#FeastVoxBox with Influenster!

I've been lucky enough to be chosen to participate in multiple Influenster VoxBox campaigns, since joining the organization a few months ago. The VoxBox is a complimentary box of goodies that is shipped from Influenster to the Influenster participants who are selected, based on their social media impact or influence.

My first VoxBox was the GentsVoxBox, which included an amazing hair product by TIGI, shaving cream and a razor from Barbasol and Gillette. The most recent VoxBox, the FeastVoxBox contained many Thanksgiving treats, new products like the Country Crock Buttery Sticks, which I used to make the most delicious chocolate chip cookies. I'm telling you, these sticks are incredible. Not only do they taste great, you don't have to leave the butter out at room temperature before use. They blend smoothly into cake batter and cookie dough.

My favorite product in the FeastVoxBox was the Tim Tam biscuits from Australia. I received the dark chocolate flavor, and the entire box was literally gone in about 10 minutes. During the Influenster Facebook Live meetup, I learned about what is called the Tim Tam Slam. You take the Tim Tam, bite a hole in each end, and use it as a straw to drink your coffee. As soon as it becomes soft, from the liquid, you slam it in your mouth. OMG! I have never tasted anything like it.

I'm very excited to keep participating in Influenster's VoxBox program. When you complete tasks during the campaign, such as talking about a product in a blog post, or sharing your goodies with your friends on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook, you are eligible to receive a super prize from the various brands represented in the box. For the GentsVoxBox, I won a complete beard grooming kit worth quite a bit of money. The products are fantastic for No-Shave November!

If you are interested in becoming an Influenster too, check it out here: JOIN INFLUENSTER!

Ever Thought of Women's Roller Derby to Destress and Unwind?

So, I know what you are probably thinking… Why is an educational blog doing a sports post? Well, these girls have created something out of nothing, which I feel is exactly what teachers do, or try to do. I like to focus on all types of teaching, and people who create things that are unique and different. Roller derby is not something that is widely known about, and Teresa and her team have done an amazing job at bringing it into the light. After only starting their team a little over a year ago, they are seeing relatively large turnouts to their events and huge growth in their created league. If we can take some of the ideas and concepts they have used and apply them to our endeavors, I see a great deal of benefit. Also, the percentage of teachers who are women is overwhelming, and this may be something you have never thought of trying. Sometimes, we have to have "me" time or destress a bit. That being said, I hope you enjoy the interview and are able to see the value in what these ladies have created.

Photography by Russell Reno Photography

Jeremy Whitley, KindleSparx: Hi Teresa, thank you so much for agreeing to talk with me. Could you tell us a bit about yourself and Loco City Derby Girls?

Teresa Wright, Co-Founder of Loco City Derby Girls:  Thank you for your interest in roller derby and giving us the opportunity to spread the word. I’m just a normal, family-oriented gal; I have a son, with a daughter on the way. For my full-time job, I manage a small dentist office, here in Lodi, California. Growing up, I was always very athletic. However, when I became an adult, the opportunity to participate in sports sort of fell by the wayside. I’ve done marathons and adult softball, but nothing really pushed me physically and I missed the team aspect and the competitiveness of my youth. Loco City Derby Girls (LCDG) is Lodi’s women’s flat track roller derby team! We just started the team in late 2014 and had super successful 2015, 2016, and 2017 seasons—we are really looking forward to more growth and exposure during 2018, so this interview opportunity presented itself at the perfect time.  

KS:  What sparked your interest in roller derby and how did the team get started? Could you give us a little background on the derby landscape in the area?

LCDG:  One day, while being a couch potato, I came across a few documentaries about roller derby on Netflix. I searched up local roller derby online and found Port City Roller Girls in Stockton, California. I went to one practice to watch, showed up to the next one with cheap Big 5 Sporting Goods skates, and the rest is history—5 years have gone by in the blink of an eye! I skated with Port City Roller Girls for 3.5 years before a friend of mine contacted me about a team in Lodi she was looking to start up. She asked me to be the Vice President of the league and together, with an awesome team of coaches, LCDG was born from a fresh bunch of recruits from Lodi and the surrounding area.

