and see and um, and usually um, it's a hey, can you get all the drinks for the day, or whatever. Um, but mainly it's get the people there and make sure it's filled. And Andy is stressful.

Speaker 4:

I get a list, cause I do the drawing on our Facebook page, um, and I get all the names and, like every year, you know we'll draw our 50, but then I think what? Last year I had like 35 dropout and then the big thing we always have is like the no call, no shows, and only the first year we only had one. Second year we had. Last year we had zero. That was like a first. It was wonderful. Everyone showed up, all 50 of them. So I'm usually standing there at the meat point. You know all the Minnesota made guys are, you know, using live scopes, finding where the fish are cutting holes, and I'm standing there basically taking muster. Who's here? Okay, your coach is here shipping them out. So that's a little bit of a stress on our part, but I mean that's that's. I mean that's pebbles compared to what the Minnesota made guys do for us. I mean, you know, getting a list of 50 people to show up, you know that's the stress we have to do. That's about it.

Speaker 3:

It's always fun watching you, though that day out, because you are stressed out to the Mac.

Speaker 4:

I just call in people. Are you coming? Are they here?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah, but you always got like a couple extra aces up your sleeve that are actually your starting distance my father.

Speaker 4:

he used to linger in the area. I'm like if they drop out, you can show it Sure Just circling the lake waiting for you. Come on down, you're fishing, yeah.

Speaker 2:

I love it. He's a good guy. He's always reliable to go and help out.

Speaker 4:

Oh yeah, I'm going to go and fill in the last minute, fill on a few trips for sure.

Speaker 2:

So you said something important I thought would be interesting to expand on was the word coach. So the day is set up a certain way and you have coaches. Expand on that a bit.

Speaker 3:

So, yeah, each there's, there's 25 teams of two and those are all the HHO members and we split, the Andy sends that list over, so we have 25 teams and then I basically send that out to our guys and some of them know some of these and sometimes I know, like with with Andy's boss, evan is going to take him out, oh gosh, because he's competitive and he wants to win.

Speaker 4:

That's all yeah.

Speaker 3:

Before it was just fun. Now it's starting to get competitive too. There's a little bit of trash talking going on day of and and that's what we put.

Speaker 3:

We put those together and then I mean these guys are all, they're all tournament anglers and they're all really good at what they do. They they're really good at teaching it. They're really good at kind of explaining what's going on and why they're doing things and why they're going to move, and what you should use and what your jig and canes is and how to read your graph and the fish mood and all these things that it's somebody that gets to go out, you know, three weekends of winter doesn't really have in their, in their toolbox yet. So not only do they get to have a fun day, but I think they actually get to learn a ton. And we've had a lot of comments after saying like, oh, this was so awesome. I've taken my kid out three times since that and just the stuff that I learned, we're catching way more fish and like that's like an added bonus to all this.

Speaker 3:

Um, another thing is when we put this out there. This is probably the one day that is circled on all of our guys' calendar, kind of like the Vikings Packers game. That's what this is for our guys. Gotta be there. Every single person's like that was. When they do it for the first time they're like that was the coolest thing ever, like I'm in for that forever, and it's just the connections that are made, I think, between the teams and the guides is life lasting, and I think a lot of our guides or members, or whatever you wanna call them, are still friends with a lot of these people today, and that's the other cool part too.

Speaker 5:

I see that a lot on Facebook where it's like I know I'm friends with pretty much anybody. I think in Minnesota made, and I'll see HHO members commenting back and forth on various posts that they make on Facebook. It's really cool to see yeah.

Speaker 2:

So what's the typical species that's targeted on your guys' tournaments?

Speaker 3:

So we do they get to bring in their 10 heaviest fish between crappies, gills and perch, and then we weigh those in and we do it in order and then that's how they get to pick their prizes. So if you're in last place, you get the last two things on the table. Well last year there was leftover prizes.

Speaker 4:

They had quite a few choices.

Speaker 3:

For sure, yeah. And then there's always added stuff too, like those cool, those hat racks.

Speaker 4:

Those were unexpected.

Speaker 5:

I actually bought some from the guy that made those and gave all the board members one.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, mines on the wall right there.

Speaker 3:

Those are slick mine's sitting right there.

Speaker 5:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Mine's in the garage works great.

