Live from the 19th Hole: Behind the Scenes at the Travelers Championship

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Text, Wednesdays with Woodward (registered trademark) Webinar Series.

The text appears on the screen of a laptop sitting open between a potted plant and a red mug with a white umbrella. Joan Woodward stands behind a podium in a feed in the upper right corner. Logo, Travelers Institute, Travelers.

(SPEECH)
JOAN WOODWARD: Well, good afternoon, and thank you for joining us today. I'm Joan Woodward, President of the Travelers Institute. Welcome to Wednesdays with Woodward. I'm here in downtown Hartford today, and let me tell you how good it feels to be in person again. So, thank you all for joining us. And we're going to have a terrific program for you today, something a little different. We're not going to talk about insurance. So, get ready for that.

(DESCRIPTION)
Text, About Travelers Institute (registered trademark) Webinars. The Wednesdays with Woodward educational webinar series is presented by the Travelers Institute, the public policy division of Travelers. This program is offered for informational and educational purposes only. You should consult with your financial, legal, insurance or other advisors about any practices suggested by this program. Please note that this session is being recorded and may be used as Travelers deems appropriate.

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Before we get started, I'd like to share our disclaimer about today's program just for a moment.

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Text, Live from the 19th Hole: Behind the Scenes at the Travelers Championship. Logos: C.B.I.A.,

MetroHartford Alliance, Travelers Institute, and American Property Casualty Insurance Association.

(SPEECH)
And also, a very big thanks to our partners today-- the MetroHartford Alliance, the American Property and Casualty Insurance Association, and the Connecticut Business & Industry Association. So, thank you to our partners.

I'm thrilled to be here today, really to discuss an event that I and many of us, especially in Connecticut, look forward to each year-- the Travelers Championship Golf Tournament, the largest professional sporting event in the state of Connecticut. This June, once again, many of the world's top golfers will descend on Connecticut for a thrilling week of golf-- and entertainment, too. It all happens at the TPC River Highlands, the award-winning golf course in Cromwell, Connecticut.

So, joining me on stage live and in person in a few moments are two individuals who are instrumental in making sure that the Travelers Championship is best in class and world class to showcase our terrific state of Connecticut. So, Andy Bessette who is the Executive Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer-- sometimes we call him our Chief Golf Officer here at Travelers-- will be joining me. Also, we are going to hear from the tournament director himself, Nathan Grube, and Nathan is a very good friend of the family, and we're just so thrilled that they can both be here today.

So, a few weeks ago, we visited TPC River Highlands and where preparations are really underway already for our event that will happen in just a month. So, we brought some of our camera crew, and we talked to a number of the clubhouse employees, the grounds crew and others who make the event such a successful event every year.

So, get ready. In the next 10 minutes, we are going to show you what we found at TPC River Highlands and talking to the restaurant owner there, talking to the clubhouse manager, going inside the locker rooms, going on the green, talking about cutting the grass. It's all in this short video. So, get ready to watch that.

And then Nathan and Andy will join me on stage, and we'll have a live chat, and we're going to take your questions. So put your questions in the Q&A. And also, my friends, if you're wondering, over the last two years, you saw my head, and I actually have a body attached to my head. So, it's really great to be with you today. You have a terrific program. And, hey, let's go ahead and roll that video.

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From above, a red umbrella floats in a gold course pond. A sign reads, Travelers Championship. A golfer and his caddy jump and bump bodies. Spectators sit next to the course while others walk the green in a split screen. Text, Travelers Championship - Behind the Scenes at the T.P.C.

Andy Bessette stands in front of a clubhouse.

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ANDY BESSETTE: Hi, everybody. I'm Andy Bessette, Executive Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer of Travelers, or, as Alan Schnitzer likes to call me, the Chief Golf Officer of Travelers.

(DESCRIPTION)
Footage of Andy and Alan Schnitzer posing with a golfer holding a trophy on the course. Then, footage of Andy and Nathan Grube strolling through the clubhouse.

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We're here today to meet up with Nathan Grube, our tournament director of the Travelers Championship, and give you a quick inside-the-ropes tour of TPC River Highlands, which is where the Travelers Championship is played every June. So, let's go on inside and take a look.

