3. Megan Leatham, CEO of Colorado Springs Sports Corp – How Sports Corporations Work
Farrell Sports Business Podcast
Interviews with unicorns from sports business and their unique stories, dreams, ideas, insights, innovations, flops and career paths. Get a unique perspective of the inner workings of jobs working in sports beyond just pro sports leagues. Hosted by 30-year sports business veteran Matt Farrell, President of Farrell Sports and CEO of Bat Around.
Watch it on YouTube - www.youtube.com/@farrellsportsww
Listen in Podcasty Places - Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio and more
Farrell Sports Business (00:00)
Welcome everyone to the Farrell Sports Business Podcast. On this week's episode, we're going to look at the world of sports commissions or sports corporations, how they work, what's their goal what events they try to bring to drive economic impact and how they measure it. I'm your host, Matt Farrell.
Today's guest is the CEO of the Colorado Springs Sports Corporation, Megan Leatham. She's one of the most tireless workers and one of the biggest advocates for the success of the city of Colorado Springs, which is known as Olympic City USA in bringing events and driving economic impact in the city.
So let's jump into it. She's just an incredible champion for this community and is going to teach us a lot about how sports commissions work in general. Megan
Farrell Sports Business (01:05)
Megan, excited to have you be part of the podcast today. Thanks for joining.
Megan (01:09)
Thank you so much for having me today, Matt.
Farrell Sports Business (01:12)
So just to reset before we get going, sometimes their organizations are called a sports commission, sometimes a sports corporation, sometimes they're part of the CVB. Can you just explain what the Colorado Springs Sports Corporation is?
Megan (01:26)
Absolutely, and that's a great question. And what's fantastic about our organization is we are a lot molded into one. So we have basically four pillars. We'll focus on the third one a lot today, but I'll quickly review the others. First, we were originally established in the late 1970s to help relocate the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee from New York City to Colorado Springs. So our organization is unique in a sense that we are very
to the Olympic movement. The United States Olympic Committee, there's 26 national governing bodies in Colorado Springs. So we are just very passionate and that'll always be a part of our bloodline. Our second pillar is we are a sport event management company. We put on eight to 10 major events every calendar year, mostly through the lens of sport. Oftentimes we tail off a little bit. For example, we put on Labor Day Liftoff, which is a massive balloon festival.
We put on the Pikes Peak Regional Air Show. This year it's headlining the Blue Angels. So those in fact could be argued that hot air balloons and airplanes aren't sport. So there is this huge community component surrounding it as well. And then our third pillar is our Sports Commission pillar. And by that I mean, what is, what isn't in Colorado Springs that could be through a lens of sport?
So there are all these different events that happen all over the nation, right? Well, why can't these sporting events be in Colorado Springs? So we serve as that conduit to help bring outside events into Colorado Springs. We actually have a contract with the city of Colorado Springs to provide this service basically to the administration and the mayor's office. So they're off busy running the city, which is hard to do. And we have the, the,
we have the capability of being able to put a bid together if there was an event that we needed to bring into town. For example, the NCAA Division II men's and women's soccer championship that recently just got awarded here to Colorado Springs at Weidner Field. So we worked with the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference, Weidner Field to put together a package to say, we want you, we want this right here in our city. And the benefit of this sort of work is the economic impact.
right? It's the heads and rooms, it's the vrbo is that are then eating out in and shopping in our local we have our hands and prob to 40 events every calend are. and it's so fun, to kind of get to know all these and it's honestly not sup
Farrell Sports Business (04:12)
You mentioned the Olympic connection with home of national governing bodies, the U S Olympic and Paralympic committee. Several years ago, the city really rebranded with Olympic city USA. And in your line of work, they're just, you know, if the greater Colorado Springs area is 750 ,000 to a million people, there's a lot of cities around the country that are about that size. So.
How much of a differentiator is that and how do you use it in your role?