Speaker 5:

One of the things that didn't get mentioned is that the Minnesota Maid crew is really good at and Andy is taking account of who's got fishing gear for that day and everybody gets squared away and I like to think that Minnesota Maid is one of those days that, as long as you show up in appropriate weather clothing, you're gonna have a good day, and so you'll get just squared away Waiters, waiters.

Speaker 4:

Hey, he was standing by the fire, so he was gonna be able to go in too.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, he was there. We've had some doozy days, though. I mean oh.

Speaker 5:

And that was it.

Speaker 2:

Your second year was like was it like 20 below?

Speaker 4:

Yeah, with the wind chill, it was brutally cold.

Speaker 2:

That was bad. Broke his drone that day.

Speaker 4:

Yes, Racing the automobile, trying to be fun.

Speaker 3:

He was racing Johnny.

Speaker 5:

Yeah, is that 2021 or 2022? That was the first year at Rush, so Okay, so that'd been 21.

Speaker 3:

Yeah.

Speaker 4:

Well, it was like first year was great and then it was super cold. Is this wait? Is this the fifth year we're doing already? No, this was four. Okay, four, because I remember it was like it was really nice, super cold, and was it last year? It was pretty fine, it was mild, it wasn't too bad.

Speaker 5:

That was a good day, a good day of fishing.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, Nice and sunny. I remember that one year, though, when it was freezing cold, I got a call Saturday night or Sunday morning from another league, the UPL, and that's Matt Johnson. He runs the Clam Ice Team and calls and he says are you guys gonna cancel for your event today from Minnesota, Made Cause our tournament is on Sunday and we run the HHO deal on Saturday. And Giz is asking me, and I was like how can we cancel our event when it's the same as yesterday and 50 people from HHO came out and fished? We can't cancel.

Speaker 4:

Right, that's right. Yeah, Back to back days. Your guys captain's got beat up pretty good there.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and so that's another thing too. These guys, not only are they given up a day out of their life, but they're giving up a pre-fishing day for the tournament the next day. That's huge. So I mean, and that's kind of what our league is about too. We've always said, if you're here to cash the check, then just we'll give you your money back and you can just walk right back out the door. If you're here to learn and do cool things, then you're at the right spot.

Speaker 2:

Do you have a certain number of membership for Minnesota Mades Sorry, Tony.

Speaker 3:

We can do 30 teams We've had 30 teams in the past, I think probably the bread and butter is probably 25, just for starts to get a little cramped with some of these accesses with 50 vehicles and trailers, cause I mean these guys are all bringing trucks and trailers and some bring their ice castles out and stay there for a few days. So we lock up the accesses pretty good. I'm sure the locals are really happy about it.

Speaker 2:

But Happens what Not that often. So whatever Once a year yeah.

Speaker 5:

Tony, I'm gonna add something. The one thing that I'd add to the extremely cold days is Clam is very generous in donating hub houses for warming houses. So there is, they're there, they're there, but they don't get used very much.

Speaker 2:

Well you're running you're running in, gunning for fish, right Popping holes and moving. You're not staying inside the house too much.

Speaker 5:

I think that's 2020. Some guys will. Yeah 2022 was the year that I was walking around with an oxygen tank and my dad was staying in his ice castle. In the same area, there was members that actually fished in the ice castle that day because it was so cold, but Couple of years back to back.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, if there was probably one thing where we put too much work in it's, it's setting up the hubs and taking them down, because we've I think we set up like 15, 20 hubs probably, and maybe two get used. Oh wow.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, it's pretty pretty rare.

Speaker 2:

So you do your check in, everyone gets their coaches, and then you have a hard start and a hard stop. What does that look like?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I think. What do we fish from like eight to one?

Speaker 4:

I think, it was like eight to noon and then we weigh in at one, because we kind of wrap up and eat and prizes, something like that. Yeah.

Speaker 3:

It's, it's four or five hours of fishing and everybody's, everybody has a bucket to keep their fish in with water and keep them alive, and then then they bring them up to the scale and we weigh everything in and then I think it kind of switches every year depending on for the food situation. But either that we eat and then we announce all the winners and then once we go through and announce place 25 through first, then we do the raffle and everybody can, kind of what would we do? Sign up. It could sign up for either the bear hunt or the turkey hunt type of thing.

Speaker 3:

And then they all, and then everybody gets one raffle ticket automatically for all the rest of the stuff.

Speaker 2:

You know pretty engaging, busy day.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah. I think everybody's pretty tired by the end of that day.

