Who is TR Gourley?
TR Gourley is motivated by fun. When he’s with his homies creating fun memories, he is the happiest.
After starting a successful career in network marketing and then moving on to payday loan services, TR faced a devastating blow that bankrupted him. Moving west for a few years, he took time to discover what mattered the most to him. Realizing that creating memories with friends and family was the most important things in his life, he started two massive events that have taken him around the world.
Hope you enjoy his epic adventures on this podcast!
TR Gourley’s career started out with a degree in history from University of Utah, and then it moved him onto network marketing. After that, he moved on to payday loan services, but with the volatile industry that this can be, he faced a devastating blow that ultimately left him bankrupt. He went from owning a company with two hundred and fifty employees with over $100M in revenue to couch surfing at friends’ homes.
This blow gave him some time to focus on what mattered most to him and really think about what he was looking to do in life. One of the things that kept coming up again and again was that creating and making memories with friends and family was something that was the top of his list of priorities. After a lot of planning and hard work, TR started two huge events, “Slide the City” and “Lantern Fest” that have taken him around the world. More than seven million people have participated in these events worldwide from 2013–2018.
Festivals and events
Slide the City is a Slip ‘n Slide water party event that started off in Salt Lake City, Utah, but has now taken place in more than two hundred cities around the world. From Hong Kong to Vancouver and Cape Town, you can experience a Slide the City festival, where the main attraction is a one-thousand-foot-long water slide. Lantern Fest had similar success, with huge turnouts. For example, at the last Lantern Fest in Salt Lake City, over sixteen thousand people turned out.
Following on from the success of Slide the City and Lantern Fest, TR created Fort Nation and worked on it for just over two years. This was the world’s first fort-building festival, aimed to bring back the nostalgia of fort building and helping to create memories for children of all ages. Though these events TR aimed to help others to create joy and fun memories themselves.
TR started his company Sack Lunch Productions over six years ago and has brought events to cities all over the world. Sack Lunch now has four brands and has sold millions of tickets. Anyone who knows about event management knows that that level of success requires a lot of work (we all remember Fyre festival, don’t we)? But after working events, TR decided to move onto something new.
Production company and business development
TR has a production company, Wulf/Gourley Productions, as well as being president of Redline Entertainment. His role as an executive film producer has seen him work as a producer on projects like “The Adventures of RoboRex,” “The Crown and the Dragon,” and O”ne of the Good Ones.” In the past six months, TR has worked as the vice president of business development for App Society, helping his passions about creating and managing companies, productions and events, all that look to connect people and help to create great experiences.
He knows that business can be hard, and he himself never had a mentor in all of this. As a result, he wants to help others to avoid the common pitfalls and mistakes that can come from working for yourself, especially in the events sector. TR can help with strategy calls, a range of online courses, or creating a consulting relationship. He has shown that you can start a business and be a success with very little. You just need a little know-how, motivation, and determination, and he’s happy to help people along the way.
If you want to go to a job that you love, then you never really work a day in your life, as the saying goes. So if you are looking to do something new, looking for some guidance, or looking for motivation and ideas, then TR Gourley could be a good place to start. There isn’t much that he hasn’t experienced in business, on a big scale or a small scale, and he is happy to help you change things around and get yourself to where you want to be, no matter where you are now.
TR Gourley Podcast Transcription
Charan: Hey guys, welcome to the Lemonade Stand podcast. I am your host Charan Prabhakar and I am with my good buddy TR Gourley.
TR: Hey guys.
Charan: It’s great because TR and I have known each other for quite a while now.
TR: Yeah. In 11th grade, we sat across from each other in Ms. Abbot’s class.
Charan: Ms. Abbot’s class. The physiology class. And he was just confiding in me. He tried to copy off of me and I had to let him know, I’m, “Dude, I’m not the right person to copy off of, so…”
TR: I would have copied off of anybody.
Charan: It’s true. It’s true, but then we also made a little short film in high school together about the effects of smoking. And you remember that? Oh man, it’s not something that anyone should ever see. But those were great times. And anyway, I’m so glad that you’ve decided to join me on this podcast.
TR: Yeah, thank you for having me.
Charan: Of course. Now I’m just going to tell the audience again what we’re doing here. So the Lemonade Stand podcast is all about interviewing creators, entrepreneurs, actors, producers, anyone that has had a dream and have gone for their dream. When you’re a kid, you’re starting your lemonade stand to make a little bit of money for yourself. So we are-
TR: We sold cherries. My family sold cherries.
Charan: You guys sold cherries?
TR: Because my grandpa had a cherry tree.
Charan: Okay.
TR: So we’d go pick the cherries and then we’d walk around the neighborhood and sell cherries to the neighbors.
Charan: You’re kidding.
TR: Yeah.
Charan: That is awesome. So I want to give a little bit of background on TR and we’re going to dive right in. So TR sold cherries, I’ve come to learn.
TR: Highlight.
Charan: Highlight. But in high school he started a staining company called TLC Staining, which actually is the initials of a couple of our buddies. So…
TR: Yup. TR, Lani, and Cassidy.
Charan: TR, Lani, and Cassidy. And then he went on after high school, he got into network marketing and became very successful in that and used some of his funds to invest in a loan company, correct?
TR: Yeah. Me and a couple other people started a… online payday loan company.
Charan: Online payday loan company. And while he was doing that, he was also exec producing and producing movies, and you’ve done 15 of them, I hear, right now.
TR: Yeah. 15 features now.
Charan: 15 feature films. That is amazing. I had not even known that he had made that many movies [inaudible 00:03:48] so that’s exciting. Did the films and then went on to the event space, started creating some really cool events like the Lantern Fest.
TR: Lantern Fest and Slide the City.
Charan: Slide the City, which is awesome. So thanks man. This is exciting. I’m glad to reconnect with you as my buddy from high school but also as a very successful entrepreneur. So I guess let’s start from the beginnings. You talked about cherries. And…
TR: Yeah. Cherries were a big deal back then.
Charan: They’re a big deal now.
TR: They probably gave me five to 10 bucks, I don’t remember how much. But I mean I learned the process of having to get to my grandpa’s house picking the cherries, bagging the cherries, putting them in the cart and then walking around with my brothers and selling them.