Megan (04:44)
that's a great question. You know, I think we have a couple of things going for us as a city of Colorado Springs. First off, we have the five new city for champions projects and that includes Weidner Field, Ed Robson Arena, the Air Force Visitors Center, the United States Olympic and Paralympic Museum, and the Hybl Sports Center. So we finally have some really first class venues here in Colorado Springs. In addition, and I'll circle back, this all come together. In addition,
a giant mountain in our backyard, Pikes Peak. And Pikes Peak alone serves in itself as a sporting venue. There is a car race up Pikes Peak. There is a running race up Pikes Peak. So just really exciting venues, natural organic venues. And with three institutions, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, the United States Air Force Academy and Colorado College, we also have these three.
awesome places to hold sporting events. So we have some of the infrastructure, but what really puts us over the top, Matt, is we are Olympic City USA. We are the only city in the nation that can be called that. It is a direct contract with the United States Olympic and Paralympic committee. And we have 26 national governing bodies. So for those that aren't familiar, I know many are, but think USA Wrestling USA Swimming
These are the entities that make up the athletes in theory for the Olympic games. So we are just a very unique city in that standpoint. And to give you a little bit of context, the next most condensed city in the nation that has more than one NGB or national governing body has a total of three. So there's about 50, don't quote me on the exact number. There's let's say 55 in the nation. We have 26 in the next city has three. So.
We're pretty unique and special in that sense. And so to answer your question, we are able to draw in a lot of events that are passionate about the Olympic Games So whether it is associated with the national governing body or they want to be an Olympic sport in the future. Let's take the international jump rope championship that was here last summer. Matt, you and I worked on this project together, but.
You know this and you can speak to it a little bit, but a lot of their reasoning for wanting to come to Olympic City USA was they wanted to get in front of the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee and show the world this phenomenal up and coming sport.
Farrell Sports Business (07:21)
It was a great example and whether you're familiar with that event or not, there were more than a thousand athletes, almost 3 ,000 participants in that event, including family. It's a great economic impact driver for the area as well. I want to get into the role of a sports commission generally, but first,
Megan (07:39)
Absolutely.
Farrell Sports Business (07:47)
I'm just always fascinated by how did you get to where you are in this job? What was your career path to become the CEO of the Colorado Springs Sports Corporation?
Megan (07:58)
Great question. Well, I won't bore everyone with the long story, but I'm genuine when I say I do actually think I have the best job in the world. I'm a native to Colorado Springs. I've lived here my whole life. Sport has been a huge part of who I am. And I'm one of those believers that the impact sports have on people's lives outside of the white lines. I mean, just I am the person that I am. Success, failures, everything because of sports. So I have a huge passion for
Colorado Springs, a huge passion for sports. I love people, I love connecting. I love, you know, being the conduit or the spoke for a wheel or however you wanna put that. To bring people together, I say this for anyone that knows me, but all boats rise in high tide. And I genuinely believe that the more we can all do together for this community, the better. So I have...
I've been extremely lucky to have this position. And so prior to this, I ran the Pike's Peak International Hill Climb for a decade. That's the car race up the mountain. And what was really cool about the opportunity is I got to grow with the event. I think I took, I think I became the executive director of that in my late twenties. And the, the organization itself was in a little bit of some financial disarray.
I can tell you how desperate they were because I met with the chairman of the board and he offered me the position and I said, or I think it was like the interview and I said, I had never seen this event and I don't know anything about cars, but I think I could do this job. And so they were like, here you go. So when I say I got lucky and fell into it, there's a great example. So the coolest part is I got to grow with the event, Matt. And I got to learn how to take something that was kind of,
in disarray a little bit and really kind of formalize it, especially from an operational standpoint and get it on its feet and get its legs built. And it was just a really awesome opportunity to get to know kind of just the ins and outs on the event side of thing. And then the Sports Corporation and the Hill Climb have a very unique relationship, a partnership agreement in place. So I had been keenly aware of Sports Corp and
I fell into this position about two and a half years ago and I didn't even really have to pay anyone off, which is shocking if you ask me.
Farrell Sports Business (10:29)
Nice. So let's take a,
I want to take a quick step back about sports commissions. Generally speaking, whether we're talking about Colorado Springs or Dallas or Des Moines, it doesn't matter. and sometimes they're called different things, but generally how would you summarize their goal in any city or community that they're in?
Megan (10:42)
Sure.