Speaker 4:

Well, yeah, and then we always start in the morning. We do like a brief meet the captains, then we do the national anthem, and usually Dale Luegenbill is our, our singer. Did he do it last year or two? Yep, he did.

Speaker 3:

Okay, it's done it every year then right, yeah, we tried to get a sailor Jerry.

Speaker 4:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

That's right. I don't think that ended up working out. So we we had a, we had a close like maybe we were going to get Ted Nugent. It was, it was. It was close but not that close.

Speaker 2:

And I got a. I got a loose connection with Hank Williams Jr. We can try that next time, That'd be kind of cool. Yeah, he comes up to malax all the time too, so that's how I ended up meeting him. He was up on malax, so he's he's a huge outdoors person and pretty cool person to meet. Back to our podcast.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, is there anything else you guys want?

Speaker 2:

to talk about with Minnesota made.

Speaker 3:

No, I know we have openings, so, if anybody I know there's a lot of guys From the HHO that they're getting competitive if you guys want to test out your skills and come on out. I know we got probably 10 or 12 openings right now. Mikhail, if you're listening.

Speaker 4:

I'll tell him. You call him out. Yeah, no, he would. You know what, right up his alley. I mean, he's one of the most competitive people I've met. He is a darn good fisherman and I think he would have a lot of fun. And you know, what you should say, too, is like it's an all-skill level thing. Yeah, you guys are really good, but you've got, you know, young kids going on, you've got older guys, everybody and you guys all have such a good time. Like you said, it's kind of like a big frat party. You're all buddies, you know You're laughing like so you're not there chasing the money in the check. You're just having fun and just having an experience.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I mean, what's super cool First off, like if you finish in the top half you're gonna get a prize. Yep, you're going home with the price. If you get lucky and end up catching the big fish, you usually go home with a pair of relevant sunglasses. Those are nice. Yeah, I I'll say this if you haven't tournament fish, if your normal style isn't drilling a 100 200 holes a day and and running and chasing fish, you'll learn how to do it. You're not gonna finish very well the first year. Well, what we've always seen is year one is, if you stick around and learn, you know what you get, what you put into it too. So If you talk, our guys are open books. They'll tell you what they're using, how they're breaking down lakes, why they're looking in certain areas. They'll they'll give you the information after Sunday.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, they're over there they're. They're an open book. So I always say this it's it's $450 to enter as a team, so it's 225 a guy. You get four events, you get a good, good group of people to go fish with and If you go, take one guided trip with a guide, you're gonna learn 10 times more doing this absolutely. So it's a good. It's a good way to get into it and learn about fishing. I mean, our guys can go catch fish on any given lake at any given time, whatever weather it is. They're not kind of one-dimensional like, oh, this is my lake and I know that they're off of this weed line or something like that. They they can break it down and figure it out. So I think joining it is a is a big deal. If you're trying to get better, you'll, by year three you'll be for sure, taking some prizes home here and there and possibly cash in a check.

Speaker 2:

So that's pretty cool. So how do they go about finding Minnesota Bay?

Speaker 3:

Social media. Either that, or if you go on to I don't even know what it is. Let me look here.

Speaker 5:

The website. No, yeah, I know, while he's looking that up real quick, the one thing I'll bring up during the day. During tournament day, andy and myself Go head-to-head versus Jake and Paul. We owe you brunch. I know we still do. We need to figure out a Sunday for brunch nice gentlemen's wager.

Speaker 4:

We usually have a good time. They usually do a. They catch 10, we catch five and they kick our butts. One time we were close I think we had four, but it still there. Yeah, he's still got these guys. It's flip the back.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we made one year.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, you got that a lot. He's got his mug. He's gonna get the mug.

Speaker 2:

So far listeners. He's showing one of his prizes that he got here.

Speaker 3:

He's got a bunch of prizes from Tony and Andy.

Speaker 5:

I Around yeah, taking my money, but we do. We do owe you brunch.

Speaker 4:

Yes, true, true story and a coin. Still got the coin.

Speaker 3:

It's all laying right around here. This is where I live my life, so Love it Sometimes.

Speaker 2:

It's awesome.

Speaker 3:

You reminded that I'm a champion.

Speaker 4:

Last love to be a whiskey glass fit you more.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we got fresh new ones too. So nice, yeah. So do you find the website?