Charan: That’s awesome. Did you keep the money for yourself? Or [crosstalk 00:04:42]
TR: I think we split all the money. The brothers and sisters all shared the money. I don’t remember though.
Charan: Yeah, that’s awesome. And are you the youngest in your family? Or…
TR: No, there are seven of us.
Charan: There’s seven of you.
TR: I’m right in the middle.
Charan: You’re right in the middle.
TR: Three older, three younger.
Charan: That’s awesome. So you sold cherries, and you made money. And how old were you when this happened?
TR: I was grade school, so I don’t know. Probably up until sixth grade we’d do it.
Charan: Okay.
TR: Something like that.
Charan: That’s awesome man. I had no idea that you did that. That’s incredible.
TR: I moved to Utah in fourth grade. So probably two or three years I did that.
Charan: You did that two or three years. And when you were doing that, was that when you first said, “Hey I like this. I like business. I like to do stuff like this.” Or was that what inspired you to keep going?
TR: I think I was doing it because my older siblings were doing it and we got couple bucks. I mean I didn’t really understand money then, but I got to buy candy with it. And so that’s why I think we did it. I don’t know.
Charan: Dude, that’s amazing. But the thing was, even at a young age, you learn, “Hey I can make a little bit of money for myself and buy some stuff with it.” Right?
TR: Yeah. Yeah.
Charan: See, I never did any of that stuff. I never sold cherries or anything like that. No. I really didn’t. I think the only money I made was from the tooth fairy. So I definitely did not put any effort into business. So I am always interested and excited to talk to people from an early age they were, “Oh wow. Just that little bit of extra money would allow us to buy some cool stuff.”
TR: But you got deep into entrepreneur.
Charan: I did.
TR: Especially actors are hardcore entrepreneurs.
Charan: We are. And that was definitely something I had to learn, and I took a lot of classes about entrepreneurship while I was in… BYU is where I went to school. And I do know that. As an actor you’re constantly trying to sell yourself and you’re trying to brand yourself and market yourself. So I did learn. But I think back then as a kid I was a little too shy. Even in high school, I think I was coming out of my shy phase but even during those years of Mrs. Abbot’s class I was pretty shy. I don’t know if you remember that, but…
TR: I don’t remember that.
TR Gourley Talks About Becoming an Entrepreneur
Charan: Yeah, I was pretty shy. So… So you do that as a kid. Now let’s talk about high school and you started this staining company. Tell me about that. How did that come about?
TR: Let’s see. My oldest brother George he had stained decks and fences through high school. And he graduated high school, and he’s, “Hey you could do this for some extra money.” And so I was, “Yeah, I’ll do it. Let’s do it.” And I think he had one of his buddies helping him and I was really good friends with Lani and Cassidy. And so I was, “Hey guys, I’ve got this gig. If you know anybody, let’s power wash and stain their fences and decks.” And Cassidy I think had a truck, and so we used his truck, and it was one of the little trucks that had three seats in the front. So we’d all cram in there and drive to the houses and the decks and power wash them and then stain them.
Charan: Wait, what year was this?
TR: This was junior and senior year.
Charan: Junior and senior year. So I knew you back then.
TR: Yeah. Just during the summertimes though.
Charan: Just during the summertimes. Did you like it? Did you have a good time doing it?
TR: Yeah, it was fun. It was fun because I was with my buddies just hanging out, and we’d just be doing nothing anyways. So we might as well do something and make some money and hang out in the same time.
Charan: See, TR, I love talking to you because some of the entrepreneurs I’ve been talking to and interviewing are really money-hungry, they were boom, boom, boom, “We knew what we wanted.” And they were organizing all these sales routes and all of this stuff. You’re just super casual. I mean you’ve been casual ever since I’ve ever known you, and yet you’re very successful. So I love your style of…
TR: I’m trying. I’m trying hard to be successful. So I like it. I like entrepreneuring.
Charan: Yeah.
TR: It’s a lot of fun, it’s challenging, it’s rewarding, every day is different. So I like that.
Charan: Yeah, which is the same as being an actor, right? Every day you’re trying to do different things and different auditions. It’s great. So you went from staining decks, but I know that just kind of during our college years is when you got into network marketing, right?
TR: Yeah. I started doing network marketing my sophomore year of college, I think.
Charan: Of college. And that was ACN I’m sure, right?
TR: Yeah ACN. At that time we just sold long-distance phones.
Charan: Long-distance phones. I remember it. Yeah, because I was invited to those pizza parties.
TR: Did you go?
Charan: Oh, yeah. So many. Because if you remember-
TR: Did you do it?
Charan: I never ended up joining but Scott Sumsion was in there, Josh Covey was there, everyone from our high school somehow jumped on super hard into this company that… And I think it was kind of just barely getting going. And our buddy Spencer Hunn was running the whole thing. And yeah. So everyone was kind of getting involved, and-
TR: I was roommates with Spencer Hunn.
Charan: Okay.
TR: So we were college roommates. He started it here in Utah, and it had been going for 10 years everywhere else, but it hadn’t really gotten to Utah. And he’s, “Do you want to do this?” I was, “Yeah, let’s do it.” And then he put me in one line and then he put McClain my buddy in a different line. And he’s-
Charan: Sorry guys.
TR: Yeah. I mean he should’ve been underneath me, or above me. But he put us in separate lines and he’s still doing ACN. He’s crushing it still.
Charan: Yeah. No, I remember. He was just doing so well with it. I had never heard of network marketing until that point.
TR: Yeah.
Charan: Have you done anything like that? Or…
TR: I had never heard of it either.
Charan: You had never heard of it, right? Yeah.
TR: So the story was, is Spencer and I wanted to go hang out with our friends down at BYU. And we didn’t have a car to get down there. So we’re, “How can we get down to BYU?” And we were up in Salt Lake at the University of Utah. And so we decided to take a bus to, we could get a bus from where we were down to, what do you call it? The mall at 7200 South. So 20 minutes south of us. But then we had another 30 minutes to go. So once we got off the bus there, we decided to hitchhike from there down to Provo.
Charan: Okay.
TR: And the guy that we hitchhiked that picked us up was doing network marketing. He was in Quixtar. And so he explained to us Quixtar and it was shopping for your groceries and different things online. And we’re, “This is awesome. And you get people underneath you and they do it, and you get a piece of what they’re doing. But why would we shop online for our stuff? Our buddy does all the shopping.” Our third roommate was, “I’ll do the shopping. I’ll handle that.” Why would we do that? Kylie does it. So but we liked the idea. We thought the idea was awesome. And then he found ACN and we went with it.
