Tennessee Turfgrass Association – Interview with Tom Samples Professional of the Year Recipient, Bill Blackburn

March 18, 2019 | Tennessee Turfgrass Association | PODCAST

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Tennessee Turfgrass – Bill Blackburn

Turf Zone: Welcome to Tennessee Turfgrass Association’s February episode of the Turf Zone podcast. Today we’re talking to Mr. Bill Blackburn, General Manager of Tennessee Business at Smith Turf & Irrigation and recipient of the 2018 Tom Samples Professional of the Year Award.

Thanks for joining us, Mr. Blackburn.

Bill Blackburn: Thanks, Julie. Thanks for having me.

TZ: We want to get started – we need to know about your long and illustrious career and how you came to be honored with this award. Let’s start at the beginning and tell us a little bit about how you got started in the industry.

BB: I’ll be glad to. Long, as I’ve gotten older, I realize long is, that’s now what it is. I guess in high school I went to school, I wanted to teach and coach through my education, and in fact, with an injury in high school, I gravitated a little more towards golf and enjoyed working and the little golf course at Carnton Country Club in Franklin where I actually grew up. Shortly after some time there, my junior and senior year in college at Middle Tennessee State University, the opportunity to be the manager of a little golf course in Murfreesboro, actually where Indian Hills is, there was a little course there called Fox Run Golf Course. I was the manager my junior and senior year in college of that little 9-hole facility, and what a great time for someone of my age to have that responsibility. From there I did graduate – graduated on time, actually. I have a sister who helped along the way. But right after college I had the opportunity to come back to the little club in Franklin as Director of Golf and Assistant General Manager. I guess I was 22 at the time. I was involved in junior golf programs, I felt like we had a really neat program with juniors.

I wanted to teach, wanted to coach, I realized that probably I was not going to be an educator in the sense of in a school system, but to help with juniors and kids, that became the passion, quite frankly. Two or three years after that, I wanted to really broaden that and either wanted to sell turf maintenance equipment or be involved in the golf side of it with the apparel and soft goods. An opportunity was available, but it would’ve required a move, and I just did not want to leave my roots, and I didn’t. But an opportunity in the turfgrass industry in 1985 did present itself. So I guess something like 30, 34 years ago, I began selling equipment, wet behind the ears. Looking back, how naïve I was, but I began. My territory was eastern Tennessee and I actually would commute. I would leave on Sunday and get in the territory, the Knoxville, Kingsport, Tri-Cities area, a little bit of Virginia. I met some really nice folks, that are still friends today, that I’ve come to know from those travels. Frank Turner comes to mind, Roger Frazier, some of those really do come to mind, Gary Weller, Jeff Hollister around Chattanooga. Those are some of the old-timers.

From there, back to Middle Tennessee and worked this area as an outside salesperson for distribution and after about three years of that I had the opportunity to work on a national level with a company that was owned by the Toro Company, it was called Olathe Manufacturing it was outside of Kansas City, Kansas. For five years I traveled the eastern seaboard as a manufacturer’s rep, calling on distributors from Maine to Florida, actually one in Toronto. With this voice of mine up in the northeast it was quite a challenge, but I have to tell you, the folks in that area treated me so warmly. I still have a number of friends that I call friends that I see from time to time, basically at the GIS show. I guess I see a lot of those long-time friends that we’ve grown up in the industry together. So I guess after doing that up until about 1992, I had the opportunity with Smith Turf & Irrigation. Toro had changed their distribution in Tennessee and they were a customer in Charlotte. STI was certainly a very large customer, I resigned from the Toro company, Olathe, and simultaneously accepted the role that I’m still in 26 and a half years later, here at STI. With all this, I never had to move. I had to travel a lot, but I never moved. Here we are, I’m 59 years old, I’m right here outside my hometown.  That was a very long-winded answer to your very direct question.