Speaker 3:

Yep, it's, it's super easy. It's Minnesota made outdoors calm.

Speaker 2:

Oh it is easy. Yeah, it's easier than ours.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it's a mile long social media. I believe it's a Mn made outdoors Perfect cool, cool.

Speaker 2:

No, it's awesome. That's the, the home of the brave event that they host with Minnesota made annually. This year will be their fifth year. Let's look at us. It's kind of cool to talk about and you guys recently just got into and I know Tony and and he brought it up a few times is the like you don't have enough going on, but the future anglers of Minnesota want to share with listeners what that is.

Speaker 3:

Yeah. So we actually when we when we started this thing, we were talking about starting an on-profit, and Then it just happened to where we could just coordinate with HHO and just do it that way and then we were like, well, what are we doing? The other things we can, we got more. We got more time and more things that we could do. And so we kind of looked Into the veteran side of things and we were gonna kind of try to find a niche on the veteran side of nonprofits To help out or coordinate with other nonprofits and and do similar things. And the more we kind of looked into it there was there was a lot of them. So we kind of looked into like maybe doing stuff for kids of veterans and whatever. And then that spun out to why don't we just do it for just kids, period? And so we started future anglers of Minnesota. I've started two companies in my life. Starting a nonprofit is no joke that the red tape and all the whole leak out, Right yeah, you feel it every day.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah and so like, and not having any funding or any sponsors or anything and then like, so Minnesota made basically Funded the startup of of fam, and Then so, yeah, we've started that in June, we start of 2021, we kind of figured everything out throughout the summer and the fall, and then the winter of 2022 is when we started doing our first ice clinics, and so Right now we run three ice clinics a year where we take out about 2025 kids to each one. I think last year we had one where we had 40 kids when the crappie chronicles guys came out. And then this summer we've done yesterday I was out on the lax, we took 20 kids out on out of hunters nitty's point and we took 20 kids out there on a launch, and we did another one of those. In June we did a guided boat trip on West Rush where we had 20 kids out there and 10 boats, and then we were just starting a new one in About a month.

Speaker 3:

Here we're gonna be out on Battle Lake. We're taking 20 kids musky fishing for two days. Wow, that's cool, that's gonna be sick, so, and it's during a full moon, so we're we're excited for that. So, yeah, that one's gonna be kind of our, our new flagship Clinic, where these kids will come out on Friday and we'll have a dinner for them, they'll meet their guides and then on Saturday they'll wake up and they'll fish from Sun up the Sun down. We got hotels booked for all of them and then Saturday night we'll go back and have another dinner.

Speaker 3:

And we got a ton of prizes, like we had St Croix musky rods, we got Bates from like musky innovations and musky mayhem and I think we're gonna get Rob Hooliman, who's the. He was the PMTT champion last year. He won the musky tour. He's kind of the brainchild behind this all, and then we had the infrastructure to do it. So he's a Got a bunch of guides, he's got a cabin on the lake and when I asked him how many Muskies he thinks will catch on a conservative side, he said seven and probably one over 50.

Speaker 2:

So, that's awesome.

Speaker 3:

If that happens, if that, if we get, fine you. Know, I don't know some of these kids my night and be able to really win yeah that's true.

Speaker 2:

We just had a Veteran trip up on per million for muskies and those guys I I'm just blown away by how many muskies I caught.

Speaker 4:

But they hammered them yeah.

Speaker 2:

Where they using live scope.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, live scope and watching them.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah, it just thinks right in front of them.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, man, they were after the races. It was wild. The things that they can do nowadays is pretty crazy, I hope. I wish you guys luck on that. That sounds like a phenomenal adventure. I.

Speaker 3:

Yeah should be great. And so we just we just expanded our first expansion. We're kind of, I Guess, at this point now, the Twin Cities chapter. So, just like you guys, where you guys keep adding states and stuff, which is super cool, or we're gonna add cities and we got brainered Joe, joe Gonska, joe and Miranda Gonska, the own Pelican Lake Fish House rentals and guide service, they were looking to do something similar to what they were doing and so they started a chap drop and brainered. So now, and brainered is like the epic center of getting kids out and like there's tons of kids that want to and they're. They're so much better than city kids at catching fish and so they're gonna be running Winter clinics and summer clinics as well, and it's super cool because they they have a pond too and with a bonfire pit in the middle of it. So Few times a year they take out like four or five kids and they roast hot dogs and marshmallows on the pontoon while they're Bobber fishing for walleyes and bats.