Charan: And you went with that one. Well it’s great because I remember you guys were definitely involved and on board and…
TR: Yeah, we sold out to it.
Charan: You guys sold out to it. Network marketing. Dude, it was so great. How long were you involved in it?
TR: That was probably about four years, five years.
Charan: Four or five years, right? And were you able to build a pretty [crosstalk 00:12:39]
TR: Yeah. I made some good money my first year—first or second year, I don’t remember—I made 60 grand while I was still in college, which was, “What?”
Charan: Yeah.
TR: And I was still playing baseball at the University of Utah. So I was traveling a lot and I met a ton of awesome people doing it. And I had a lot of fun up and to a point. And then it just started… I hated it.
Charan: You did.
TR: Yeah, I was just getting bored and sick of talking about the same thing over and over and over and over and over.
Charan: Yeah, it’s interesting because I had a buddy of mine who I guess… It’s funny. Leanna, Spencer’s ex-wife, is a really good friend of mine. And so she introduced me to another guy that used to do ACN and network marketing and stuff, and he got out of it. I think there was a point where he was making $200,000 a month or something like that. It was just insane.
TR: Yeah, you can make so much money doing it.
Charan: It was so insane. But he said the same thing. He said he hated it. He said he would invite people to these events that you guys would be having and then he himself wouldn’t go. He’d hide in the hotel room, or else he’d go somewhere else just because he was so bored of it is what he was saying. And yeah, it just wasn’t as fun or as exciting. But was that something that happened over time where you were just, “This is the same thing over and over.” Or…
TR: Yeah, it just gradually became more and more monotonous and boring and repetitive, and just stopped liking it as much.
Charan: Yeah. And that’s the thing, right? It’s when you have that entrepreneur spirit you want to keep innovating. You want to keep creating. You want to keep doing different things and having things be fun. That’s a big part for me anyway as an actor. It’s if it’s not fun, I’m, “No I don’t even want to attempt it because it doesn’t excite me.” So you moved on from ACN. You just kind of said, “Hey I’m done.” Or…
TR: Yeah. I just slowly backed my way out of it.
Charan: Backed your way out of it?
TR: Yeah.
Charan: I know a lot of network marketers, they leave but they still get residuals from the…
TR: They continue for a very, very small amount of time.
Charan: Okay, small amount of time?
TR: Yeah.
Charan: But yet then you said, “All right, I-
TR: A short amount of time.
Charan: “I did this, I liked it for a time. Now I’m going to go to doing a payday company, or a…”
TR: Yeah, I didn’t know what I was going to do. I had just slowly stopped doing it. And I met a guy who had a technology, well he had a company that moved money electronically, which is ACH processing and credit card processing.
Charan: Okay, yeah.
TR: And we got a client and invested some money with him. And I got a client that was a payday lender. So we were moving the money from the payday lender to whoever was borrowing the money and then debiting their account. And we were watching how quickly this payday loan company was growing. And we said, “Well, why aren’t we doing this? We should be doing this.” And so we figured out how to do it and we put together a bunch of money and we grew to revenues of about 100+ million dollars a year.
Charan: What? Are you serious?
TR: It grew really, really big.
Charan: Yeah.
TR: It’s till going today. That company is still around today. It lasted for about five or six years, and the CEO we had, my partner, starting stealing money.
Charan: Oh shoot.
TR: And we had grown large enough that when we told the investors of what was happening, we all decided to go to the SEC and get it all straightened out. And the government stepped in and they took the company and they sold it at auction to one of the bidders. And so everyone that had anything to do with it was either let go or replaced. I was an employee as well as an investor. So I was a little bit tricky. And it was a five-year ordeal to get through all of that, which was rough. And in that time, I lost everything. I had to claim bankruptcy and I really saw how the system works on the financial side when you have something that’s really good, but a few people just can mess it up very easily for you. And my partner, a couple other people in government, just-
Charan: They switched it all up.
TR: Just switched it all up. Yeah.
Charan: Yeah, it’s interesting. I mean I see that in film and when millions and millions of dollars are on the line and you’re trying to create different projects and stuff. It’s everyone has got to be aligned in their mind to be, “This is our goal and we’re sticking to it, and we’re having integrity.” And the moment people stop being integrous and they start doing their own thing, everything can fall on its face.
TR: Yeah. So quickly too.
Charan: Yeah.
TR: So quick.
Charan: So how did you cope with that? I mean you were seeing all the success and money coming in and probably a lot more money than you even made through ACN. And then to have it just disappear.
TR: It was tough. I cried a lot. I cried a ton. I remember one of the worst days was I got a call from a guy. He’s a really bad guy and he said some things and it scared me a lot. And I-
Charan: Was he associated with the company?
TR: Yeah.
Charan: Okay.
TR: Yeah. He was one of the investors.
Charan: Okay.
TR: And I talked to my friends who were older and had been through stuff like this, and they said, “You should probably go talk to the SEC and let them know what’s going on.” And I said, “Well, do I need to bring a lawyer?” They’re, “No, you’re fine. Just go talk to them and let them know what’s going on.” And that night when I decided, I call, I made an appointment, and the next day I was going in to talk to the SEC. And I mean I was, what, 27?
Charan: Yeah, we’re still young, right?
TR: I was the youngest guy in the company, the least amount of experience in the company. And I’m crying on my floor, just sobbing. I lived up in Salt Lake, and my brother lived in the basement, and I just couldn’t stop crying. I was listening to two songs over, and over, and over again. And they’re kind of ridiculous songs. One was Katy Perry “Fireworks” because it’s, “You’ve still got it. You’re going to be fine.” And then the other one was a song, what was the name of that song? It’s a Cher song, “You Won’t See the Last of Me.” How does it go?
Charan: Oh man. How does that one go? I think I know what you’re talking about though.
TR: And so I was listening to that on repeat, those two songs, and I just couldn’t stop crying. So I go down to my brother, knock on his door, and he just hugs me and I sleep on his floor. And the next day, I go into the SEC and I’m carrying a big bag. And they’re, “Oh good, you brought us all of the documents.” And I was, “No this is actually donuts and orange juice because I really want you guys to like me.” And they just start laughing and they’re, “Nobody ever brought us anything. You’re going to be okay.”
