today gaming america is speaking with andrew kenward the president and ceo of almost friday media we're to hear about what they offer and how afford looking media company can work with the gaming industry thank you for speaking with us today andrew hey thanks for having me our pleasure um so before we get into it a little bit i was hoping you could talk some about your background uh what was your path to your current position at almost friday media yeah so um i mean uh i really started working the entertainment business when i was in college i went to university of texas started working in music doing some concert promoting uh kind of like caught the bug that way ended up falling into this big concert promotion business uh out of austin called c3 presents they produced like all the lollapaloozas uh austin city limits they do concert booking you know globally and you know around the us and from that moment i was kind of like oh like i wanna i wanna make this my career you know so um i kind of uh charted a path to find my way to one of the major agencies i wanted to go work at like a ca or wme and this was kind of like as the recession was just like ravaging america too so i kind of made the uh the decision like you know what feels like a good time to go invest in myself my education i'll go to law school i went to university of florida kind of immediately after after college um and that's actually where i first got my taste of like startup life i i worked at a company called grooveshark which if you remember them at all they're like an early little modified competitor like uh they they were it was awesome it was founded by two gainesville students um they were a young company everyone was like 25 you know they had 30 million users at their peak it was it was like this like cool hip music company in gainesville um and uh after that i was able to get an internship at wmu one summer so i was like still in law school and and eventually went back full time like right after i graduated and and i mean i took the bar exam in florida just like i guess to say that i did and then uh moved to los angeles like two weeks later and that was the start that was the start of it i um spent eight years at william morris endeavor uh for sort of like bouncing around working in different departments everywhere from music to television to like sort of like the chief of staff position for our co-ceo for about a year and a half and then landed uh as an agent in our digital media group it was like growing incredibly fast i had uh this nice little bird's eye view working for patrick weitzel was the co-ceo at the time um now he's the executive chairman but i i was like all right this group looks like you could be super entrepreneurial there's not a lot of like you know seniority or people above you know above you so you could kind of you know go do what you want you had like your department head and and see if you can go figure it out and on a macro level it's just like digital media is is becoming more and more the thing it was sort of that that decision is sort of what put me on the rails to get to where i am now and working at almost friday media sure uh and about almost friday media i was wondering if you could just sort of explain for a viewership uh what you do what your ethos is what distinguishes you from the other uh startup media companies yeah for sure so you know i can tell a little story in how i even met these guys it was about uh you know ended november 2019 so like coming up on three years ago i think another friend of mine had sent me a dm with the friday beers uh like one of their first videos and was like oh check this out like this is hilarious he knew i was an agent in digital media it was like something just like clock and put on my radar i think they had 5 000 followers at the time right so i um i checked it out i was like this is funny i kind of went home for the holidays forgot about it for a couple months and then i got a phone call from a colleague in early january we're just getting back to the office like hey these guys are looking to talk to you know some agents and digital media representation uh they have this instagram account called friday beers would you be interested i think if anybody would know what this is it'd be you you know i kind of represented other like you know dude comedians these guys like chad goes deep if you've heard of them they uh they actually have a show on netflix coming out um next week that uh we like helped put together so it was like very much like in my world and i uh i met him and then i looked up the account again because it did a couple months i hadn't seen it and they had like 250 000 followers like it went from like zero to you know 100 like very very fast um and we uh we got to talking we really like had this conversation about like philosophically like what do they want to do with this you know like do do they want to just use this as a way to like store some jokes and like be funny online while they pursue like careers as like writers and screenwriters or like do they see this becoming like a media company and um they chartered this they put a deck together actually that was like really well thought out that sort of laid the foundation for what we've been pursuing ever since really so now almost friday media is a network of digital media brands and accounts we have you know like 15 plus brands across like tick tock youtube instagram uh you know we have merchandise that we sell for friday beers and almost friday and a lot of our other accounts that uh we operate um and we you know we're we work with brands um we uh started really working with a lot of like beer companies there's like such a natural fit for what our largest brand was in our ecosystem yeah the handle at friday.beers uh but now you know we're working with all sorts of blue chip brands from like grub hubs of the world to dave and busters to uh you know uh alto like a rideshare company is a new partner of ours that