KS:  That’s so inspiring! So, this may be a little personal for you, anything you want to say about this would be great. Why not just stick with Port City Roller Girls? Why go to the trouble to start your own?

LCDG:  My friend Anne and I skated for the Port City Roller Girls and decided we wanted to go a different direction business-wise. We both felt the team could be an outlet for community outreach as well as empowering for women. Like I had mentioned, she is the one who made the big move and called me up one day and said, “Well, I got the business license,” and we went from there. With her degree in accounting and mine in business, and our history of skating together, we really make a good duo on and off the track. We recently celebrated the team’s 1^st birthday, and we honestly accomplished so much in this first season. We obtained our non-profit status as well as being accepted into the WFTDA Apprenticeship in 2016—we spent the 2016 season working hard to obtain our full “member league” status. We are the first, and only, Central Valley roller derby team to accomplish both, non-profit status as well as WFTDA association, and this was just our first season!

KS:  To be able to accomplish all of this in one season, you must have a great community. Tell us a little bit about their involvement and what you do to give back.

LCDG:  Lodi has really accepted the team, with an outpouring of support at our bouts (games). As a result, we had 2 teams in the 2016 and 2017 seasons. We will operate under the league name, Loco City Derby Girls, but will have a “home” team comprised of the “C” level skaters, and a “travel” team, comprised of the more seasoned skaters. We will let them come up with the team names and take a vote; we let the girls vote on pretty much everything, it helps them to feel in control and empowered and gives them a sense of ownership of the team.

Photography by Russell Reno Photography

Anyway, we have something that we call the LocoCollective. It basically represents anything we do in the community, which would be considered charitable or giving back. It’s a play on words, we are Loco City, but we used it to represent Local—so instead of Local Collective, we created this whole hashtag frenzy #LocoCollective. We have donated to the Lodi Santa Truck, Animal Friends Connection, Case4Kids (suitcases full of goodies for foster children), Ruth’s Room (same idea, only instead of foster kids, it is geared toward underprivileged teenaged girls), Lodi House, 180 Teen Center, and a bunch of smaller foundations.

KS:  What advice do you have for anyone interested in getting involved? Are there other areas besides skating that someone can participate? If someone does want to join the team, are there openings? What are the procedures and requirements?

LCDG:  It takes a lot of guts for people to even show up to roller derby practice for the first time. Most are super nervous and very intimidated. My advice to anyone interested in getting involved is to just believe in you! We are capable of so much more than we give ourselves credit for. The team doesn’t expect you to know how to roller skate, let alone know how to play the game. We are fully equipped, and more than willing to teach anyone what they need to know to not only start but to excel.

I had never even seen roller derby in person before I showed up, and I kind of think it was a good thing. Had I gone to a bout beforehand, I may have never had the courage to skate onto the track myself. I guess my official advice would be to check out our Facebook page, check out our website, and send us an email to find out a good night to show up to practice and watch. Our doors are open at all times to anyone interested. You could even come out to a bout at the Grape Festival grounds in Lodi to check it out, but like I said, that may have been a deterrent for me; you will see a lot of hard hits and falls and at that point, you don’t realize that these girls have been training to know how to do everything safely.

Many people show up to derby and decide rather quickly that the athletic endeavor, along with the commitment required, is a bit much for them, but have met so many awesome people that they decide to become off-skate volunteers. Our league is a non-profit organization, so we absolutely need, appreciate, and LOVE all of our volunteers! Our off-skate volunteers are an integral part of our team and we would definitely not exist without them. Many people (both male and female) choose to become referees for the team, which is an on-skate, official position that does not involve the full body contact that a player encounters. If anyone is interested, there is training available to be successful as a referee as well.

KS:  You must know a lot of roller derby ladies. Are there any predominant characteristics you've noticed in ladies who gravitate toward this sport?