Charan: Okay.
TR: And so I talked to them. But it was hard. Those types of things are so hard. For me they’re really, really hard, especially the first time that that happened. It was devastating. You go from having whatever you want, traveling the world, having money, and then go from that to not even being able to put money in your car. Gas money. And then having to sell your car and working through all of those things.
Charan: It’s so interesting because it just shows these empires that we’re building they can be so fickle. And I mean you look at even 2020 and COVID hitting and how many people have lost jobs, how many people are suffering from depression, how many people have just… Businesses have shut down, completely shut down. And it can be so devastating.
TR: Yeah. It’s really, really tough. I just saw this morning, I was reading some stuff. And a massive business like 24 Hour Fitness is filing Chapter 11.
Charan: You’re kidding me.
TR: Yeah.
Charan: Wow. See this is what I’m saying. It’s you have no idea how quickly life can turn for the good or for the bad.
TR: It’s true.
Charan: So during those times when you were crying on your brother’s floor and sleeping on the couch and giving the SEC donuts and orange juice and all that stuff, how did you pick yourself back up emotionally from this situation?
TR: Music helped me a lot. Music has always been one of my favorite things ever. Love music. So I’d listen to a lot of music, and I would write in my journal a lot. And I moved out of Utah, I sold everything here. I gave most of it all away. And I moved out to California, and my buddy that I had done a previous business with was, “Just come live out here.” He lived on the beach. And so I just lived with him. I had no money. He didn’t ask me to pay any rent, he didn’t ask me to pay any food, anything, no expenses, and I lived with him for three years, and we just hung out. One day at a time. I had little projects that I was working on that I knew would… they were just keeping me busy. And just tried to stay busy.
TR: The biggest thing for me was I would work out every day. I made sure I’d work out five or six days a week, not crazy hard, but to keep active. And then I read a lot. So working out for me, it helps me stay not depressed.
Charan: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, I’m with you. During COVID, I had all these projects I was putting together. I had a couple TV shows that I had already filmed, everything was all lining up. I was going to go maybe to LA and go pitch to people and stuff. And then everything shut down. And I remember at that time being, “Well…” And I couldn’t blame anyone. I couldn’t be, “Well this is just the nature of the world. Everyone is shut down.” I was, “What can I do to stay sane and stay happy and everything?” And so I’ve always after high school really got into tennis. I really love tennis. And so I decided, “Hey, I’m going to play tennis every single day.”
TR: Oh nice.
Charan: And so that’s what I’ve been doing. I play tennis every day, well almost every day. And then I go hike a lot. But it’s interesting because those type of activities really help you stay present. And I’ve learned that being present is a very important thing for people instead of living in our heads and living this weird false reality, an empire that we created. So yeah, no, I appreciate you sharing some of that stuff with me.
TR Gourley Talks About How He Got into Movies
Charan: Now while the loan company and stuff was going on, you were investing in movies. And I think your brother may have been one of the people that helped you get into movies, because I know your brother Ben [crosstalk 00:24:53]
TR: Yeah, Ben graduated film school. He wanted to do movies. So he had his first movie. And he had the money for it and it was with Jon Heder.
Charan: Yup.
TR: And the initial investor in that was threatening to sue people and just wasn’t a good investor for him. And he called me and we were talking through it, and I said, “Well give the money back and find a new investor.” And he’s, “TR you don’t understand how hard it is to get investors.” And in my head I was, “Well, my payday company put together about 52 million dollars for it to do funds, all private money.” So I’m, “Ben, it can’t be that hard.” So he’s, “Well, if I give it back, will you help me?” And I was, “Yeah, I’ll totally help you.” And I didn’t really think that he would give the money back.
Charan: Okay.
TR: The next day, he was, “Okay. I gave the money back. Now what?” I was, “Oh geez.”
Charan: Yeah.
TR: So I started putting together the money for his movie. And we put the money together, we had Jon Heder and Rutger Hauer and Mila Kunis in it.
Charan: Yeah. Yeah, in “Moving McAllister,” right?
TR: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Charan: That’s the one. Yeah.
TR: And it’s a good movie. And then he wanted to do another one. And so we put the money together for that. And I figure I should learn how to make the movie, and then we just kept doing one, by one, by one, by one, and doing one, after another, after another. Now you and I both know the movie industry is a very fickle industry.
Charan: It’s hard.
TR: It’s very difficult. And making money back on films is a bit of a challenge. And so I actually have been producing films as well and helping raise money. But I kind of got to a point where I was saying, “Okay. Until I figure out a model for making money back for films, I do not feel good about talking to an investor. I just don’t feel good about it because it’s there’s no plan.” And I’ve talked to several of my filmmaking friends out here, and they tell me about this movie idea, and they’re, “Oh, it’s going to be so great. It’s going to be so awesome.” I’m, “That’s great. Where is your distribution plan? What is your marketing plan? How are you going to get to the markets?”
Charan: It’s true.
TR: They’re, “Well we haven’t gotten that far yet.” And I’m, “Oh guys, I can’t. I can’t. I cannot talk to an investor on a good idea.”
Charan: It’s true. So how did you say, “Hey, I’m going to keep going.” and make 15 feature films?
TR: That’s a good question. So I did most of my films, produced most of them with David Wulf, who’s a lot smarter than me. He’s a smart guy. And we were looking at it, and he came on when our first movie was having issues. It was in the can. “Moving McAllister” was in the can, we were having some problems. And so he came on and it was so great working him that we were, “Hey David, let’s do this next one together.” So we did the next one together and we just kept going. And he saw the same thing that you did, that I did. We were all, “Okay, we made the movie. That’s fine.” It’s hard but that’s not the hardest part, right?
Charan: No. No.
TR: The hardest part is letting other people see it.
Charan: Yeah.
TR: And so what we did is we found a foreign sales agent and we went and we started a company with that foreign sales agent. It’s called Redline Entertainment.
Charan: I think I heard of that. I think Ben was telling me about that a while ago.
TR: Yeah, maybe.
Charan: Maybe. Yeah, it sounds familiar.
TR: And she would go to the festivals and the markets, so Cannes Film Festival. Most of them have a market that go along with them. So she’d go the markets and she would see what the market wanted, what the foreign market was buying and what they needed coming up. So out of those 15 films, I think three of them are dog movies.
