Jamie Shea of Strive Gaming joins us on the Knup Sports Show to tell us all about Strive Gaming, her extensive career in the iGaming industry, and her upcoming panel at iGamingNEXT NYC.
RYAN KNUPPEL
Hey, what’s going on everybody? Ryan Knuppel here, Knup Sports Show Episode 192. Thank you so much for giving us a little bit of your time today. Hope you’re all doing well, hope you enjoyed the Super Bowl this past weekend. Man, what a game. What a game if you’re a Chiefs fan, probably disappointing if you’re an Eagles, but anyway, we will not dive in to that too much today because we have another awesome guest with us today. First off, I want to mention that this show is actually brought to you by iGamingNEXT. They have a conference coming up in March, here, March 7-9 in New York City. I’m excited to go. If you’re going already, please make sure you look me up, we’ll say hello. If you’re not, we’ll put up a little promo code later and show you how you can get to this event. But, without further ado, I’m gonna bring on my special guest today, I’m excited for this one. Today we have Jamie Shea of Strive Gaming. Jamie, how are you?
JAMIE SHEA
I’m doing great, how are you doing?
RYAN KNUPPEL
Doing really well, thanks for giving me a little bit of time. Hey, how’s everybody hanging after the Super Bowl, how ya feeling, how’s everybody in your area of the world?
JAMIE SHEA
You know, it’s almost like having a hangover after Super Bowl because there’s just so much that happens. There’s so much in the betting world, it’s so much fun, you get people who have never really wagered before getting in there, so your manage services, customer service teams are very busy helping people understand wagering and getting onto the sites and so it is, in my entire career, it’s been the culmination of everything, right? It is the biggest day and I did a presentation for our company talking about the Super Bowl and what it means to Americans, and I just wrote on one of the slides, “It means everythiing”. [Laughs].
RYAN KNUPPEL
You’re so right, you’re so right. And hangover is a good word for it, but it’s just like, manm you’re just like run, run, run, run, run, and then it comes and you’re just like, ahh deep breath, right? Deep breath, we can relax a little bit now and move on. But, yeah, that’s crazy. Um, well yeah, thank you for joining me today, I’m really excited to dive in. I mean, typically we love to start and learn a little bit about yourself, so why don’t you give me a little bit about your career path and kind of what got you to where you are today with Strive Gaming?
JAMIE SHEA
Sure. So, you know, I’ve been in this industry for a very long time. I started in 1994. Um, at the Sans, and it was really interesting because I actually went to school in New Orleans to be an elementary school teacher and did my student teaching and said “No, I don’t think this is for me”. [Laughs]. So, I had to pick a different career, and my dad bet on race horses when I was growing up, so I remember being at Gulfstream, Hialeah, Calder racetracks when I was growing up, so I knew exact as trifectas, all of the lingo, and I saw an ad saying “We’re hiring for a ticket rider”, so I started as a ticket rider. Um, you know, they say that timing is everything, and it really was because at that point, they had just started bringing in computers with DonBest on them, and all the people who were working there weren’t so computer savvy, and I’d just gotten school so I was a little bit computer savvy, not like people are today, but for back then I was pretty cool, and so I was able to go in and create some programs and play our tracking systems, and things like that, and you know, the rest is history. I just went, I found my place, right? I have loved it from day one, I’ve loved watching it grow, I opened up the Venetian, worked at the Flamingo, I was at the Hard Rock for 9 or 10 years running that sportsbook, so just crazy good times, and then I got to jump on to the bandwagon of online betting because I moved to DraftKings in July 2018, and we took the very best in New Jersey digitally on August 1st, and talk about insane, like, that war room was crazy, it was so much fun, and for me, it was like a, it felt so good because I feel like my whole career was leading up to that. We were kind of stuck in Nevada, you couldn’t really do anything, and I just knew how much people loved betting, and I knew people were betting anyway because they would tell me that “I bet with my bookie, I did this” and for them to have a safe place to play that’s regulated, responsible gaming, I just love where we are.
RYAN KNUPPEL
I love it too. What a great path you’ve been down, and yes, some amazing companies there. I’m sure you have story upon story that you could tell from each one of those experiences, but for sake of time we’ll move on because I’d love to hear more about that at some point, but I, maybe that’s another, maybe we’ll save that one for another show. I’d love to hear now a little bit more about Strive Gaming. So now you’re at Strive Gaming. For the people listening, tell us what Strive is, and what you’re up to with them today.