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(DESCRIPTION)
In slow motion, Andy looks around as he walks across a paved path to the clubhouse on a bright and sunny day. Nathan Grube meets him in the lobby, which features a stone gas fireplace, white columns, wainscoting and leather lounge chairs. They bump fists.

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Hi, Nathan.

NATHAN GRUBE: Hey, Andy.

ANDY BESSETTE: How are you doing?

NATHAN GRUBE: I'm good. How are you?

ANDY BESSETTE: Good.

NATHAN GRUBE: Good.

ANDY BESSETTE: Thanks for being here today and joining me to give everybody a great tour of this brand-new clubhouse in preparation for the Travelers Championship.

NATHAN GRUBE: I never get tired of showing this off, right? I mean, you remember--

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, it's great.

NATHAN GRUBE: It was built in '19, and you think like, here, in just a couple of weeks, the best players in the world walking through that front door, registering right here. They're excited about the Travelers Championship. So it's a pretty cool place. They like it a lot.

ANDY BESSETTE: And what a player field we have this year.

(DESCRIPTION)
Footage of Scottie Scheffler taking a swing, Rory McIlroy touching a spectator's hand as he struts by, and Dustin Johnson kissing a trophy.

(SPEECH)
Scottie Scheffler, number one in the world, Rory McIlroy, Dustin Johnson walking right where we are.

NATHAN GRUBE: They literally walk through these steps, come through that door, and it's fun to see the looks on volunteers. And they go, oh, I've seen you on TV. You look exactly the same, you know? But to have the top player field come right through where we're walking, it's pretty cool.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah.

NATHAN GRUBE: All right, let's go.

[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]

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They make their way through a hallway with a beverage counter on the right and a wall of screens on the left. Trophies are displayed in a lit case and dining tables are visible through open doors between white pillars.

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Of course, Grille 58, named after that historic round by Jim Furyk in 2016, where he set the PGA Tour record for the lowest score ever.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, what an exciting day that was. Everybody was running around. It was so exciting.

[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]

(DESCRIPTION)
At the bottom of a staircase, six screens around the Travelers Championship logo on a wall display of photo slideshows from past events.

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Nathan, you know what? This is one of the special places in TPC River Highlands. Nobody gets to see this except for the players during tournament week. Can you tell us a little bit about the interactive wall and why it's here?

NATHAN GRUBE: Sure. I mean, you go back to the old clubhouse, and there was a sign-- the Travelers Championship basically is played here. It's kind of cool. People walked in and like, oh, hey, the tournament's here. But this, when they built the new clubhouse, just became something totally different. It tells the story of the tournament year-round, past champions-- this interactive wall here, you can go through and see who the champions were.

You can see which charities benefit from the tournament. It tells their story, you can hit play on the video. You can actually make a donation to those charities right here. So, it looks at a lot of our sponsors for the tournament. So, it's one of those things where it tells the story of what the Travelers Championship is about year-round, you know? And that's pretty cool to see.

Well, you want to say hey to David Corrado who’s GM of the club?

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah.

NATHAN GRUBE: All right, let's go.

[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]

(DESCRIPTION)
Artwork and ceramic pieces are displayed on a whitewashed wood table in a nook. A spacious locker room features rows of walnut-toned wood lockers and benches in between. Andy, Nathan, and David Corrado step into an area outside the locker room with a billiards table and TV.

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ANDY BESSETTE: So, this is now we're getting into the locker room area, David. This is the second home for the players for the week, which is really, really cool. Maybe you can tell us just a little bit about what goes on in here during tournament week.

DAVID CORRADO: Sure. For the players, their office is the golf course or the practice facility. Coming into the locker room here, it's a safe haven. It's a place to relax and unwind a little bit in between rounds. So that's what we try and provide here.

Now, that being said, they're competitive out on the golf course, but they're equally competitive here on the pool table. Frankly, it's the ping-pong even more so than the pool. See some really good competitive matches down here.

NATHAN GRUBE: Well, I think the biggest testament of that is when you see the guys come off the golf course, tens of thousands of fans-- they're all over them. The media is all over them. They're very buttoned up, very polished. They come down here, hat comes off, sunglasses. They untuck their shirt. They grab a sandwich. They just kind of take a deep breath, and they exhale.

DAVID CORRADO: Well, we try to provide services to make life easy on them. These guys are on the road for half the year, probably, at least. Things like laundry service or equipment storage or luggage storage or you name it. Certainly, the locker room attendants play a role in that as well.