Charan: Yeah, I remember that. Yeah.
TR: And then we didn’t make them because we love dog movies, but we love making movies, and if it was a kids’ movie with a dog in it, we could keep making movies. So we reverse-engineered filmmaking on our level, at the lower level, and figured out how to do it so we could continue doing it.
Charan: So were your budgets for these films in the few million range, few hundred thousand range? Or…
TR: No. I think the highest budget for those was less than a million-and-a-half dollars.
Charan: Yeah. Yeah.
TR: I finished UPMing a movie called “Inheritance,” with Lily Collins in it, and that was a lot higher budget because that was a really big budget.
Charan: Yeah. Well it’s great. It’s cool that you learn this new craft because for me, I’m currently producing a movie right now, and they initially were told, “Hey, maybe we should be five six million.” I’m, “Guys, this is your first feature.” And even they knew. They’re, “No, this sounds weird hearing it from these investors.” So now they’re tailoring the script down, and they’re going to make it for a few hundred thousand. And I’m-
TR: That’s perfect.
Charan: “That’s a lot more safe.” And it’s a great place to be. And it’s great.
TR: That’s perfect.
Charan: Well that’s awesome. So are you continuing to do films as well while you’re doing some of the other stuff you’re doing?
TR: I haven’t done film. The last film I did was… It was last year.
Charan: Okay.
TR: So it was last year and it just came out.
Charan: But it wasn’t very long ago. Oh, which one was it?
TR: The “Inheritance” one.
Charan: Okay.
TR: So you can watch it on Prime [crosstalk 00:30:45]
Charan: Yeah. No, no. Do it please. We’re promoting you, dude.
TR: You can watch it on Amazon Prime and I think probably a couple other places. I’m not sure. I only UPMed it. I didn’t produce it. I didn’t executive produce it. I didn’t put any money into it. I just… David needed help in that position and so he brought me on a week before.
Charan: Well UPMing, in case you guys didn’t know, that’s a pretty big deal, man, breaking down a script and getting all the numbers and all that stuff is…
TR: Yeah. I didn’t know how much work it was.
TR Gourley Talks About Getting into Events
Charan: It’s pretty tough work. It’s a lot of work. That’s amazing. So you did films for a while. And now you got into some really cool stuff with the event space.
TR: Yeah. I said to myself when I was in the payday world I didn’t love it, and it’s not the best thing for humanity. And I said the next thing I’m going to do is going to be something that is fun that I love, and that is good for everybody.
Charan: I love that.
TR: And if I wanted to just make money, I would still be doing loans.
Charan: Yeah.
TR: But I don’t want to just make money. I want to do something that’s good for people and that I love. And when I was living out in California with my friend, one of my other friends, John, called me and he was, “Hey, I don’t want to really go out and do emceeing. I don’t want to host my events anymore. Do you want to go do it?” And I was, “Yeah, that’d be great.”
Charan: I’m pretty sure you guys also hired Adam Johnson a couple of times to emcee some of these. He told me about it.
TR: He was great.
Charan: He’s amazing.
TR: He’s really good at it.
Charan: Yeah, he’s great at it.
TR: He’s doing “The Outpost” now [crosstalk 00:32:43]
Charan: He is. Yeah, in fact “The Outpost,” it was a series I was on.
TR: Oh it was?
Charan: Yeah, I was on it. I don’t know if you knew that. I was on it for the first season. But they killed me. I was a season one death. Yeah, I know. I was hoping that I didn’t die, but so I didn’t get to go to Serbia. But it was a great, great first season. So…
TR: That’s cool.
Charan: Yeah. Anyway. Yeah, keep going.
TR: I didn’t know that. I didn’t know that you were in that one. I haven’t watched it. Don’t tell them that.
Charan: Don’t worry. No one is going to see this. So…
TR: So I said I wanted to do something that was good from… John called me, he said, “Do you want to go out and emcee the races?” And he was doing Color Me Rad and The Dirty Dash.
Charan: Okay.
TR: And I said, “Yeah, that’d be fun.” So I would go out and work a weekend one day and then fly back home. And I’d be hosting and I’d be getting everybody excited, stretching them out, giving them contests to do before the race, throwing paint up in the air after the races, it was a lot of fun. It was high-energy, high-intensity, really fun work. I loved it. I was, “This is so cool.” And [crosstalk 00:33:58]
Charan: It makes you feel alive, right?
TR: Yeah. It was really fun. Really fun. And I did it for two years. I got done with everything with the payday stuff, the loan company, and I was, “Okay. I think I’m ready to do my own thing again. I’m ready to do something.” And I’m, “I love events. I’m going to try to do events.” And I wanted to do a water run, because the 5K fun runs were all the rage.
Charan: Yeah.
TR: And so I call John. I was, “John, hey I have this idea.” He was, “Oh, come into the office. Let’s talk about it.” So I told him my idea to do this water run. And he goes, “Well tell me about the water run.” And I told him about it. And I was, “I want there to be a big massive slide on it, and I want…” I told him about the obstacles. He goes, “Well I had this idea. Because fun runs are kind of dying. What if it’s just a big slide? What if we just do this big massive slide?” And I was, “That would be awesome. It’s a big massive Slip N Slide.”
Charan: Yeah.
TR: And then we just started brainstorming back and forth and he had the experience of starting a company and going around the world with it. And so we partnered on it, and we started doing the event. Our first one was here in Salt Lake City, and it grew to a worldwide phenomenon, crazy, water slide. 1,000 feet long, 27 feet wide, and I think it went to-
Charan: Where did you lay this slide down? Was it on a park somewhere?
TR: Oh yeah. It was on the street.
Charan: It was on the street.
TR: So we would transform streets downtown, we tried to get downtown wherever we could. So we would take Main Street here, and Salt Lake was on Main Street, and it went from the state capitol building down to the temple.
Charan: Did it hurt to go down on…
TR: I didn’t know how many things that we’d have to think of to make it safe. And the first time we put the slide on, we were up in Salt Lake City, we had no clue what we were doing, we probably shouldn’t have gotten the permit.
Charan: Yeah, for sure.