Speaker 2:

So that's cool, that's pretty awesome. Yeah, it's. So, Go ahead, tony.

Speaker 5:

So I have a question if any like parent or kid wanted to get involved with them, is there any cost to participate or anything, or how do you guys do that whole situation?

Speaker 3:

No, everything's free outside of the musky trip, being that that one's gonna cost us like 10 or 15 times more than most of our clinics. We we asked for like a hundred and fifty dollar. We also wanted people that were gonna be committed. It was more of like a commitment thing. We end up getting a lot of like the Andy situation. We'll get the backouts I've always played something for free.

Speaker 3:

You try to do something good, people take advantage of it and we're learning. We're doing kind of a three-strike rule. We're just no longer Eligible or whatever. But yeah, everything's free. So all of our ice fishing clinics there is a limited number of spots we, when we started this, we wanted to impact less people in a more impactful way than Having 50 kids out there and they didn't learn crap because there was only 10 volunteers and each volunteer had five kids. So all of our clinics are two to one, volunteer to kid ratio.

Speaker 3:

So and the majority of our volunteers and guides are again Minnesota made members, or X Minnesota made members, their tournament fishermen, their their studs. So they're getting Real, real good information again, whatever they put into it. Sometimes we're just a babysitter for a few hours and that's fine too, as long as they had fun and they want to fish and they learned a few things about life. But yeah, everything's free. So all they do is they sign up and they show up and they go home with, I don't know, winner clinic. They go home with a bucket and we usually have donations and stuff to where one kid's going home with an auger and or a pop, a hub shack or Custom rod or relevant sunglasses, something pretty sweet. And then every kid goes home with prizes.

Speaker 2:

Yep that's cool. Yeah, it's one thing that we're trying to get more of is Doing our youth involvement. We know we have our McCoy's launch, that we do what four or five times every Open water season. You know they get to bring a plus one and we encourage kids to come with and Sean Olesberg down in Texas as a youth deer hunt. But it's pretty cool that you guys do that. That's something that we're hoping to do more with our members is get more youth involved with their parents, and I mean it's. There's something to be said about the bonding that All of our staff or volunteers have with our members, but also if they're able to bring a kid with, it just adds another element. I think that Drives a lot of that mental health home. You know, hoping all the things, my little soapbox.

Speaker 4:

No, it makes sense and I agree with you because you're growing up. I was in outdoors with my dad as much as I could be. You know he taught me so much and some kids don't have that opportunity. So through HHO or you know, fam, these kids are getting chances to, like you said, learn life lessons, basically out on the water and where they couldn't if they don't have that opportunity. So it's pretty awesome what you're doing.

Speaker 2:

And now I didn't even go a step further too. You know you guys do a lot with your event that you do with us. You know, maybe, maybe, down some down the road, open water wise, we'll be able to partner with you guys and help with some funding there. And yeah, let me get one of those trips set up with, you know, parents and the youth.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, absolutely for sure.

Speaker 2:

Like you know enough, on your plate some of the other thing for you.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah, but you know what it's. It's getting a little bit easier because I Think we're starting to build a little bit of a following, which which makes it easier, and we're getting some people out there that Better that are coming out of the woodwork. And now we got we got a really, really good core staff of People that kind of have designated jobs and they do awesome. Like Tony Alberg runs a are, you think, requests. So I mean, he was poking around on the internet one day and saw something that they did in like Wyoming or Montana or something. So we got these little, these little coins.

Speaker 3:

I have it somewhere around here. With it you get a plaque. Well, you start with these coins and so there's those little challenge where we like ditch pickles and and gravel lizards and river rats and they have to try to catch all these different species with minimum lengths and it forces is kind of a challenge to get them off the the console and and out outside. And they get these coins and they, every time they get one, they get a coin shipped to their house and then, once they complete the challenge, they get a wood plaque with their name engraved in our logo and the spot for those little coins. But they can glue right in there and finish that and hang it up on their wall. Very cool.

Speaker 3:

I think we've had the waterfall challenge water.

Speaker 2:

The Delta waterfall ultimate waterfall challenge. That one sounds like that a little bit. That's pretty cool.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah, just just incentivizes them to kind of get outside and do that stuff. I know we've been talking about doing. I don't know if this has ever even been said publicly so but it doesn't matter because I don't know if we're gonna do it, if I don't know. But we want to do a really cool fama palooza type of thing and we got to find the right location first.