TZ: That was the perfect answer. It’s so interesting to hear how you started in golf course management and then moved to the sales side, which I imagine has got to have some unique and different challenges. How did that transition go for you back in the day?

BB: Yeah, well. There have been some transitions and challenges and you kind of framed that up a little bit, I might correct you just a hint, if I may. Going from being involved in a little bit of the golf operation from the inside and still involved with the operation outside, while in college at the little course, Fox Run. I’ll never forget the two owners, they gave me an opportunity, they said “Bill, we know your background and we’d like to offer you X number of dollars.” I said look, I’m up here in Murfreesboro for my education and that’s first and foremost. I love to duck hunt in the winter and there’s not a lot going on, so I’ll tell you what. If I work 100 hours, you pay me a hundred, if I work X, you pay me for that. I don’t care about the salary part, I’m here to graduate on time. But with that, my junior and senior years I did get to learn a little bit about the inside operation, the apparel, the golf equipment, and then continue to learn more about the turfgrass side. I’m dangerous at both. But again I look back on it and I can’t think how – it’s hard to explain how fun those times were. You didn’t know how fun they were. You didn’t go to spring break, you had to get the course ready. So I missed every spring break, and I guess looking back that’s okay too. At the end of the day from that, I’m gonna sell one or the other, I’m either gonna have to learn more about equipment (again, I know how to operate some of it) or learn more about the golf apparel end of it. I loved clothes. I loved all colors, all pastels, I kind of joke about it. I was our best dressed in our senior class at Franklin High School and when you get a little bit bigger, your colors don’t look so hot, so now I’m a dark color person in khakis, as opposed to lilacs and those similar colors I used to wear when I was on the golf side of it. But I think I answered your question, I think.

TZ: Well, even if you didn’t, I just love the vision of you changing from pastels to dark colors and khakis.

BB: It’s dark colors and khakis. Probably a little jacket or something as well. But man I love those Kelly greens, lilacs. But those days have come and gone, but they were pretty special. Looking back on it, I’m kinda starting now to realize just how neat they were.

TZ: In your sales career over all these years, have you incorporated some of that passion for coaching that you talked about? Is a lot of it educating and training, and does that fill that role of coaching for you sometimes?

BB: You would have thought we’d rehearsed this. That actually is a great question. I’ve been fortunate to have been around a number of folks that are quite frankly probably better salespersons than I. I think if you’re really smart – and I’m not, but I do have a little bit of skill to realize, if I could steal a few ideas or thoughts from those that I know are smarter, more intelligent, more skilled, and kind of incorporate those into my being, my way of saying things, then the nail is hit on the head. It IS coaching, it is promoting. Some prefer a pat on the back, some prefer that soft touch. I was one that would go through a wall for a coach if they knew that motivator. Those that did not motivate that way, I did not perform that well.  I never did well without – you never want to break a spirit of a kid or of an employee of what they may be doing. They may be doing it totally different than what I think they should do or the way I may want them to achieve a goal, but at the end of the day if that works for them and it’s ethically correct, morally correct, and valid… then a good coach will commend that creativity and go “I think that’s probably a better idea than what I would have suggested, way to go.”

So yes, you better be a good coach, you better be a good motivator, and some do require a little kick in the seat from time to time. Typically if you understand that, then they’re gonna look at you and say “I probably deserved that,” and we move on past it and we learn from it. Yes, it’s coaching. To coach, in my humble opinion, to coach and promote children, especially, it’s a sales game. You’ve gotta get down on the kid’s level and get eye-to-eye, on your knee and tell them how great they’re doing, and “Man, that’s a great shot.” Sometimes a great shot means that it just gets airborne or they made a putt. Especially out at our little course, The Lightning Bug, for 15 years, I’ve seen little kids that are playing now collegiately. They’re out of school or in high school or middle school. I’ve had some out there in strollers!

I actually turned the water on – hit the wrong button, and I actually had a family and one of the little children’s stroller, and it pops up the irrigation. I told you earlier how I’m dangerous!