TR: For real. But the state wasn’t paying attention and they just kind of rubber-stamped our permit. And the first time I saw the business—”it’s over, it’s over”—was this lady, probably 45 years old, she was walking across, which she shouldn’t have been doing. She was walking across the top of the slide, and her feet just fly, both feet out from under her, and she lands and her head just hits the slide.
Charan: Oh my gosh.
TR: And I was, “Oh gosh, we’re done.”
Charan: Yeah.
TR: “This is over.”
Charan: Yeah.
TR: And the event had just started. And she just jumps right back up and just kept going, laughing, having a great time. But beforehand, we had tested foam, and there was an inch-thick professional padding of foam underneath the slide. So there was 27,000 square feet of foam underneath the slide that we laid on top.
Charan: So it was a thousand-foot-long slide, and were people just going super duper fast?
TR: It depended on the hill. But, yeah. They’d cruise. They would cruise.
Charan: Oh my gosh. And it must have been kind of wide, right, to…
TR: Yeah, there was three lanes. And it was 27 feet wide in length all lanes together.
Charan: All lanes together. Wow, that is awesome. And so you just have people come where they pay a little bit of money or whatever to…
TR: Yeah. So the first one that we did, we put it up online, we marketed it, we got people local news to cover it beforehand, the local radio to cover it. People bought tickets and showed up, and we had about 3,000 people show up for the first day buying tickets.
Charan: No way.
TR: But there’s probably 10,000 people that showed up that saw the event and took pictures, and that went online. And then we had a video that had been done that just, it went viral like crazy.
Charan: Wow. So you guys just went all around the world in a sense doing these [crosstalk 00:38:34]
TR: I got to see the whole world because of that slide.
Charan: That’s unbelievable.
TR: It was amazing. We did them in Hong Kong, Japan, London, everywhere. We went everywhere with it. Columbia. Everywhere.
Charan: I mean I can’t even imagine what it would be like to pack a slide like that for a show.
TR: I can. Let me tell you.
Charan: Yeah. Tell me please.
TR: Ready?
Charan: Yeah.
TR: So we had a 53-foot trailer.
Charan: Oh my gosh. Okay.
TR: A normal semi-trailer. And we didn’t know how to pack it the first time perfectly, but we figured it out that the foam pads were eight by four, eight feet by four feet, and we would stack those in first. And they were the grossest things ever because they’re laying on the street, and the streets are so dirty, and they’re wet from the water that everybody slid on. So they’re disgusting. So we would stack it all in there, and then we would roll the slide up into a… It looked like a sushi roll. And then a forklift would come by and pick those up and bring those all to the truck, and it would load those. And as we were doing that, we would be loading the blowers, because it was an inflatable slide, and the merch tent and all of the tables and everything else would go in, and we would close the door, and it just all barely fit. I mean the slide was cut in 100-foot pieces.
Charan: 100-foot pieces. Okay.
TR: But dry it weighed 800 pounds.
Charan: 800 pounds.
TR: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Charan: Oh my gosh.
TR: One section.
Charan: The amount of effort it would take to throw an event like that would be so astronomically high.
TR: It was so much work. We’d wake up at 4:00 in the morning, we would walk for 12 to 19 miles a day because you’re going up and down a .2 miles. To the top is .2 miles, to the bottom is .2 miles. So you’re going all day up and down, up and down, up and down.
Charan: Just to help people go through or whatever?
TR: If a blower goes out, you have to change it, people get stuck, you got to pull them, there’s a problem with the top, I’m running to the top, we’re going to the bottom, we’re going to the bottom.
Charan: Oh man. Yeah.
TR: And you’re in the heat because it’s summertime. It was exhausting. We’d start at 4:00AM, we would close the truck. When we got good, we would close the truck at 11:00PM.
Charan: Oh my gosh. Yeah.
TR: But that was year two and three and four that we would get the truck done by that time.
Charan: See, and it’s cool because a company like this requires so much effort, so much work, and I’m sure profit is great, but probably not as high as the payday.
TR: Not even close.
Charan: Not even close.
TR: Not even close.
Charan: But a billion times more fun.
TR: So much fun. I mean the stories and the experience, it was so fun. And everybody is smiling, and everyone is having a blast, and it’s fun.
Charan: Yeah. That’s awesome.
TR: You get to bring so much joy to people.
Charan: Yeah that’s amazing. So you went from that to a lantern festival as well.
TR: I started both at the same time.
Charan: Okay.
TR: So I started both at the same exact time. We did them the same year. And the Lantern Fest was really hard to start. It took me five months of about five hours a day calling different venues, having somebody say yes to allowing us to launch sky lanterns up into the air.
Charan: Okay.
TR: The venues were easy, the fire marshals were hard. The venue would say yes, the fire marshal would say no. Until finally one day, they both lined up. The venue said yes and the fire marshal said yes. And I remember it still. Clear as day. He goes, “Yeah, that shouldn’t be a problem.” And I was, “Wait really?” I go, “Really?” He goes, “Yeah. I don’t see a problem with that. That’ll be great. Just send me one of the lanterns and I’ll check it out. But, yeah. Plan on having your event.” I was, “Oh my gosh.” I called John. I was, “John, you’ll never guess. We have a lantern fest.” We were so excited.
Charan: So excited.
TR: So excited. I had never launched a lantern, I had never seen an event, but I was just calling, calling, calling, calling, calling. And then the first one that we did was just like Slide the City. Before the event was done, the day of the event, we sold out, so many people showed up, we had to close the gates because we needed to start the event. And people still wanted to buy tickets, and we just were, “We got to start.”
Charan: “We got to start.” Yeah. Dude, that’s unbelievable man, that you’re able to have such a different… Your level of entrepreneurship is amazing because no business is alike the other. Some people are, “Yeah. I stained decks. Yeah, I’m going to keep doing stuff like this.” But you were, “No I’m going to go into network marketing. Now I’m going to go to loan services. Now I’m going to go to events and movies, and whatnot.”
TR: Yeah, I’ve had to learn how to learn. And I’ve had to learn to like learning because I’m always, “How do you get a permit for something that’s not permitted?” There was no permit for a thousand-foot-long Slip N Slide that was a temporary structure that wanted to put water down the storm drains. I had to talk to every single department in the city. And I had to learn all of it on the fly as I was going. But yeah. You’re right. They’re all different.