Speaker 3:

But the vision of it is a youth fishing day kind of state fair and vendor feel like a food truck, ice cream truck, picture booth, dnr booth, a build a rod station, paint your own lure station, pure fishing and shore fishing With buckets out there. And we'll have a weigh-in station, similar to like the Brainer Jcs, where the kids will come up. They'll have a little casting, carnival games and stuff and just something more. Families can come out and enjoy the day and and hopefully go home with a bunch of cool prizes and and then Start sending up for more clinics and way to get our name out there and to do something cool for community. And I don't know if it'll be in big lake or Minnetonka or Coon Rapids, but I'll give you in touch with.

Speaker 2:

The Minnesota Conservation Officer Association. They have their own Fishing stuff that they have now and their own programs. I do so they'd be a good connection for that. Yeah, we'll see where we can get set up and maybe help out with, because I mean they have a pretty large following too when it comes to their youth programs. I do so that might be helpful.

Speaker 3:

For sure, absolutely. I'll get you in contact. We got it. We have a vision, perfect, perfect. Yeah, we have a vision. We don't have any Any hard with. That's all we've done. We put it on paper.

Speaker 2:

Hmm, now I like it. That's cool. It sounds about a fun. I assume you're looking to do open water versus.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, the cold, yeah in the summertime, yep, that's cool. There's a lot of good options out there.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, nice day is not freezing cold. No, I always thought it'd be kind of cool because when we originally started HHO, we used to do a fish of Palooza on White Bear Lake and we wanted to go that over time and it's been many years since we've done that and I'd like to do it again at some point.

Speaker 2:

Maybe some the board can throw together. But we thought it'd be kind of cool to get some food trucks out there eventually. But you know it's really hit and miss when it comes to weather and participation looks like. So that's the hard part, yeah, such as life. But that's that's a really cool concept and a good idea and I'll really appreciate. You know all the efforts that you're doing to get the youth in the outdoors too. I think that's, you know, huge, especially Now that we're seeing in the state a lot, a significant decline In people who are buying licenses, and not only is that generation who normally does getting older, but the generations that are coming up aren't buying them like they used to. So I think that's really important.

Speaker 5:

I got a question for you, jake what is, what is the average average? What's the average age of participants that you guys get, or what's the range of Kids that are showing up? I would guess the average.

Speaker 3:

I guess 10, 10, 11 is probably the average. Sometimes we have minimums Depending on what we're doing, and I like for the musky one we had a minimum of 10, and so the musky one is 10 to 15 year olds, the majority of our turn. Like when we do all go on the ice, I think our minimum is five or six or seven I have to look, but I Would say on average you're gonna get eight to twelve is kind of the sweet spot where once they get to 13, they got you know stuff that we used to do and chasing girls and boys and doing fun stuff, and Younger than that they don't tend to Last unless it's nice. Oh, and we got hub shacks and heaters and and everything that keep warm snacks and we do it, we do it right. We're all dads on our board, so Moms and dads now. But yeah, I mean so we know Snacks are number one. Behind safety, snacks might be number one.

Speaker 2:

It's probably number one. It's not a lot. Yes, yeah.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, if you don't got snacks, you're, you're lasting, you're lasting less than an hour, but back to your snack. You're talking about the licenses. What's ahead? Nothing.

Speaker 5:

What's that? The snack?

Speaker 3:

Yes, that's we're doing, that we're doing that on the musky trip is we're putting snackle boxes together For each kid to have out on the boat. So, and the guides, just so that they don't get grumpy, but when you're talking about the licenses, they, one of the things that we do is we, we sponsor a kid or two each year and we call it our future, future legends, and so they have to put in an application, which is they got to fill out our form that we have, and then they got to submit their report card. They have to go out and get references from teachers, coaches, families, friends, neighbors, whatever, and then we kind of take a take a peek at all those. And then the one thing that we, we, there's two things one, their character and their love for fishing. That's the two things that we base it off of. We get a lot of applications where we've never met the kid and what we're trying to do is teach life through fishing, and if you don't have a relationship with somebody, you're gonna get nowhere. So, come out to our event, volunteer at you know trade show. Come say hi to us at a trade show or something. Be known, get known, do something good, and then. So we got two more kids, we got three right now and Blake Bussin Was the first one and in all reality, that's kind of where this the whole fam thing spun from.