we're really excited about um and yeah we we love to create kind of like in a sea of internet content that tries to like stir controversy or you know get people fired up in the comment section about whatever like hot take is out there in the moment like we are trying to be like a a nicer sandbox to play in like we want to talk about like our relatable and common experiences and um kind of the entire brand ethos is like what is that friday beers moment for for you out there like that that little light at the end of the tunnel like at the end of the week where like you get to shed the responsibility of your job or the things that like cause you stress and just sort of get to you know hang out and be with your friends or the people you care most about and that's the stuff that we like joke about and kind of treat in an esteem that feels like a movie uh and that's why like a lot of the content is like pulling these clips from like famous you know movies or sports moments or like big memorable tv show moments and then layering in like kind of like the mundane life stuff with like those text tracking jokes over that that become like so relatable for all of us and i think it makes us feel like we're all like in in the movie of our own lives i guess is the vibe it gives yeah sure um that's interesting but uh it does make sense considering the times and uh the generation in which we live i was wondering though uh moving on into the world of betting i know you have a big deal with uh that mgm that was just announced or almost friday media has a big deal with but mgm yeah so now i was wondering before we get into that uh was the bet mgm deal your first foray into you know betting or gaming or have had you worked in that field before yeah no it really was our is this our first like major foray into the space like we've we've done some smaller deals we're i'll give uh our guy ricky at juice reel a shout out because he's uh done some stuff with us early on but this is our first like you know big uh sort of concerted effort and campaign in in the betting space and you know what's interesting is one of those networks of it one of the accounts like indoor networks is actually a sports betting um like character it's it's called dr locks so for for your audience that's a definite follow go check out at drlocks.md and it's it's really funny it's it's you know a lifestyle account about sports betting and and um the gaming space so you know we're we're definitely not going to try and be like the actual network or you know we're we're not sharps right like we're not gonna be like trying to like give pics that you should like care about because like we think they're gonna win we are more um of a like lifestyle brand that wants to like either like ride together just for the the joy of it and and for the the excitement of it all and you know we're able to like commiserate together online but um when we lose you know also like that's probably the biggest part of it actually but um we're really excited because like the friday beers fan is is a sports fan like we over index in you know like sports fans on our pages by like 100x compared to the average instagram page right yeah um but what i think is it the timing is just so great right it's like we're experiencing this moment in america where sports gambling is coming online and all these states and you know even for like a guy who like i love sports and i i if i go to vegas for the weekend i'd love to put a little action on on you know some games or whatever while i'm there and it's like the problem is it's like it's definitely like intimidating you know like that first moment you walk up to the sports book i'm like it feels like uh you know you're doing like a calculus problem or like it's like there's a lot going on so i um i think like where we can be really helpful as a company is like simplifying translating a little bit of like this language that's becoming new to people like it now on their cell phone and we're on their cell phone it's like a very easy just you know hey we want to like one really cool thing that we're doing better gm is like we're going to have programmed simple like parley picks in app that we could send people to you know and just say like hey if you want to ride with like the crew of friday beers or almost friday this weekend like we could send you to the one-click you know landing page that doesn't make you have to like assemble a ticket on your own when you maybe i don't even know how to do that right uh narrows the field a bit yeah yeah and um i think like like anything there's it it's it's just more fun when there's community around it um i'd say like relative to like your average you know and talking about how we are different than like other sort of internet publishers and and meme pages like i think there's a real community and the friday beers uh you know audience and and you know they're pretty um just like engaged with the brand in a way where they're buying our merchandise and and they feel like they're part of this like group where if like you were to wear a friday beers t-shirt and walk down the street and see somebody else like you might get like a friday beers or like uh you know like a whale or whatever and uh i we want to bring like that feeling to the sports betting space like to our audience and um we're we're going to be throwing a lot of events we're going to be doing a lot of like cool like merchandise giveaways and and this will all be supported by digital content online but this isn't just like a purely like you know how do we pump out in front of as many eyeballs as possible and like get some sort of like you know small level of transaction based off of just like pure aggressive like content out on the internet you know this is like more about building community like creating a conversation um and using all the tools we have in our you know kind of tool shed to do that for bed mgm sure sure uh well i wanted to move on to the bed mgm thing