But if you can make those kids want to come out there and hang out with Mr. Billy Bob at the Lightning Bug, that’s a cool deal. That’s cool. So you’ve gotta teach and promote. And a good pat on the back, pat on the shoulder. That’s a good thing for kids, and for people. I work better that way.

TZ: Definitely. I think that probably that mentality and your encouragement of others in the industry and certainly your years of service probably led to your receiving this award, the Tom Samples award. The association says that the criteria for that is “an individual who has shown an outstanding devotion of time, talent, and energy to the turfgrass industry.” And it’s obvious to me that you have spent that time and energy, and you’re really paying attention to everybody – from toddlers who you’ve hosed down accidentally with the irrigation system to your peers in the industry, like you talked about – those relationships that you’ve made over the years.

Tell me a little bit about how the association and those relationships and collaborations within the industry have been important in your career.

BB: Yeah, and certainly they have. A moment to reference the Dr. Samples Professional of the Year. You know Dr. Samples came to Tennessee, the University in ’85, just about the time I was starting out in the field. So by being honored by the turfgrass association, that name was changed to the Dr. Tom Samples Award three or four years ago, if I remember correctly. I mean, what an honor for me. And for the association, the members, the board of directors, those that nominated and those that agreed upon my receiving the award — that goes down as the peak of the awards that perhaps I can receive in the industry. I’ve been honored in a few other things. I’m very, very grateful for that. But this is the thing that I do. And again, being 26 or so starting out in the field, 25 actually – naïve, I’m telling you I was naïve. But I had a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of passion and I didn’t know any differently actually.

So when you take that many years, those years, I became a board of director – I think my first year was 1989. I get elected and I’m like I’m just getting started and if I stayed on the board… as I indicated, I traveled for five years, so it wasn’t like I was at all the local meetings. I never was. I may have been at a meeting in New Jersey or Hilton Head or Miami. And I went to a bunch of superintendent’s meetings and trade shows. And actually when you look back on the trade shows, the national shows and the local state associations, that’s where I kind of got involved with the TTA from the board standpoint, to kind of be the trade show chairman, and I took that seriously.

We had some pretty cool shows out at Opryland when we had a full convention center and a full floor. Then we had to kind of realize, well, times are kind of different and the amount of money being spent from the distributors and dealers was exorbitant. The cost to the association while it was, I really feel like it was very neat, if you will, for trade shows and educational events, at the end of the day, were we raising money for the association? Rhetorical question as it may be, we were spending a whole lot and we were not able to give back to the association, so while I perhaps was one of the early ones wanting to really get involved in full-fledged trade shows, thinking I knew how all that stuff worked, we did all that for a few years. And then I was probably one of the early ones to say, you know, that’s been kinda neat, kinda cool, but things changed in ’08 and ’09 and starting to look kind of differently. I think we better go back to events that are functional, but yet allow the association to bring in some money so they can give back to research and education and not so much to the facilities or the decorators that are reaping the amount of money being spent. The association needed to see a better bottom line for the trade show, if you will.

I think I was kindly going away from the association after my presidency, what was that? 2000, 2001, I believe. My time had kind of come and gone — from a board member, I was a vice president, I never went through the secretary role, I was vice president to my dear industry friend Lynn Ray for his two year tenure, then moved up to my role. Those were some challenging times, they were. But again, I didn’t know any different. I look back on it now and I wonder how we figured this stuff out. I’m still trying to make my way at Smith Turf, and what we were charged with doing. The ones who really paid my wage, you can’t lose sight of that by doing some of the other things. But a good balance is healthy for one’s psyche and whatnot. And you’ve gotta get away the office and do some things, and yet when it’s time to buckle down, you gotta kinda understand that. And I think for the most part I’ve been fortunate to be able to balance that fairly well. I’ll be leaving for duck hunting as soon as we get done with this, so I’ll quit talking so much! A few more days of the season and it’s over and then we won’t worry about that. There you go, that’s the answer, I think.