Speaker 3:

He put a Facebook post out. He wanted he was like 13 probably at the time, I think it's 15 now he put something out saying that he wanted to do Fishing Minnesota made and in order to do that, he needed to come up with this list of things and he put a cost on each thing, on every single one of those, including the entry fee for that, and a lot of it was like warm weather gear and augers and things like that. And then, if it stopped there, it probably doesn't make an impact on me. But then it had a bottom and it said how I'm gonna do it and it said I'm gonna mow 20 lawns and I'm gonna sell this many fire starters and I'm gonna pick up poop for this neighbor and whatever. And so he had a plan and I was like that's what we should do. We want to teach that. That doesn't get taught, the stuff that doesn't get taught in the schools. Yeah, you know, how many things do you remember from Sixth grade through 12th grade that you use on a daily basis?

Speaker 3:

Not my percent, you know. So. So that's, that's one thing. So we have Blake and and then we had Calon and Kelsey last year and they're 11, 12 year old kids. Um, they've kind of had a rough Back life, you know, up till this point. Um, both are kind of been raised by mom and uh. There was at least 50 dudes crying At our banquet last year when these kids got up there and spoke and were awarded their their thing. They're so appreciative, they're just fantastic kids. Um, but things that we do like with Blake, he couldn't, he wasn't a good public speaker. When we had him the microphone At the uh at the banquet, he basically froze, looked at us and he was what should I say?

Speaker 2:

And it happened that our banquet too, with some of us no worries yeah.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, but it was okay. Well, you know, make a mental note. And so at some of these shows we were making him go up to Dave Gens and Jason Mitchell and interview him, and then that transpired into he was up on the on the stage during some of those clam presentations that they have at the on the stages, and he was part of the, the junior ice team, and he and now he's one of the first ones to grab the microphone. He's not polished by any means, but he's not nervous and and that's a huge thing to have going forward in life. And so we've got a couple other cool things that we want to do where they. They got to do, you know, sales and and presentations and and things that that will help them build connections and and figure out how life actually works.

Speaker 3:

Um, and that that's. It's a mentorship program as soon as they get Selected for this. We got two kids that'll be selected this year that are they're absolute Awesome like. The character of these kids is just I want my kids to grow up, just to be just like them. But, um, they get a man I get a mentorship from. Whenever they get a future legend award. Tell their 18 or tell they tell us to they don't want to talk to us anymore.

Speaker 2:

That's brilliant, though that's uh, that's a really awesome program and I mean it just gets people hooked to giz and life lessons without them really knowing it. Yeah, I think Down the road they appreciate it probably a lot.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and part of their sponsorship package is a lifetime fishing license.

Speaker 5:

No, I'm jealous very sweet.

Speaker 2:

That's cool, yeah, yeah, if you guys don't know about those lifetime fishing lessons, jump into them. I mean, get them when the kids are young, because, uh, the cost is only gonna go up.

Speaker 3:

Get them, get them young and soon, yeah, before three, I think, for sure that's the best.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, yeah, let's think it.

Speaker 3:

They get a 500. I mean, it's basically about 500 bucks for the age kids that we're we're getting um, and then they get a $500 guided trip with somebody. So, like I know, callan went with griff Adam Griffith, who's on the crappie chronicles, and then Kelsey just went bass fishing with sam soby. He did a cool video Um with that. When he went out and took her out, um, blake ended up being on an episode of the crappie chronicles, um, so that was just like our connections are are pretty deep in the fishing community and the people that that were connected with our our awesome people too. So, and then what?

Speaker 3:

else, then they get a $500 Shields gift card and then they got a thousand dollars to play with with whatever they want, whether they want to just get set up with rods for life, or I know callan got a new boat. That wasn't new, but callan got a boat and a motor and kelsey got a kayak with a graph. So cool, you can get them out there. It's awesome on their own.

Speaker 2:

Well, it's phenomenal, no, it's good. They say you know, get them into the fishing or hunting. They won't have money to afford other things outside of there. I hope he won't be smoking crack yeah.

Speaker 4:

I can't afford it.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, that's, that's the goal.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I love it. No, jake, that's awesome. Thank you very much. I know we're coming up in an hour here and we really appreciate your time today and also just to recap and let everyone know About minnesota, made and fam. You guys got a couple of really awesome programs there. So just so our listeners are aware, or no, minnesota made you had the email and the social media from earlier. How do people get in contact with fam?