LCDG:  There are a lot of different personalities that show up to derby. Some gals are there for the, how do I say it nicely? Male attention the sport gets. Those women don’t typically last too long because it really is hard work and that idea of fishnets, boobs, and butt cheeks is a thing of the past. Other gals show up as like, mid-life crisis type of situation. It is very common for ladies that are unsatisfied at home to show up to derby, become empowered, make changes to their personal lives that they were unable to do before, skate a season or two, and then move on to the next thing. I figure it served its purpose for them, helped them find their inner hero and do what they needed to do to find fulfillment in their lives.

Photography by Russell Reno Photography

For those of us who have stuck it out season after season, it is totally and completely because we are bat-shit crazy about our fitness, female empowerment, and being strong role models for the women and girls within our community. These ladies are always, always, always incredibly industrious; they tend to be the ones to get things done in all aspects of their lives and are usually very well-rounded—derby is only one of the awesome things they do!

KS:  How many girls are on the team? How often do you recruit?

LCDG:  At this time, we have approximately twenty-five active skaters, a handful of referees, as well as a family of devout off-skate volunteers. Like I said before, our doors are one hundred percent open at all times to anyone who is interested in the league. We do hold official recruitment events a few times throughout the year at the Grape Festival grounds in Lodi, California. This would be what we lovingly refer to as a “fresh meat” recruit night. Zero experience is necessary and it is more of an information gathering night, although, if you are comfortable and equipped, you are more than welcome to skate. On these nights, you get to see the team in action, find out what it takes to be part of the league, and learn more about what types of positions within the league would best suit you.

Here is a link to the event:  https://www.facebook.com/events/148302322191940/

KS:  What about men? Are there male or co-ed counterparts to LCDG?

LCDG:  Men’s Derby, or as we lovingly call it, Merby, is a growing sport! The closest men’s team that I know of is in Antioch, California. You are more likely to find co-ed teams simply because there are still not enough men, all located within the same area, to make up a full team. While LCDG is a women’s team, we do have many men that are part of the league, mostly as referees; a lot of our gals play on co-ed teams in addition to our women’s team.

KS:  How likely are injuries? What are the most common injuries?

LCDG:  Injuries are very real, and do happen, although the higher the skill level of your play, the fewer injuries you experience. Broken ankles, torn rotator cuffs, broken collar bones, fractured tailbones from falling incorrectly, busted noses, and road rash are among the most common injuries we see. I know a girl that didn’t tuck her hands in when she fell and lost a fingertip due to someone rolling over it—Roller Derby 101 is all about how to fall properly. However, when injuries do happen to your teammates, we really rally around them. Things like take dinner to them the first week or so, visit them in the hospital, cart kids to and from school, fundraise to help them pay medical expenses, etc. That really is what makes derby so special—there really is camaraderie of people that look out for each other on, as well as off the track.

KS:  I love the name, Loco City Derby Girls, where did it come from?

LCDG:  The name Loco City Derby Girls has actually come to mean so many things since we first formed. Initially, Anne chose Loco as a shortened term for locomotive, since the idea is that the league is made up of people from all over the Central Valley and the railroad tracks symbolize the joining of the different areas. Now, we play off of it because we are straight crazy (or loco in Spanish) when we play. It has become part of our team chant and when we skate out, we play the song Crazy Train, and it just accidentally worked. We also incorporate it as a play on words for our non-profit work, as I mentioned, using #lococollective anytime we do something within the community.

KS:  You all have such great derby names! Why the pseudonyms?

LCDG:  Honestly, I don’t agree with skating under a pseudonym. I do it because that is how it is done, but I feel like it is something that holds us back, prevents the sport from being taken seriously; I really struggled with picking a derby name. I really wanted to be Nitrous FoXXXide, but years ago when I started, there was a national registry, and you could not have the same or a similar name to anyone else on any other team anywhere in the United States. As the sport has gained more traction and become more popular, the whole registry system has gone out the window and now players just pick whatever name they want. I ended up with GingerFightis, which has been shortened to Ginger and finally Gingypoo over the years. I have a reputation for being the well-mannered derby girl (the nicest derby girl to be afraid of). Some girls are really brave about their names and pick things like “PantyRaider,” but I try to think about my kids and being a good example—what if my grandma comes to a game? I wanted something everyone could feel comfortable yelling from the stands. As a result, my family has pseudonyms as well: Dad sometimes announces himself as “GingerPop,” my son has a shirt that says “Lil Fightis,” and my bun in the oven already has a onesie that says “Baby Fightis.”

