Spring 2017 Expansion: Our Biggest Leap Yet!
Gentleman,
If you have heard OBT and Dredd speak, they stress that the only way F3 continues to be successful is by each man giving it away. To that end I wanted to take a minute and update everyone on our Spring ’17 LEAP efforts.
This was our most ambitious and successful set of LEAP’s to date!
Some key numbers:
8: Cities launched (Pittsburgh, Toledo, Columbus, Cincinnati, Louisville, Indianapolis, Birmingham, Minneapolis).
Over 600: New FNGs who have experienced F3 this spring at those locations.
53: Pax who traveled Downrange to #GiveItAway.
10: Current F3 states that sent pax DR to help with the LEAP (FL, GA, SC, NC, VA, OH, TN, MS, IN, PA).
$29,462: F3 funds spent to reimburse travel costs and provide LEAP stipends.
This was a major undertaking for a load of volunteers.
First and most important is to acknowledge the leadership of Starfish (Drew Dixon; Winston-Salem/Charlotte). He Qed the Spring 2017 LEAP, taking on our most ambitious set of launches ever while also juggling being a husband, father, and serving as CFO in a position that requires him to commute and spend many nights away from his family. A Winston-Salem Redwood Original, Starfish has helped lead the success and growth of F3 across the Piedmont Triad region.
Starfish talks a lot of smack and is always smiling, which helps hide just how huge an undertaking this effort was for him. First the research and conversations, phone calls and social media monitoring that go into deciding which cities to launch. Then, recruiting and training pax from all over F3 Nation to serve as City Launch Qs – with the massive scale of this spring’s effort, that involved training more FNGs to the LEAP than ever before, including hours of phone calls and emails.
Here’s who stepped up to lead those launches, all of which have been successful beyond our wildest hopes. If you’re proud of F3’s increasing national profile, please give the thanks to these men and Starfish:
Beverly; Winston-Salem (Minneapolis)
Schotty; Cleveland (Toledo)
Titan; CLT Metro (Columbus)
Grapevine; CLT Metro (Louisville)
Senator Tressel; Fort Mill (Cincinnati)
Long Time; Greensboro (Pittsburgh)
Fonzie; NE Indiana (Indianapolis)
Juggernaut; Greenwood (Birmingham)
Those men then got to go and recruit men to go DR, find AO’s, manage budgets, worry about the weather.
That’s when the real exciting part happens. Budgeting, flights, hotels, flight cancellations, weather (Noah called to say we had a lot of rain in the Ohio Valley in Spring ‘17) and hoping that pax will actually show up on Launch Day. The Friday night before a launch is stressful for these LEAP teams. After devoting hours of planning and travel away from families, you just have to pray that a few men will come out and give something completely different like F3 a try! We hold our collective breath on Saturday morning, waiting to get a report on counts via Twitter. Success all around!!!
Finally, huge thanks to all the men who took time away from work and families to travel to our LEAP cities and share their passion for F3! Over 50 men went DR for us – by far the most ever in a LEAP season. We count on them to return to their home AOs with a new passion for #GivingItAway and to help recruit other F3 men to help with future Leaps!
We continue to get daily inquiries from men all over the country who want us to bring F3 to their city. This week alone, we’ve heard from Lubbock, TX; Daphane, AL; Chicago; Groton, CT; Michigan; Colorado; and California. We are in high demand, but we remain an all-volunteer organization when it comes to Expansion. If you have flexibility in your life and a passion for spreading F3 to new lands, please let us know. If you have less flexibility, but other skills, we need to know that as well – we don’t just need guys to lead workouts, but also tech guys, finance guys, sales guys, etc.
I mentioned the almost $30,000 that we spent on this effort. If the unspoken 4th F in F3 is “free,” where does that come from? First is revenue generated by the royalty you pay for official F3 logo gear from MudGear. When you buy a race jersey, workout sarong, hat, etc., from MudGear, some percentage of that sale flows to F3. That’s why we can be such hard-a$$es when we find out people are producing non-official F3 logo gear or going around MudGear to sell F3 stuff to the pax. So please don’t do it, and to the extent you are able please support the effort by buying your gear through the F3 store.
The second way we raise money for LEAPs is via fundraising efforts by individual regions. For the last three years, Area 51 in South Charlotte has donated profits from their annual golf tournament to the LEAP – money generated by that event has funded over 9 LEAPs! If your region is planning an event that will generate proceeds for a good cause, please consider F3 Expansion!
Lastly if you are thinking about where you personally want to put your philanthropic dollars to work, we are very interested in being that landing spot. We have never formally passed the hat for Expansion, but the demand for F3 is crazy! I wish I could say yes to everyone who inquiries about F3 coming to their town. We spent a lot of our saved revenue from the last three years on the effort this spring and the demand for Fall ’17 is not letting up. The F3 Foundation can take tax-deductible donations and send them to F3 Expansion if you ask them to earmark that money. You can make a donation thru the link on the F3Naiton website but please tag #LEAP.
Thanks again to all the men who really sacrificed time, energy and passion to taking F3 out to men who need us. Now it is time to give it away to more men!
We are going to continue to be aggressive in the Fall of ’17. Now that we’re on the doorstep, we’re going to make a big push into Chicago this fall, launching four locations at once beginning at the end of September. We’re also going to St. Louis and we’ll connect the dots between Dallas, Houston and San Antonio in Texas with a plant in the state capital of Austin.
Follow @F3Expansion on Twitter and F3 Expansion on Facebook.
If we can keep the momentum going, this F3 thing might just work….! : )
Best Regards,
Crotch Rocket. @Cotchett1
Q/Plant, F3 Nation
Sorry, not well formatted. I had it formatted with actual spaces between paragraphs and bolded important words.
THANK YOU STARFISH (Drew Dixon) and All the CITY Q’s!!!!
I would be very interested in helping to one of these launches. I don’t have a ton of time during the week, but can travel and leverage some FF miles and hotel points to limit the cost to the F3 Foundation. Many of the Davidson (TPR) F3 guys have helped with launches and the stories are epic – of course.
Let me know who to connect with about the ones being planned in Dallas or St Louis.
Aye
Canuck
Make that a 2nd for St Louis. I could make 3 or 4 days work.
If the Daphne guys want to connect, pass along my info. I’ll be in Gulf Shores this week.
Currently have a lot of flexibility to support. HC for St. Louis.
It’s also notable to mention the countless Qs that returned their LEAP payments back into expansion efforts. Between $8,000 – $10,000 was saved in costs because of their generosity. Aye!!
Excellent work on the part of many. I am always willing to do a LEAP Qs wherever needed.
We’ve come a long way, great work brothers!
Great work to everyone involved!!! Amazing to share and spread what we know we, and others, need. Proud to be part of F3, and the men of the GrandStrand stand ready to help #GiveItAway!!
Many thanks for bringing F3 to Louisville. Didn’t know I needed it but I did. And our numbers show many more do as well.
If we are interested, whom do we contact? Email addy? I would love to see what I can do.
Send us a email at Expansion@f3nation.com
Please list any geographies you have inside knowledge and any super powers you may have!