Speaker 3:

Um our our website. There is f a dash mnorg. Either that or you can email set future anglers mn at gmailcom.

Speaker 2:

And anything on the social media platform instagram.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, so we're on um Facebook and instagram, I think, correct.

Speaker 2:

And everyone's aware too you know we do have listeners from all over the country is based in minnesota. So, um, I mean, if you're in the area too for a family trip or whatnot, and look these guys up if that's something to do. But, um, you know, minnesota is a very, very hot commodity when it comes to a fishing destination for states in the country, and the, the amount of lakes and species that you can target out here is pretty phenomenal. So make sure you look them up If you're here or looking. The Minnesota made things. But, uh, gentlemen, do you have any last final comments? We'll start with andy. Do you anything else you want to say?

Speaker 4:

Yes, if you're a veteran um First responder or active duty. If you want to go on this event, look for it Basically late december, early january. This trip will be posted for the home of the brave event. Tons of great prizes, good to see us Um laughing and having a good time. So I encourage you to check it out and thanks for listening.

Speaker 2:

Hey tony, how about you?

Speaker 5:

Uh, I just have to thank jake uh for all he's done for us. Um, it truly it. He he touches my heart. Uh, jake and paul Um truly touched my heart with all the hard work that they do and all the mn made guys and gals um they they've become true friends of mine and uh Definitely a great group of people.

Speaker 2:

It's awesome. Oh, thanks, hey, jake. Do you have any final thoughts or things you want to share?

Speaker 3:

If you make me cry on here, dude, I'm gonna punch you. I love it. Um, no thanks, thanks, uh, I Agreed, like everything you guys do is absolutely awesome. Um, I'm just happy to be a part of it for one day and to help and do that kind of stuff. And and, uh, it's cool that that we can call each other buddies and friends and brothers now. Um, I think that that's the coolest part of this whole thing. And, uh, I look forward to, uh, to getting out to brunch someday.

Speaker 2:

Maybe you gotta do brunch. We do it, we gotta do it. No, that's awesome. No, jake, I gotta say thank you too. I know I watch these two guys light up every year when this time comes and I'm excited they get, and I know it's a huge thing that they have to look forward to. And we all have our own little niches when it comes to the things that we like to do in the outdoors, our trips that we host or the things that we get engaged with. And these guys are, they glow. I'm serious when this comes around the corner and then, uh, appreciate everything you guys do and the work that you put in for the organization and our members. I know people rent and rave about it all the time. I'm pretty sure that if we like had people like fight Out front of the house, people would probably fight to get on the trip. Uh, it's just, it's just that highly sought after and people I could be doing it would be. I mean, it's another way they could pick people, I guess.

Speaker 4:

Last two spots, it's it's fight yeah right.

Speaker 2:

Like club out back your dad's gonna be there though, andy, so but no, it could be the awesome that. Yeah right.

Speaker 2:

I'm a little gladiator mode at the end, um, but everyone has a blast and everyone rants and raves about how awesome it is every time, and Even during the coldest days of our year in the north, um, it's. It's a very good time that I get to see uh Unfold on social media and hear from these guys and how it was. So appreciate you and your team and everything you do, especially on the fam side of things the kids getting kids in the outdoors is huge. So we thank you very much. So everyone knows how to get a hold of minnesota made and fam at this point and Really appreciate everything they've done for us and the organization and we continue to hope to have that partnership, continue to build and be here and Help each other out and for our members that are out there.

Speaker 2:

You know outdoors Is something that we are very involved with when it comes to our mental health side of things. But a fair times where it gets a little bit to be too much, please feel free to reach out us, to us at hho. So we have our staff has trained in our assist training or applied to the set intervention skills training, you know, and if it's something that's more immediate, you know you can always call 988 or text 988 for the crisis intervention line. But Just because you're having a difficult time today doesn't mean we can't get through it. So let's stay here today so we can talk about things tomorrow and get our way through it. But that ends today's podcast. So thank you all for being here today. Really appreciate you all and Continue into uh grow the future of hho and helping our members out for that. We'll see you all next week.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for listening to the hometown hero outdoors podcast. For more information, visit our website at hometownherooutdoorsorg.

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Christopher Tetrault

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Phil Ewert

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