Speaking of the lockers, let me show you another little area over here.

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They step inside the locker room.

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Each player gets assigned a locker for the week. Now, this first bay of lockers here is what we call Champions' Row or Champions' Bay. And all of our past champions that are coming back to play in the event get a locker assigned in this area.

NATHAN GRUBE: That's really cool to see that, and you think about some of the history and some of the champions that are in here and all those guys in here during tournament week in the last 14, 15 years with Travelers as title. They're all collected here. Just the history is pretty cool to see.

DAVID CORRADO: Also, I think I saw Jeff Reich, our Director of Agronomy, outside--

NATHAN GRUBE: Oh, great.

DAVID CORRADO: on the putting green. Maybe let's take a walk out there and see what the agronomy team is doing in preparation.

[INAUDIBLE]

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(DESCRIPTION)
An aerial view of the clubhouse and course. A flag sways on a green. Andy and Nathan stand with Jeff Reich on the course with the clubhouse behind them.

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ANDY BESSETTE: Hi, Jeff. Thanks for being with us today. We appreciate you taking the time to come out with us. What do you do differently here during tournament week versus the rest of the year for the club members?

JEFF REICH: Andy, great question, and great to have you here as well. Before the tournament, a few things we're doing different-- we maintain the turf both morning and night versus just a morning mow for our membership. There's a few different things that we use as metrics to test how the greens play, how the fairways play, how the tees hit from.

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An employee drops a black ball onto the turf while holding a chain with a triangular piece at the end, then rolls a ball down a stimpmeter.

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And that gives us, hey, we might need to roll the greens another roll. Or we might need to mow the greens, give them another mow.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, I have to tell you, good thing you cut the fairways at night during tournament week because that gets me the chance to come out on Saturday night for the last 10 years and cut one of the fairways with you, which is the highlight of my week.

JEFF REICH: And that fairway always plays a little bit better.

[LAUGHTER]

So, we appreciate you taking the time to come out there because it's also a highlight of mine.

ANDY BESSETTE: Thank you. Thanks, Jeff.

NATHAN GRUBE:  Well, I mean, the guys never see this, right-- what goes into making sure that this surface is just perfect for them to show the world their craft, and it's-- I mean, you do this year-round. I mean, this is a 12-month year job.

JEFF REICH:  It is. It is. It's a 12-month job, and during that time, we have a staff of 30 and a team of 70 volunteers, so almost a hundred people that we do to set up this golf course versus during in-season, it's only 30--

NATHAN GRUBE:  Got it.

JEFF REICH: on a routine basis.

ANDY BESSETTE: Nathan, I think we have to move over to the First Tee and meet up with Mark Moriarty.

NATHAN GRUBE: Great. Sounds good. Let's go.

ANDY BESSETTE:  Jeff, thank you.

JEFF REICH: Hey, thank you guys.

(DESCRIPTION)
Andy stands aside as Nathan putts, his ball an inch from the hole.

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ANDY BESSETTE: Roll mine into the hole.

NATHAN GRUBE: I'm really, really sorry about this.

ANDY BESSETTE: Roll mine into the hole.

NATHAN GRUBE: Sorry.

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Nathan makes the shot.

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ALL: Oh!

[LAUGHTER]

ANDY BESSETTE: Cheat, cheat, cheat.

WOMAN: And that's round [INAUDIBLE].

[UPBEAT MUSIC]

(SINGING) Oh, ooh, whoa.

(DESCRIPTION)
A photo mural on a stairwell with a First Tee Connecticut logo depicts a man high-fiving a young woman on a course as a young boy putts. Another area houses a golf simulator and an indoor link with a hole. Andy and Nathan meet with Mark Moriarty, Executive Director of First Tee of Connecticut, in the lobby of the David and Geri Epstein Learning Center.

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Oh, oh, ooh, whoa.

ANDY BESSETTE: Hi, Mark.

MARK MORIARTY: Hi, Andy.

ANDY BESSETTE: How are you doing?

MARK MORIARTY: Hey, Nathan.

ANDY BESSETTE: Good to see you.

MARK MORIARTY: How are you?