Yeah, absolutely. That's a great question. You know, sports commissions, it's so fun learning about how every different, every sports commission is structured. Honestly, like we're structured very different than even the sports commission in Denver. I will say as we're learning more and more from different sports commissions around the nation, everyone is really, it, it, even though you are competing against other cities, everyone genuinely like,
seems very happy about what they're doing and excited to help support each other. There might be an event that isn't just a good fit for a city for one reason or another, and it might be a perfect fit for another city. And the groups talk back and forth. It really is this fascinating community. But I would say most sports commissions are probably...
50 to 80 % funded by the city themselves and or fall under their visitors bureau. So every city just about has a visitors bureau. Oftentimes the sports commissions are a department within the visitors bureau. Oftentimes they are standalone organizations that are maybe potentially funded by the government. But the idea is it all is driven by economic impact, right? Everyone wants.
big sporting events in their own cities that can help drive economic impact in the sports mentality. So does that kind of answer your question?
Farrell Sports Business (12:19)
Yeah, it does. Which leads to maybe, maybe a follow up to that on general revenue model for a sports commission or a sports corp. can you maybe just explain that? And then we can get into maybe just if I attend an event in the city, how do you know to count me against that total, but general revenue model buckets.
Megan (12:44)
Yeah, so we're a little bit different because we do have the four pillars and the fourth pillar I did not mention earlier is we are providing some afterschool sport programming to some elementary school kids in certain areas of town. We're kind of piloting this new afterschool program called YES. It stands for Youth Education in Sport and it's just a really awesome program. It could be a whole nother podcast for another day. But to answer your question, our funding model is a bit different than others because of our pillars. So,
Our Olympic pillar honestly is not revenue generating. It doesn't make us any money, but it is why we exist. And so it will always be of high importance. We are able to survive financially if you will, due to our event management pillar. So the eight to 10 major events that we put on every calendar year, these are sometimes we own and operate the events solely ourselves. Sometimes they are partner events.
But regardless, all of them are revenue drivers to a degree, whether that be through sponsorship or ticket sales or vendors or that sort of thing. So some of these events are in fact, are in fact economic impact drivers as well, if they bring in a lot of out of town tourists. And then some of them are just local events and they're just here to help support the city of Colorado Springs.
And then the sports commission pillar is actually subsidized by the city of Colorado Springs. So we have a very small bucket of money and it's money in and money out. So it doesn't help our bottom line. It doesn't help fund us. but it does help give us a little, a little money to help incentivize or bring some of these groups into town. Now the, the structure of this does vary from city to city. Some, some cities have.
a large amount of money to kind of draw these events in and some, it's a little more modest. So it just depends. So we do have a little bit of money. If there's a bid fee or something that can just get a group over the hump to come to Colorado Springs, we can use some of those funds to get them here. And then we report directly back to city council and the mayor's office to show them how their dollars are being spent. And so,
The other interesting thing about different cities, Matt, is I will take a moment to talk about the LART tax. This is the lodgers automobile and rental tax. So anytime you stay at a hotel or rent a car, you know, when you're like checking out and you're like, what is this fee? What is this fee? What is this fee? Well, every city has an additional fee added on and.
It is in Colorado Springs, that is 2 .5%, which is actually very low compared to other markets of our size. So if you were to come to Colorado Springs, have an awesome time, stay at a hotel, you are charged 2 .5 % at the end of that and it goes into a bucket. And this bucket of money then is used by the city to help bring these outside events into Colorado Springs. So that's where our piece of the pie comes from in regards to pulling these outside events in. So.
Again, every city is structured a little bit different. That's how it works here in Colorado Springs.
Farrell Sports Business (16:01)
It's really helpful. And we're not going to dive deep into this number, but one of the numbers that I saw up here in, you know, online or in an article was that the world jump rope championships generated as much as $8 million of economic impact to the city. And so I'm assuming that's all those elements that you just mentioned. It was the hotel stays, people staying for a week or more, the restaurant.
That has to be part art and science of how you measure economic impact. But how do you, how do you go about looking at that? And, there's always subjective benefits to an event being in your town, but how do you look at that with the objective benefits?
Megan (16:33)
100%.
Yeah, absolutely. Right. It's that's that's a really great question. And it's hard. Right. How do you calculate economic impact? Right. How do you end up? The trickiest part is when these groups are interested, you ask all the questions like what is your estimated hotel room nights, estimated spectators like they're estimated. So you're taking a swing that this organization can come into your town, put on a world class event and then hit hit the economic impact numbers.