how how did that uh relationship sort of start what's the backstory and how has it been working with such a monster company like that yeah i mean quite candidly like when we were first exploring doing something in uh with you know as a sports betting partner or gaming partner it was uh almost like a year ago i mean it was it was kind of like fall of uh 2021 is when we started just like having like some early conversations um we were talking the all the you know the the players and um it was exciting there was actually i think a lot of interest from these uh these guys to to work with us and it's funny there was always seemed to be like a guy on their team who like really knew who we were it was like acting as like the translator to like the rest of the the rest of the you know the executive team or whoever we were talking to um but uh you know we um we had a relationship through two of our investors that's uh connected us um actually through entaine who's that mgm's uh partner in the uh the app and uh it was it was like a really quick introduction like hey you guys should you know meet right um as most things start and we i'll say one thing we're really good at is like we put we put together pretty comprehensive pitch decks that kind of show the breadth of our you know reach and the kind of like fandom i was explaining within our community you know and um it was uh it was sort of like a really exciting match i think when we we met that mgm like there's a few things i think we were particularly excited about one is like their bet just best in class like from a user experience um they're you know the app is amazing um you know i know a big way that like we're going to be judged and how the success of this like partnership works is like getting people to sign up and use the app and like a big thing for us was like not wanting to send send somebody to a product that like was like clunky or you know there's uh or difficult to get money out of or put money in or any of that stuff so that that was sort of key and then i think the other really exciting part about the bet mgm relationship is like they are a global you know casino brand with like an actual footprint um in every state that that has like a a like a retail gambling experience right and like so much of that aligns with almost friday media in the sense that like we we are not just an internet company like we we throw we did a whole spring college tour with a dj act that we have under our umbrella uh you can check out dj press play at dj pressplay on instagram but you know we did like a 13 stop tour in the spring we have a residency actually at the borgata for that act uh which is um mgm property so there was just a ton of overlap and as much as like the economics like you know were a driving factor like there honestly there were some other opportunities i think that would have been like a guaranteed like bigger payday but we just thought the alchemy of the mix uh the um you know the the cachet of the brand uh itself is just like incredible we uh we love working with them and their team is amazing they've been super you know they're a huge company but i think we've been able to be incredibly nimble so far and we're gonna be kicking off content uh in like the next like 10 days so i'm excited to really see it start to come to life on the uh publicly yeah and i was wondering if you could speak uh a bit more about that content or about sort of the nuts and bolts of your relationship i know you mentioned that you uh sort of aggregate uh tips for your followers uh and lead them to bed mgm can you speak more about uh you know what's what you're actually going to be providing vis-a-vis bed mgm yeah so um you know it it's it's almost like a little bit harder to explain the exact type of content that we create but if you if you check out on friday beers there's there's certain like formats throughout the week that um that our audience has like become to to really know and uh obviously like on the handle at friday that beers like it's a pretty big celebration every time we like get around to like thursday or friday like we're we're starting to really celebrate the weekend and what's nice is that lines up so perfectly with like the big sports cycle especially during football season right so the the idea is and and i'm not gonna say this is gonna happen every week uh because i you know i'm sure we're gonna have to like really get in a rhythm but the um the goal is like be able to have special curated bets that uh we come up with from the friday beerus point of view that i think touch more on like cultural relevancy than like trying to be like a boosted you know like sharp pick right so like for instance like kenny pickett is like a like a friend of ours and we we're always like engaging with him online right and now that he's going to the steelers like we want to like support him you know so like i'm sure you'll see a lot of like kenny pickett like same game like parlay action coming from from us right so we're going to create content that sort of um you know is is in support of that kind of joke but it also now has like a real tangible experiential moment where you could go hey like i can go throw 10 bucks on that you know so um we're gonna have a consistent like cadence of content throughout the week that mainly is on the at friday.pure's handle and then the at dr locks handle um you know and uh we're uh we're super stoked about it it's it's really i think for the fall gonna mirror the the football season cadence um but this is a you know a partnership that's gonna stand beyond football season so we're we're excited to you know see how it plays around hockey and basketball and all the like you know what's going on in golf right now is like so interesting too so there's like a lot of like cultural like touch points that we could grab on to to sort of get people like fired up about these moments in sports and yeah right alongside us and uh with bet mgm well lord knows betting