JAMIE SHEA
So, Strive Gaming was started by Max and Damian that were funnily with Kambi, and they came in and they kind of found all the gaps in the market, right? They saw where the pain points were, and they created a solution to solve for that, because you need to be able to see your player holistically. You need to be able to bonus your players with targeted bonusing, it needs to be, your promotions need to be targeted. You need to be making sure that you’re spending the money the right way, and how you do that is by having a system that can look at your customers, that can look at everything that’s going on and say “Let’s put this bonus out there, let’s do this”, and that’s really what the Strive system does. It’s got the infinity engine, it has the back office where you can set up bonuses like that, you know, you can, at the spur of the moment, say “Hey, I wanna do a buzzer reader” and stick that bonus in and make sure that it happens quickly. It works, we’re integrated wtih everyone, you know? So we have Kambi as a back in, you have Open Bet, you have Betsson, you have anything that you can think of, we have integrated. We have the payment processors, so we’ve integrated with every payment processor. Our whole, basically, our whole life is to make sure that the operators life is easy, and for me, coming from being an operator, you know, working at DraftKings for almost four years, I love this, and so when I heard what they were doing, um, I called them up and I was like “Hey, you guys got space for me?” because it was, I was just super excited and I continue to be super excited about everything that we’re doing, signing new clients constantly, and really hitting our targets, and it’s just a great company and I’m really excited to be a part of it.
RYAN KNUPPEL
Well, being from the operator world like you are, you said the goal is to make everything easy for the operators. You already know that it’s not, out of the box, it’s not easy for them, like, there are so many challenges that go into the day-to-day of an operator and operating things. I can only imagine all the issues that you guys are there to help with, and you guys are there to help solve, and that’s a, yeah, that’s a great company, great mission, and, can you mention, you mentioned a few of the companies you’re already working with, I’m curious, other operators that you’re specifically working with. Are there any big names that you’re working with currently?
JAMIE SHEA
Well, we can’t announce some of them. We have inked some deals that we’re waiting to do the PR, but really excited about them. We do currently work with Desert Diamond, um, in Arizona. They have gotten accolades out there for being really strong and we were able to get them to market very quickly. Um, and we’ve been working closely with them. We also work with Golden Nugget Online Gaming, that’s a big one for us as well, which you know is a part of DraftKings, so this happened pre me leaving DraftKings or being with Strive, so. [Laughs]. Um, but yeah, they, before it was acquired, we had come in, Strive had come in, so.
RYAN KNUPPEL
Cool. Very, very cool. So what’s the future look like for Strive? I mean, is it as simple as just continuing to get new clients, bigger clients, more clients, and just continuing to serve them well. Is that it? Or is there some big, big, breaking, you know, strategy that you guys have that you can talk about that you’re looking at into the future?
JAMIE SHEA
You know, right now, we’re making sure that we have the best clients. The clients that fit in with what we’re trying to do, that need our services, we’re taking all the calls, we’re sitting down and then really, you know, going through and saying “Does this make sense for our company?”. So you know, doing our due dilligence, but at the same time, being so open, and I’m enjoying getting to go, I go on most of the pitches and I love getting to meet all the different operators, and what they’re doing, and seeing how they view the world of sports betting. Um, I particularly get excited when I get to go on those because having been in this industry for almost 30 years, which blows my mind to say, I feel like I can offer some insight, or a little bit of advice, and that makes me happy because for me, this industry has been my whole career, so I will do anything to make sure it’s done well, it’s done properly, it’s done responsibly, you know, lot’s of parts for the responsible gaming. I love that we do that at Strive, we have the self-exclusions, we’ve got the limits, we’ve got anything you might need, and your app, we’re going to build your app to make it what you want to see, what your customers want to see, and we’re gonna make sure in there that we have all the tools necessary for customers to look at the statistics, for them to look up what they want to see for responsible gaming, and if they do have a problem, or just how do you wager, you know, wagering 101, just all that stuff to make it a really good experience for the customer.
RYAN KNUPPEL
That’s a great segue into where I want to bring this, because, you know, obviously, going out, getting the best clients, and being able to talk to all of these operators, what better way than to be able to go to a big event or something, and be able to sit down with people that are there, or maybe operators or potential clients that are there. I know you’re on the speaker panel coming up March 7-9 at iGamingNEXT. I’m so excited for this event, I went last year and really, thoroughly enjoyed it, so we’re excited to go cover it and be around it, but I wanted to talk, just really surfacey, about the panel you’re on. I think it’s Staking a Technological Claim in the US. So, we’re talking a little bit about tech, using some of your tech experience, looks like a really good panel of people. Tell us about how excited you are about being able to speak at this event.