And as well, there's the X factor too, like you mentioned. I mean, the World Jump Rope Championship is a great example. 7 ,000 spectators, 1 ,500 athletes, 7 ,000 room nights. Matt, we just had an event here. It was called DPL, Development Players League. It was under 13 through under 19 girls soccer. So up and coming really, really good soccer players. This was just here about three weeks ago, in fact. And...
It was 3 ,500 athletes, 4 ,000 spectators, and listen to this, 15 ,000 room nights. This was a massive, massive, massive soccer tournament. Only three of the teams were here in the state of Colorado. So when you're evaluating these events, right, this one you look at and you're like, that's a no brainer. You're going to bring in 3 ,500 athletes.
and they're the right age where their parents still have to come to and they're gonna be spending all this money and it's 15 ,000 room nights. And so that's an easy one to assess. That's an easy one that you can look at. Here's an example of a little more subjective. The Warrior Games. This is only about 300 athletes. It is...
through the Department of Defense. And basically it takes all five military installations and brings wounded warriors together every two years to compete. It is a phenomenal, phenomenal event, organization. It's ran by the Department of Defense. They are very interested in Colorado Springs for 2025. They were just here last week for a site visit. And if you actually just break down the numbers on this, yes, family does travel. Yes, there is a huge kind of,
media draw to it, but it doesn't have 15 ,000 room nights. I can tell you that, but we are also Colorado Springs and we have this huge, passion and dedication to the military in this town. And it's one of the things that makes us great. So here we are as, as a city of Colorado Springs, looking to bring this amazing event into town that had through the lens of sport, through the lens of.
the Olympic spirit and through the lens of military rehabilitation and healing, and we can bring all that together in one, that's not gonna show up in some stat line. But yes, the Warrior Games needs to be here in Colorado Springs.
Farrell Sports Business (19:51)
That's just a perfect explanation of it. And so helpful, you know, what, what people may or may not know about Colorado Springs. And you touched on some of it of it's a tourist destination and very tourist driven city in the first place, everything from Pike's peak to the U S Olympic and Paralympic museum garden of the gods, Cheyenne mountain zoo, the air force academy, all these different attractions that I would think obviously help your.
case on attracting events to this area. But if you're walking down the street in Colorado Springs, I would think there's a lot of interest and support from those organizations looking to you of like, Hey, Megan and sports Corp. what, what, what, what you got? Cause they're somewhat not maybe fully dependent, but partially dependent on your success.
Megan (20:45)
Yeah, are you speaking about just the camaraderie and the community and how we rally together to help bring some of these events into town?
Farrell Sports Business (20:57)
A little bit of that and a little bit of the win -win. If you bring the weightlifting national championships to town or the jump rope world championship town to town, there's a vested interest in all these other entities in the network, if you will.
Megan (21:12)
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, a lot of it honestly does go back to the economic driver. And I think, you know, it might be, so I'm a native to this town. And like I said, I think it's the best town in the world. Watching the growth is a little bit scary, right? Like I, you know, I grew up where out East was so far away and now it's just where you go. You know, it's the town is, is booming. And, and when you actually look at,
how valuable the economic impact of sport can be for a community. And it's ability to provide, you know, a great, I think actually yesterday in Colorado Springs was just named the third best city in the world to live or in the nation to live. So what people don't understand is what makes the city so great. Yes, you can talk about all the different tourist attractions, but.
For those that are living here, there's affordable housing, there's cost of living, there's all these different things. And unless we can be economic impact drivers, we can't keep those numbers where we want them to be for our local community. So I think there's a lot behind the scenes that are so super important for the economic impact. And then for your neighborhood gathering or for your friends down the street, we are Olympic City USA and having sporting events in our town is,
part of our bloodline and you can feel it in our community and you can feel it within the people of our community. And I think that's what's so great about the sports corporation is we can help bring these cool events in, but then we also can put on our own events. Labor Day Liftoff, it's a giant balloon festival. 200 ,000 people come at, and yes, a lot of it is for our community, but you know what else people are doing over Labor Day? They're not leaving town. They're staying in Colorado Springs because of Labor Day Liftoff.
