Last Thursday I took the 3 hour drive to Omaha, Nebraska. What little I know about Nebraska revolves around planting corn and a lot of Red Huskers flags waving above farm trucks, and plastered on license plate covers. To my surprise Omaha is representing the Midwest in a big way.
May 7, 2009 marked the first annaul Big Omaha conference. As with most attendees that showed up, we saw Gary Vaynerchuck, Jason fried, and a handful of other big players on the roster for keynotes, and then looked at an unbelievable price, and there was no questions that we would close shop for 2 days and head to Omaha, Nebraska. Looking back, I'm trying to think what I expected as I took the 3 hour drive. From Google street view of the address marked on the site, I saw an old building, that wasn't too big, so I knew that this wasn't going to be Web 2.0 in San Francisco, or SXSW in Austin. From the design of the web site, I figured it would be quality at least, and from the little chatter on twitter (#bigomaha) people seemed interested, but mostly in @garyvee.
Every person I talked to in a unified voice exclaimed, "Wow!" . Organizers, Jeff Slobotski (now self employed) and Dusty Davidson of BrightMix set the bar for the Midwest no less high than the sky. I can't count how many times that I heard people say it was in the details. Big Omaha branding everywhere. Sponsorship were cleverly place above above the urinals, outlets, doorways, and buckets of starburst. Projectors with twitter feeds have been done before, but never were they perfectly placed as a side element just as a conversation starter. I'm doing a virtual walk through in my mind, and there is just too much to cover. The center pieces on the tables, simple and creative, but fitting. The Traffic flow, I never felt crowded or felt like I couldn't hear the speakers. There was never a lack of coffee, redbull ( not my thing, but very popular) and snacks. The breaks were not too long that you were bored, but long enough to take care of nature's call, and chat with some new acquaintances about the last keynote before getting back to see more. And the after parties were just long enough, and just chill enough to grab a drink, grab a couch, and talk about your plans to be the next Jason Fried of 37 Signals
And the space.... Don't get me started on the space. First off, lets step back. Omaha is a gem. Or at least Old Market of Omaha is a diamond in the rough. I am so glad that I booked a hotel in walking distance, because the walk was gorgeous. Turn of the century brick paved buildings and streets with outdoor seating nearly every twenty feet. Shops, art galleries, cafe's, lined several blocks next to a beautiful park and river walk. Just a wonderful place to be. Then make your way down to the Kaneko. This recently renovated old brick warehouse boasted a stunning creative library and work space, open art gallery, and what appeared to be space for installation pieces, and wonderful events like Big Omaha. Just fantastic.
So the conference. That's why you're reading this. Thursday evening Gary Vaynerchuck made an appearance at Slowdown, a small concert venue and bar (part of the Saddle Creek records development- Very cool by the way) along with a live taping of "Winelibrary TV". How great was it to have the opportunity to be in a small venue ( 150 people tops) chatting it up with creative designers, developer, biz devs from around the nation and Gary V joining in on the conversations.
Friday was packed with back to back Keynotes from some phenomenal entrepreneurial inspirations, with an overall message to 'Just do it!" It was the first conference that nearly every speaker fit right next to the previous speaker. Jason Fried started off the day talking about focussed action. Not worrying about tomorrow or the 5 year plan, but get the work done today, and stop making it so complicated with business turns and plans, but get to what it is. Creating great ideas, and doing top notch wor. Something 37 Signals does right. Micah Laaker from Yahoo followed up with a great tool set and history of design from yahoo and his personal career. (maybe he didn't fit quite as well).
Let me take one moment to only just mention the Adriana Gascoigne of Girls in Tech sorority recruitment keynote. I think the message was fine, but the venue was wrong, and the lack of clear answers in Q&A was almost embarrassing. There's only so far that being cute can get you in a room full of ambitious Entrepreneurs . That's all I have to say about that.
Micah Baldwin of Lijit was great. Very open and honest about pushing past the failures and mistakes and moving on to do great things. After lunch we all laughed so hard as a no-show speaker spawned a impromptu panel Q&A with Gary Vaynerchuck, Jason Fried, Micah Baldwin, and Jerrery Kalmikoff. Not going in to this, I hope that they put up video soon. It was just great. Straight off from the panel Jeffrey Kalmikoff of Threadless led in to taking action and building community by being transparent and accessible to your audience, clients, and peers. After a short break, Ben Rattray of Change.org straighten us all up by pushing home the message that our gifted talents and resources can be used to change the world in a big way. Very convicting, and very good. A small spotlight on some Omaha entrepreneurs really help support that "Go for it!" mentality as we saw just a few faces that were doing just that in Omaha. Finally Gary V. of Winelibrarytv.com gave his always entertaining and passionate keynote on passionately pursuing success, purpose, and family. The poster boy of the "Just do it!" message. I will say that for the first time, Gary did step outside of his normal speach and gave some great practical points that I really took note of.
Closing up the evening with a great dinner with some new friends from Anova Solutions in Lincoln Nebraska, and then heading out for some drinks at Nomad Lounge. I drove home the next morning excited for the connections I made and the inspiration I got from the speakers, and just the Omaha itself. I am looking forward to seeing the plans come together next year at Big Omaha 2010.
Monday, January 2, 2012 at 4:53PM
Dustin Hayes joined CremaLab coming to Kansas City from Joplin, MO. Shortly after joining the team, Joplin was devastated by a horrific tornado. We were thankful to hear that all of his family and friends were safe, though the disaster touched us all. Dustin is helping to shape our CMS driven web experiences!
Also joining the team was Ross Brown. Ross has been working with CremaLab for years, but the timing was right for him to come on board as an official member of the CremaLab team. His expertise is putting CremaLab on the map in our front-end experiences! And we are always excited to see him growing his music label, Golden Sound Records.