season is about to commence yeah i can't wait yeah um i also wanted to ask uh well do you see sports betting as having uh a bigger space in almost friday media slash do you have an exclusivity sort of agreement with bet mgm yeah so we're they're our exclusive partner on these uh you know these like two uh being accounts i mean we definitely see what you know i i think that the timing is like so perfect like not only do i see it as a bigger part of like what almost friday media is doing like i see it as a bigger part of like just the glo like the sports economy in the united states like you know as and we're sort of riding that wave together and at the same time so like we um we absolutely uh you know want to continue to like deepen and broaden our relationship i mean we we have other accounts i think that we're we're you know still in like earlier days of growing like some particular niche like sports accounts that we're gonna like definitely blend to this deal but i think as those grow and like the the opportunity in sports gambling uh grows like in the us like there's gonna be bigger opportunity for us to be doing more and more with with our partner um like empty netters for example is a hockey account that we operate uh you know it's it's it's got a small but mighty following right now you know it's probably like around like 25 000 followers right on on instagram but um really engaged audience super niche audience and that's the way that we're thinking about communicating with a sports fan is you know it's really hard to go be like another like bleacher report right just like super general like you know talk about everything in sports under the sun um it's just it they've got a great uh they've cornered the market on on those things it's a it's it's hard to challenge that that kind of incumbent but i think where we get uh we have a competitive advantage getting very granular on these communities and talking to them as if like it was just like one of their friends who really understood that uh that community i mean uh we're you know we're we're thinking about how do we build out you know content like specifically even for lacrosse right as like the premier league premier lacrosse league is growing in the u.s like we over index and lacrosse fans um on like the friday beers and other accounts that we operate so we we know that like that's a market we could speak to um we're just trying to be like you know cautious but diligent and finding like good partners who can create for for those niche communities and i think in turn like that's all going to fuel how we better serve and grow our relationship with uh you know our partner in bed mgm sure sure um my last question is sort of going a bit further away from sports betting more towards almost friday media but i would like to know i mean it seems you're on this big growth path of getting all these you know different accounts together or platforms or whatever you want to call them i was wondering where do you see almost friday media 18 24 months from now yeah i i think like it's doing exactly that um you know we're what i've what's interesting is you know there's a lot of really really funny creative people out there that are operating uh these accounts sort of like completely on their own right with within the real infrastructure and and what we have decided to invest in um was you know building out that that team like having a real like merchandise operation that if uh there's a creator and a brand out there that we think really fits our our brand's tone of voice and ethos but maybe talks to a different niche community how do we bring them in offer them you know support to run the account um you know and then ways to really go monetize the account like we want to be an economic backbone for the these people that like a lot of them like have full-time day jobs you know and like these things are a hobby for them but um it's something they're very passionate about and they put a lot of time and energy into and now we're becoming a solution where hey like you know you could you could make some money off of this and and um you know i think there's some really interesting opportunities in uh you know bigger like ownership or licensing type of opportunities with our brands as well you know it's it's it's early days but like you know you would think with a brand name like friday beers like we would be trying to figure out a way to make a product in in like the alcohol beverage space you know so like we've we've gotten approached a ton of different times about it and we're just again being very like diligent the company is so young right like it it's it's really funny how many people have approached me and being like oh like i've been following friday beers for like five years and i'm like i know it feels like that because two of those recovered but like it's only been around for like two and a half years you know so um it's uh it's awesome because there's just so much opportunity i think like coming our way and and now we're at this point we have to be very just like diligent measured where do we see like real growth and value in the next like 18 to 24 months and i think it's continuing to expand our media footprint but but not in a way that's like a shotgun right like we're not gonna say like hey everybody you can be part of our network we're gonna be pretty i think discerning as to like what brands like fit or fit our voice and like fit our style of uh comedy and then what are those like bigger swing opportunities where we can create businesses that we have more ownership in uh with the right partners that you know our brand are like a face up and a part of and can be the marketing engine behind um is uh i think like the the real focus for the next like 18 to 24 months sure sure well andrew good luck with that thank you cameron yeah uh this has been andrew kenward president ceo of almost friday media thank you for speaking with gaming mayor thanks cameron it's been great you