KS:  What kind of marketing do you do for LCDG? A lot of our readers will be interested in getting their own names and shops and causes out into the universe. We had spoken before and I know you said there is an incredible turnout at the events. What is the average number of spectators per event? How did that number grow over time? What advice do you have for someone who is trying to promote something and get the word about what they have to offer?

LCDG:  We do anything we can to get our name out to the public. Namely, we focus on events within the community. Getting the team out into the public to meet people personally is invaluable. One real-life event is worth more than 150 posts on any social media site. We have been able to network with other local businesses, forging awesome relationships and helping us to establish a pretty darn good reputation within the community. We host bouts regularly each year, and our turnouts tend to be 350 to 500 people per bout. I really think that our community has been starved for fun, affordable, family-friendly events and things to do that are exciting; it’s nice that we get to quench that thirst.

There are many, many options and opportunities for businesses, big and small, interested in working with the team. We have sponsorship levels that range from $25 for a single event to $1000 for a season—some are even tax deductible. You can check out our website for more information on that at www.lococityderbygirls.org. For example, Stockton Railcar Repair sponsors me—he pays $500 per year to be named as my sponsor. The business’ logo is on my uniform, the owner gets free VIP tickets for the season, free advertising, and free representation at any events he does during the season. His sponsorship pays for my monthly dues and could go toward new equipment purchases, but I am pretty set on equipment, so this year, I just donated the rest to the team.

We are also open to listening to ideas, suggestions, and trying to cater to the needs of individual businesses. As we are well aware, not every business model is the same, so if we can work out something that is mutually beneficial than you can’t beat a win-win.

KS:  That sounds great! I am going to have to think about doing a sponsorship or some advertisement. This is honestly something that I had never thought of before, I’m sure there are roller derby teams all across the country; which is virtually an untapped resource for many small businesses.

Is there an opportunity for an entrepreneur or small business to participate in the events themselves? I know you had mentioned getting a booth or table to sell items during the events. What all is involved in that and is this normal across the country at similar events, you think? Perhaps this is an untapped resource for new businesses to get inexpensive exposure?

LCDG:  Having vendors at roller derby events is par for the course wherever you may go throughout the United States. Hosting these events comes at a substantial cost to the team, so offering vendor and advertising spaces helps us to make it all happen. At our bouts, we typically have a food vendor, beer and wine vendor, and offer “other” spaces as well. Roller derby is an affordable way to get the word out about your business to a hard-to-reach demographic that typically has disposable income.

KS:  How much does a typical bout cost a spectator?

LCDG:  The typical cost all depends on the spectator. If you plan ahead, early bird tickets are $10 each, which covers come in, watch the game, and leave. However, there are very few people who just do that. Our bouts have Mexican food, the beer booth I mentioned, snacks and sodas, team merchandise, local vendors booths, as well as a “fan party” after the bout at Take 27.

KS:  Perfect! So, it sounds like it could serve as a unique, fun date night—or a family-friendly outing that most people have probably never thought of.

I want to give a great big thank you to Teresa Wright, Vice President of Loco City Derby Girls, for taking the time to talk with me and share your insight, and walk our readers through the ins and outs of roller derby as a potential business opportunity as well as a possible extracurricular activity or way to get or stay in shape that they may have never thought of. Please keep us updated on any LCDG news and I will be sure to share with our readers! I look forward to following up in the future and checking in! I will definitely be coming out to a bout or two during the 2018 season, and I recommend everyone else in the area do the same. Even if you aren’t able to make it to the Lodi area, maybe you will be able to see the 2018 “travel” team Teresa talked about or support a roller derby league in your state.

Photography by Russell Reno Photography

If you’d like more information about Teresa’s team and everything we’ve talked about, and you want to support them, please check them out on their website, their Facebook, and Instagram:

https://www.lococityderbygirls.org

https://www.instagram.com/lococityderbygirls/

https://www.facebook.com/lococityderbygirls/

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