TZ: From this conversation and from speaking to you at the conference in Murfreesboro a couple weeks ago, I know that you’ve devoted a lot of time to your actual job, with the travel, and working up through that through the years. Also with your service to TTA, and let’s not forget duck hunting. I know you have a wife and a daughter. I think that something I hear sometimes from the younger folks in the industry is the hours, the time is very demanding, especially those guys who are out on golf courses trying to keep everything above water and functioning for the busy season. Could you offer any tips for maintaining your job and your industry roles, the association, and travel, and hobbies, and still also having a family?

BB: I can tell you the issue better… you better be blessed, lucky to have a bunch of friends, and I have that. Now, one would say you’re probably really lucky to have a handful of those that are true, personal friends. And I have that. But I have a ton of folks that do a lot of stuff for me. Jokingly, well I’m not sure it’s a joke, but some of my closest friends will always kind of say “Billy Bob, it’s always about you.” I kind of joke back, and sometimes I am much more the recipient than the giving, and that does trouble me from time to time. Because I think they’re right. Sometimes I think they’re right. One in particular has said more than a few times over the 45 years that we’ve been best of friends, you know “Billy, your favor bank is overdrawn, now.”
And I’ve overdrawn it with a number, but I would like to think that giving back and maybe what I’ve done – I don’t look at it as like “Oh, I have to give back,” it’s just what transpires.

But I would say this – if you’re in this industry, it is vital that your neighbor down the street at XYZ facility, perhaps it’s a sports facility or a municipality multipurpose fields throughout the respective town or county, or the golf course down the road. Or the baseball coach or football coach that’s trying to make his game field at a school that probably doesn’t have the budget to spend on their athletic field – he wants it to look like the golf course down the road at XYZ golf facility. You know, if those folks are able to pick the phone up and contact so-and-so at that facility. So many times I’ll find that I have some product that I have a few extra bags, or I have a piece of equipment that I’ll be glad to let you borrow and use to help, let’s just say, aerate your turfgrass, your infield, or whatever the case may be, or a certain attachment. That’s where those that are successful have that rapport with others, and it’s garnered at events like superintendent’s meetings or sports turf managers meetings or at the TTA Conference and Trade Show and educational opportunities. One must develop a relationship with the doctors and professors and those that have “been there, done that”. They could easily hunt and peck an email or text and say “Man, I’ve got a little disease here, I’m not sure, can you offer some guidance or assistance?”

And those that give and receive, that’s what is special about what we do. I’m just on a different side of it, where a man’s or woman’s piece of equipment or irrigation doesn’t perform well and it’s 95 degrees, they’re in a trick, they’re in a bind. They have X number of members or parents or school board – whatever – looking down for them to get things done correctly. And sometimes it doesn’t work so hot. I get the challenge of, Hey, I’ve GOT to help that person – some way, some form, some fashion. Sometimes we are good at it, sometimes we miss the mark, but kind of going back to learning early. You do whatever you can do as long as you don’t violate ethics or morals or character. And you do whatever you can to support those that need your help, and you look back on it –they’ll support you. And that’s kind of how it works as I see it.

TZ: That’s a great word for everybody listening – do what you can to support others and that’s certainly what I see with the association, with TTA. Mr. Blackburn, thank you so much, again,  for chatting with me today, and congratulations on being recognized for this award.

BB: Thank you as well, and again, allow me to thank all of those involved with the association that have honored me, humbled me more than I can even write. And I have written up a note to the association. But certainly I’m somewhat at a loss of really how grateful I am. And thank you for allowing me to join you today, Julie, and I hope you have a great rest of the day and we’ll talk again soon.

TZ: That sounds great. Thank you all for joining us and be sure to keep an eye out for new podcasts and more each month on the turf zone.