Charan: So it’s great because as you’re saying this, I keep thinking you are all about creating your own path. And I think that’s really what has brought you a lot of joy is to create your own path. And it’s kind of funny. And I won’t go into this whole story. But I actually hung out with Ben Stiller once at the ski resorts. And he took me aside when he found out I wanted to be an actor. And that was his advice to me, create your own path. And I think it’s a beautiful teaching because everything you see around you was once an original idea and someone had the audacity and the excitement and the level to create that path and forge ahead even though it was tough. So…
TR: Right. And I mean for you to create your own path, now you’re doing Lemonade Stand.
Charan: I’m doing Lemonade Stand.
TR: I mean you had your own show and now you’re doing Lemonade Stand, which is really cool.
Charan: It’s really cool. Yeah. It is. It’s amazing. And it was one of those things where I really went in having no expectations. I was, “This is just going to be fun for me.” I knew when I was going to be fun for me.” I knew when I was doing the Zoom calls it was going to be fun for me and I was going to learn a lot and hopefully share a little bit of joy. And that was the only intention I had. So to do that and now to have Lemonade Stand is pretty wild when you think about it.
TR: It’s really cool.
Charan: Yeah, so I really am a big believer in that. So I know we’ve been talking a lot. So I want to wrap things up a little bit. During those times of hardships, when you were at your friend’s beach house for a few years and just kind of relaxing and kind of, I don’t know, just kind of redefining yourself and finding yourself after you’ve in a sense lost an empire. And you’ve mentioned to me you’ve been bankrupt before and you’ve had to start over a couple times.
TR: Yeah.
Charan: Right?
TR: Yeah. I’m on my second start over right now.
Charan: You are. Okay. Yeah. COVID.
TR: COVID. Well I have two new events that were coming out. One of them is called Fort Nation. And it’s you go, you build your own fort, you listen to stories, and you hang out in your own fort. You can go to the stage and listen or you can hang out in your own fort with your radio.
Charan: Okay.
TR: It’s really fun, cute, build whatever fort you want, we provide the forts, we provide the covering for the fort. So everything looks like you’re in the medieval times.
Charan: I love it. Yeah.
TR: It’s really cool. Right?
Charan: Yeah, super cool.
TR: And I ordered 95,000 feet of PVC pipe for these forts.
Charan: No way.
TR: And COVID hit and I mean I had 15 events lined up back, to back, to back, to back. And now I’m just waiting for that to-
Charan: Open up again.
TR: To open up again.
Charan: Wow.
TR: I had to walk away from my Slide the City and my Lantern Fest.
Charan: You did. Because of COVID, or because of just…
TR: Beforehand. I walked away from that. Yeah. Long story.
Charan: Yeah.
TR: So…
TR Gourley Talks About Persevering and Finding Joy
Charan: No worries. No worries. You don’t have to talk about it. Unless you want to talk about it. I don’t care. It’s up to you. The thing is you’ve had to start over multiple times. So how did you keep going?
TR: The first time I had to start over, I didn’t think I’d be able to do it.
Charan: This was the loan thing, right?
TR: The loan company. I’m, “How am I ever going to do it? How am I going to be happy? I have nothing.” That was my first lesson I had to learn. I learned that I can be happy if I have nothing.
Charan: Okay.
TR: Which is I learned it when I was 29, 30 years old. I’m really glad I learned it at that point in my life.
Charan: So how did you achieve that happiness when you had nothing?
TR: I just went back to the only thing I could hold on to were my relationships, and I just put everything into my relationships, my friendships. And I find so much joy in those relationships. And I think that’s probably the biggest thing that brings me joy is relationships with other people, interacting with other people, especially that I’m close to. And I think that was what got me through the first hard time, and what I always am most thankful for are my friendships.
Charan: Yeah. It’s so interesting because you’ve become a bit of a public figure because of all these events and stuff you’ve done and success that you’ve had. And whenever people become public figures, I’ve noticed this for myself, you don’t know who’s your true friend, or who’s kind of around you just because you’re successful and they want to ride on your coattails. Or… And then they disappear when you don’t have anything. But when they disappear and when success is gone, that’s when you realize who your true friends are.
TR: Yeah. You can’t imagine how many people were, “Oh TR, can I get some tickets to Lantern Fest?”
Charan: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
TR: I’m, “Yeah, sure. Here’s your tickets.” And then they’re gone.
Charan: Then they’ve gone.
TR: Then they’re gone. Yeah. And it’s interesting because you had your true friends from before that you’re able to connect with and find that those relationships made you happy.
Charan: Yeah.
TR: Right?
Charan: So would you say that that’s where your truest sense of joy comes from right now?
TR: Yeah. Relationships.
Charan: Relationships.
TR: Yeah.
Charan: So what do you do to I guess strengthen those relationships that you have right now?
TR: I rarely make new friends because I know how much time and effort I give to my friends and my relationships. So for me to bring on a new real friend is really hard because I know how much time I have. And it’s, “Do I have enough time to…” “Yeah, let’s bring on another friend. Let’s bring one more in. Let’s bring one more in.” But I know how much time and effort that I have and want to give to relationships, and bringing on new friends is always…
TR: I mean, I remember when I was really little I moved to a new school, and my mom said, “Pray that you make some friends.” And I’d pray every night that I would have friends at school. And my first friend ever was Josh Nielson.
Charan: Oh wow.
TR: Do you remember Josh?
Charan: Dude, not only do I remember Josh, we talk almost every other day or-
TR: Stop it.
Charan: I’m dead serious. We’re really close friends.
TR: Okay. So you got to tell him this story.
Charan: Okay. Absolutely.
TR: So I go out to recess because he was in my class and he was so nice, and he was my first friend. And I’m, “Josh. Josh.” I’m yelling at him across the way. I’m, “Hey.” We’re in third grade or whatever. And then he’s, “I’m not Josh. I’m Jared.” And it’s his twin brother. “But I know where Josh is. Come on.” And then I’m, “Oh, I have two friends.” But as I grew up, I think that prayer that I, and I continued to pray that I always have friends. I’ve been able to make friends with so many people, and I have so many good relationships and friends all over the world. I was just a groomsman to my buddy who was my Slide the City franchisee in Hong Kong.
Charan: Wow.
TR: And I go and visit my friend in Malaysia who we’ve for the last five years have been friends because of Slide the City and the other events that we do. Now we’re doing a New Year’s Eve party every year in Malaysia and we just have a blast. We talk every day on the phone together.