NATHAN GRUBE: Nice seeing you. What we have here with the headquarters of the First Tee of Connecticut here, so tightly knit with the Travelers Championship-- there's stuff that we do during tournament week. There's stuff we do throughout the year. It's really one of the most unique setups. So, Mark, you want to just kind of give a highlight of the kind of partnership a little bit and then what you guys do here?

MARK MORIARTY: Sure. This is really a year-long friendship and relationship, most recently with the PGA Tour's diversity, equity, inclusion funding that you all were nice enough to designate to our chapter. And really, what that's going to allow the First Tee of Connecticut to do is continue serving young people all across the state.

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Photos and sponsor banners cover the walls and hang from the ceiling.

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We were at a high of 71,000 young people impacted through our programming, and we're hoping to get back to that number in 2022 and 2023.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah. That's terrific.

NATHAN GRUBE: Well, that's-- I mean, you see the year-round stuff, right, from the clinics and things like that? And I think sometimes people think, oh, it's teaching kids how to play golf, but you and I both know-- we all know that golf's kind of like this much of it.

(DESCRIPTION)
Nathan indicates a small space between his index finger and thumb.

(SPEECH)
I mean, what you introduce from a life skill standpoint, I think that's one of the things that, Andy, to your point, make us really proud to be able to support what's going on here.

MARK MORIARTY: Definitely the goal is to create, as we say, good golfers, better people, and really to use the game of golf when they're having a good time. And a lot of the relationship building that we all know exists really make that possible for young people to develop confidence in themselves.

(DESCRIPTION)
The Wall of Honor in the lobby lists the board of directors and a multitude of donors.

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First Tee really can offer that opportunity on a golf course, which is exciting.

NATHAN GRUBE: Well, Mark, thank you for what you're doing not only here but, to your point, in the schools. I mean, the kids that are impacted, the families that are impacted-- it's just this mushroom effect, obviously, of what having a PGA Tour event in your community-- you're kind of the arms and legs in the community and what that means. So, thanks for the work that you and your team are doing.

MARK MORIARTY: Thank you. We appreciate the support from Travelers and from the tournament, and we're coming right into Travelers Insurance's backyard this year, taking over the golf operations at Goodwin Park, which is one of the city of Hartford's golf courses.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, which is terrific.

MARK MORIARTY: So, there could be a Travelers League. There could be all kinds of opportunities there.

NATHAN GRUBE: Mark, thanks for everything you're doing.

ANDY BESSETTE: Thanks, Mark.

MARK MORIARTY: Good to see you and thanks.

NATHAN GRUBE: See you.

ANDY BESSETTE: Mark, thank you.

MARK MORIARTY: Andy, take care. Thank you.

(DESCRIPTION)
All three men shake hands.

[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]

(DESCRIPTION)
Andy and Nathan meet back up with David Corrado inside an empty dining room with a large clock above a gas fireplace, green walls, a white shiplap ceiling, and contemporary curved-back leather chairs around dining tables of different sizes.

(SPEECH)
DAVID CORRADO: Andy, Nathan.

ANDY BESSETTE: Hey. How are you doing?

DAVID CORRADO: Good to see you, gentlemen. Welcome to Grille 58.

(DECRIPTION)
Andy, Nathan and David fist bump.

NATHAN GRUBE: Thank you very much. Thanks for having us.

DAVID CORRADO: Have a seat. Let's walk you through what we do here during the Travelers Championship.

NATHAN GRUBE: Awesome.

ANDY BESSETTE: David, tell us a little bit about what the difference is between tournament week in the club and a normal week.

DAVID CORRADO: Sure. 51 weeks of the year, obviously, we're taking care of our members and guests in Grille 58 here, and it's a la carte dining. You know, breakfast, lunch and dinner service coming in, ordering off the menu, certainly special requests. But during tournament week, we get to really put on a show. We get to cater to the players and their families.

These are athletes, so they really want to focus on healthy eating. So, whether it be egg white omelet station in the morning or, during lunch, the salad bar. Then we, of course, always have that cheat station in there. You know, mac and cheese bar, paninis, those types of things, things that I would eat. But these athletes, boy, they really want to focus on eating healthy. That's for sure.

NATHAN GRUBE: All right, David, you take the same philosophy that we take with the tournament, right? You try to accommodate every special request, things like that. What are some unique things where you see a player and their family walk in that you say, OK, you know what? Now we're going to be special and treat them like they're home.