It is a free event to our community. It will always stay free. I can tell you putting on free events is a little trickier on the backside. but it, you know, it is, it is part of, of who we are as a city. And I think that's what, what is exciting about events is you get to, you know, no one understands that you're there at two in the morning, turning a generator on. But when you're walking around at Liberty liftoff and seeing thousands and thousands of.
members of our community smiling at 6 a watching balloons go up in the air. There's something about that. You can't get doing anything else.
Farrell Sports Business (23:43)
so, so good. So I know you played, you grew up playing basketball, a lot of sports. You're a multi, you're, I'm being sincere. You're very well -rounded athlete. You played basketball. I don't know what position you played, but you're, you're, to me, you're a point guard at heart. You, you always want to dish credit somewhere else. and we're not going to let you do that. so.
I want to just ask you a few really kind of quick hitters. I think you've got just a second or two to get the shot off and learn a little bit about you just in a quick way. So, what, it, it.
Megan (24:22)
And I did play point guard, just so you know, because the whole point is pass the ball to people better than you, right? I mean, that's what you do as a point guard, makes sense.
Farrell Sports Business (24:28)
It makes it all make sense now. It all makes sense. So what we.
Megan (24:33)
And I'm short. I'm quite short.
Farrell Sports Business (24:37)
So what was your school and your college major?
Megan (24:41)
I went to Whitman College. It's a small division three school in Walla Walla, Washington. People say the town's so nice, they named it twice. And I was a psychology major, which is very random compared to what I'm doing today.
Farrell Sports Business (24:57)
What was your first job in sports?
Megan (25:00)
Ooh, my first job in sports. Well, can I tell you about my first job ever? My first job ever in fourth grade is I was a clown. I'm actually not joking. And so my first job in sports, I think, it was in college and I interned in the athletic department.
Farrell Sports Business (25:14)
Yes.
And so any point in your career, is there, because none of us are perfect, is there a mistake that you look back in your career that you really learned from and it was maybe a huge lesson for you?
Megan (25:37)
Absolutely. I mean, yes, I make mistakes every day and I want to keep making mistakes forever because it's just how you learn and how you get better. And if we're not making mistakes, we're definitely not doing something right. But I think I learned very, very on in my professional career, thanks to some amazing mentors and my predecessor specifically at the sports corporation, just the power of collaboration. And I can tell you that the city of Colorado Springs is very special.
The people that we have here that are in it for the right reasons to get things done is phenomenal. But everyone needs everyone. You have to, you need your colleagues and the people that you work with. But there are some times you just need to pick up the phone and be able to call someone. And it is the power of collaboration. And when people all get together for the right reasons, it's what gets things done.
Farrell Sports Business (26:31)
It's one of the things I've always appreciated about you and we laugh about it a little bit, but if I see your name come up on my phone, I know it's going to be friendly. I know we're going to get down to it really fast and it's going to be productive and it's always fun and appreciated. So.
Megan (26:47)
It's, it's a, hey, is now okay? Do you have two minutes? And you're like, yep. And then it takes two minutes and then we're done. See ya.
This is the longest conversation we've had in a long time.
Farrell Sports Business (26:59)
Yeah, this is taking a lot of energy. So I want to give you the last shot. Anything, I call it the shameless plug, anything that you're working on that you just want to mention, but I want to give you the last word.
Megan (27:01)
Yeah.
I just, Ooh, that is, that is actually a really good question. I am going to tee up a really awesome project that we have coming up that we can't announce yet, but we will be announcing probably within the next 30 days. it's a new event here for not only the city of Colorado Springs, but the state of Colorado Springs. And it is going to impact, it's going to have a great impact on the world of sport. And we are doing it.
in conjunction with the YMCA of the Pikes Peak region. And it's going to be a brand new partnership for us, a great new event for our region. And I am so excited to tell everyone about it. We are working behind the scenes to get it off the ground and more to come.
Farrell Sports Business (28:02)
Awesome stuff. Well, always a pleasure and enjoyable to, you know, play the little pickleball, little golf occasionally, and you're in all sincerity, you're just doing great things for the city of Colorado Springs and you've given us a great perspective on sports commissions in general. So Megan, thank you so much.
Megan (28:20)
Thanks so much, Matt, for having me today.
Commentaires