Charan: That’s amazing.
TR: I love my relationships. They’re great.
Charan: And relationships truly are priceless. I mean they really are. It’s interesting because in high school I was shy but when I started making more friends, I found that I would kind of hop around. I didn’t have one group of friends. I would hop around from group, to group, to group and I had a couple friends in all those areas. But as I’ve gotten older, I still have tendencies to do project, to project, to project, to project, but I do have certain people I would spend more time with than others. And it’s with them it’s I can be so real. And they don’t care about anything other than just spending time with each other. And with those people, I want to have experiences with them. So for me, it’s having those friendships and saying, “Hey, let’s just go out and go camping, or let’s go hiking.” I just hiked last week with some friends. And it’s just unbelievable how something that’s completely free really when you think about it are the things that you remember the most. You’re not always concerned about how much money you spent on this or this or that, but you’re…
Charan: We have a common friend Easton and just seeing you guys run the other day, it’s so cool to think that after all these years, you guys are still such good buddies.
TR: I know. I know. I love that. It’s fun.
Charan: Yeah. And then the last question I’d ask you, first off, thanks so much for taking the time.
TR: Yeah, thanks for having me on this.
TR Gourley’s Advice to His Younger Self
Charan: This is amazing. Yeah, I’m learning a ton about you. What would you tell your younger self? Maybe what would you tell your 29-year-old self, or 27-year-old self when that failure happened? And what would you tell the self that’s back in high school?
TR: Geez. Man. What would I tell myself in high school? Have as much fun as I possibly can.
Charan: I love that.
TR: Right?
Charan: Yeah.
TR: Have fun. I want to say to my younger self, “Don’t do this, this, this, and this. Watch out for this, this, this, and this.” But then I wouldn’t know what I know today.
Charan: Absolutely.
TR: Right?
Charan: Yeah.
TR: Sitting where I am today, I’m really happy for the experiences that I’ve, for the lessons that I’ve learned, the patience that I’ve learned, the relationships that I have, and being able to travel the world, being able to do so much. I’m really thankful for what I have. I’d probably tell my younger self, “Just love what you do. Love what you do and treat other people well.”
Charan: Yeah. [inaudible 00:55:00] It’s so interesting, TR. I love where you’re at in life man. Here’s the deal, we both grew up in similar communities where the ideology would be, hey, get married, have a family, and all that stuff. That didn’t happen for me.
TR: It hasn’t happened for me.
Charan: It hasn’t happened for you. We’re about the same age. And…
TR: We should have four kids right now.
Charan: We should at least have four. Between the two of us, we should have tons. But what’s interesting though, and I love this about you, is there’s a lot of people when things like that have not happened, and there’s an expectation maybe of it happening, they get really depressed. And they kind of or get really bitter. And yet I see you choosing to make good decisions and still make the world a better place.
TR: Trying. Yeah.
Charan: And I loved how you said, “Hey, have as much fun as you can.” That’s kind of my motto. And it’s not about being selfish because when you’re having fun, what happens I think is you end up spreading your light and your joy to a lot of people. And so I’m really a big proponent of, “Hey, have fun with your family, your friends, your relationships. Strengthen those up. Because those are the things that have the most amount of value.
TR: Yeah.
Charan: So, well, any last words, TR, as we wrap this up?
TR: One other thing that I would say would be to make memories. Do things to make memories. And I think that’s why I love my events. I love my events because they make memories. One of my fondest memories, we were doing Lantern Fest, and there was a family that got there a little bit late and I asked them, I’m, “Where are you guys from?” Because everybody comes from all over everywhere. They said, “We live in Philadelphia. We just moved here from Pakistan.” I was, “Okay. Cool.” And they came up to me when I was handing wood out for the fires. We give free wood to everybody and everyone has a fire pit. And they didn’t have a fire pit. And I grabbed them their own fire pit. The first time they had ever had this experience. I grabbed their own fire pit. There’s 20 of them. Big family, little tiny kids running around having a blast.
TR: And I start the fire for them, they had no clue that I started it. And I’m just helping them out. And they go, “What are these?” And we give everybody a s’mores pack. I go, “These are s’mores.” They go, “What’s a s’more?” So I go, “Oh, this is going to be amazing.” So I make them a s’more and I hand it to the dad. And he goes, “I’m not going to eat that. No way.” I go, “Well can I give it to your kid?” He goes, “Absolutely.” The kid eats it, the kid’s face just lights up like crazy and the dad is, “Okay, let me have a bite.” And he tried it and that was their first s’more ever.
Charan: Wow. Yeah.
TR: And I already understood, but it was at that moment I was, “This is why I love doing events.” I remembered why I love doing something that gives back a positive message and a positive experience to people. And that’s what I would probably tell myself. “Create something good.”
Charan: “Create something good.” That’s beautiful man. I really appreciate you saying that. I don’t know if you remember Mike Earl back in high school. He was our year. And he was always like that. He was, “Hey, let’s make memories. Let’s do this.” And we made these little homemade movies and it was so ridiculous. It was like the physiology. It was just so ridiculous. But after high school, he got into a longboarding accident and he passed away.
TR: Oh geez.
Charan: And then I looked at all those memories that we made and I’m, “Dude, these are priceless. These are absolutely priceless.” So I really value making memories and making memories with my friends and sharing that with the world and just sharing joy with the world in whatever way you can, right?
TR: Right.
Charan: One of the reasons why I left LA to come back to Utah for-
TR: LA is hard.
Charan: It’s hard. It’s very difficult and it’s a challenge. But I also felt the reason why I even got into making movies was not really achieved when I was in LA, which was to make really good positive messaging but with my friends. And so I’m just a big believer in doing that. And, yeah man. I’m so grateful that you decided to join me on this thing. And, yeah. Let’s make some positive memories together, okay?
TR: Awesome.
Charan: Awesome. Okay. And that’s TR Gourley at the Lemonade Stand. Thanks again, TR.
Charan: Thanks so much for listening to the Lemonade Stand podcast, and we hope you enjoyed this episode. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast on whatever platform you use to be alerted when we release new episodes. We’d also love to hear your feedback in the reviews, and if you or someone you know has an awesome Lemonade Stand story, please reach out to us on social media and let us know. Thanks so much and have a great day.