JAMIE SHEA
I am. You know, I love iGamingNEXT. I’ve spoken on panels there before. Not only is it great to be on the panel, but I also really enjoy getting to be with my peers and talking about, like, you learn so much, what’s gonna be up and coming, what’s, you get to meet people who have this great idea that you look at and you talk to and you, you know, I really like that, how do we integrate, how do we do business together, or just getting to hear what people are thinking for the industry and, you know, we all kind of have our own thoughts, but when you can sit and talk to somebody and find out, like, how are they thinking it’s going, it’s just a lot of fun, um, and, you know, these events are always fun as well. You know, nice dinners. [Laughs]. Getting to chat with people, you know, having the coffee in the morning, and really catching up with people, and they’re so informative. I love going to all the different panels and hearing my friends speak on the panels, and really just, you know, how are we evolving?
RYAN KNUPPEL
That’s awesome. That’s awesome, then, so it’s 2:20-2:55, I told the folks of iGamingNEXT, “Well, I won’t ruin the entire speech by asking exactly what we’re talking about”, so we’ll just be very high-level. I think it’s gonna be an awesome panel, though, I’m super excited to learn from this one as I am all of them, and it should be a good time. So, Thursday, March 8th, 2:20, if you want to listen to Jamie and her friends talk and give some of her experiences in the tech space, be sure to do that as well. So, that’s gonna be a great event, and amen to all of that. You know, I love the networking side, I love everything about iGamingNEXT and the way they put all that together, so should be a great time.
JAMIE SHEA
Absolutely.
RYAN KNUPPEL
Yeah, Should be a really good time. Awesome, awesome. So Jamie, any last words for the audience before I let you go? You know, I always ask this, there might be other iGaming professionals listening, or there may be new people in the space that are looking to get into iGaming. I don’t know, any high-level, you’ve got so much business experience in the space, any high-level advice or just any last words for the audience here before we let you go?
JAMIE SHEA
You know, one thing that I would love to push more is women in gaming, and making sure that we are, you know, I’ve talked to so many people who want to get involved and they’re afraid because maybe they don’t know sports well enough, or something like that, don’t let that hold you back because there’s just space for everyone and it is so exciting once you get into it, it’s, you’re gonna want to stick with it and you’re gonna really enjoy yourself, so don’t let that fear of the unknown scare you from trying to get in and anybody who wants to talk about opportunities with Strive, if I can offer any kind of mentorship or anything like that, I would love to do that as well.
RYAN KNUPPEL
Yeah, I love that. I’ve had 192 episodes, and probably only maybe 10-15 women, so I need to get more on that list to get in here, and I’d love to have anybody in this space that, you know, is excited for that, so yeah, thank you for that advice, Jamie, that was really good, I really appreciate that. Alright, well, I think I’ll let you, Jamie, I know you’re busy, you know, when do you actually head to iGamingNEXT? Are you heading just over the weekend, early March, or what?
JAMIE SHEA
Yeah, so I’m gonna add in some getting to hang out with some colleagues and stuff like that, so I’ll get there on that Monday, and probably leave that Thursday night.
RYAN KNUPPEL
Awesome, awesome. Well, I thank you for your time, wish you all the best, and hopefully we’ll talk to you in a few years and hear about more successes.
JAMIE SHEA
I hope before we talk before then. [Laughs].
RYAN KNUPPEL
Oh, exactly. We’ll make sure to say hello at the event after your panel.
JAMIE SHEA
Sounds good.
RYAN KNUPPEL
Alright, Jamie, thank you for your time.
JAMIE SHEA
Alright, thank you so much.
RYAN KNUPPEL
Really appreciate it. Bye-bye.
Alright, that was Jamie Shea of Strive Gaming. Wow, how much experience she has in this industry, I could sit down with her for hours and really just soak up that knowledge and learn a lot from her, so, really excited to have her on. Again, 2:20-2:55 on Thursday, March 8th, her panel. A little plug for iGamingNEXT, if you haven’t got your ticket yet, ‘KNUP10’, you have a little promo coe, you can get 10% off, head out to iGamingNEXT.com, grab your tickets. I’d love to see you there, meet you, say hello, grab a coffee, go to lunch, whatever, so shoot me a message if you do end up going to this event. It should be a good one, so. Alright, without further ado, I’m Ryan Knuppel, that was episode 192, we’re creeping up on 200, so super excited for that. Um, hopefully you’re all well, take care, stay safe, until next time. Checkin out now, bye-bye.
Relevant Links:
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