DAVID CORRADO: Well, the great part about the Travelers Championship is the number of these players that come back year after year. We know that this tour player likes almond butter instead of peanut butter to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and take it out onto the golf course with them. We try and make sure everything that we do is customized for them. And we try and take advantage of learning about them year after year to really make the week special.

NATHAN GRUBE: Can I get that to go?

[LAUGHTER]

I don't have to take it right here, right?

[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]

(DESCRIPTION)
The front doors and lobby of the clubhouse, the pool table, and the entrance. Spectators stroll and mingle on the course in a timelapse. Andy and Nathan stand in the parking lot in front of the clubhouse.

(SPEECH)
ANDY BESSETTE: Well, we're about out of time, Nathan. But thank you very much for spending the time with us. This has been a great day.

NATHAN GRUBE: Again, thank you to Travelers, all the volunteers that come and Travelers employees that do this. The tournament wouldn't be what it is without that support. So really appreciate you taking the time to be here.

ANDY BESSETTE: Well, and thank you to you and your team, to Tara, to Kevin, and all the others that make this happen. We couldn't do it without you. You're world class. You're the best of the PGA Tour. And that's why we have the best tournament on the PGA Tour. And we're really looking forward to a terrific, a terrific 2022 Travelers Championship.

NATHAN GRUBE: It's going to be a lot of fun. Thanks for being here today.

ANDY BESSETTE: Thanks, Nathan.

(DESCRIPTION)
Nathan and Andy fist bump.

NATHAN GRUBE: Absolutely. Let's go get something to eat.

ANDY BESSETTE: Eh. I'm not hungry.

[ELECTRONIC MUSIC]

(DESCRIPTION)
They step away. Various golfers cheer and hold up trophies at past tournaments. Spectators raise their arms and jump up and down on the green.

Logo, Travelers Championship.

Joan Woodward. Text, Live from the 19th Hole: Behind the Scenes at the Travelers Championship.

(SPEECH)

[END PLAYBACK]

JOAN WOODWARD: So how great was that, right? Just a 10-minute overview, but just to see all the different pieces that go into putting on the week show. And it is a 52-week project every single year. So, you saw them on the video. Now let me introduce them to you in person.

(DESCRIPTION)
Text, Speakers. Photos of Joan Woodward, Executive Vice President, Public Policy, President, Travelers institute, Travelers; Nathan Grube, Executive Director, Greater Hartford Community Foundation Inc., Tournament Director, Travelers Championship; and Andy F. Bessette, Executive Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer, Travelers.

(SPEECH)
First of all, Nathan Grube is the Executive Director of the Greater Hartford Community Foundation and the Tournament Director for the Travelers Championship. During his tenure, the Travelers Championship has generated more than $22 million for charity and has been recognized by the PGA Tour for several awards, including the most coveted Players Choice Award and the Tournament of the Year, also the Best Charity Integration award.

Nathan is a class A member of the PGA of America and is an active member of the Connecticut section of the PGA. He actually played professional golf from 1996 to 2001, participating in various tours throughout the United States.

Then we have my friend, Andy Bessette. Andy is the Executive Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer here at Travelers. He wears many hats here and has responsibility for corporate real estate, administrative services, community relations, internal investigations, among others. So, notably, he has responsibly-- responsibility for Travelers sports sponsorships, including our marketing partnership with the PGA Tour, title sponsorship of the Travelers Championship.

Andy is very active in the community, serving on the board of the Greater Hartford Community Foundation as a trustee of the University of Connecticut, Vice Chairman of the Capital Region Development Authority, and past chair of the MetroHartford Alliance, just to name a few, actually. He's widely recognized for his community support and was named to the Hartford Business Journal's Power 50 again this year.

So, finally, Andy is also an athlete and was a member of the 1980 United States Olympic team and continues to support Olympic activities. So that was just a terrific video. And, Andy and Nathan, I'm going to join you and talk just for a minute-- I'm going to go to Andy first. I want to talk for a minute because we started the sponsorship in 2007. Last year, we agreed to sponsor it through 2030.

(DESCRIPTION)
Andy and Nathan sit in chairs on the stage next to the podium.

(SPEECH)
So, while I walk over, tell us what it's like for a company to sponsor such a huge event and what goes into it from a corporate perspective first. Talk about that.

(DESCRIPTION)
Andy.

(SPEECH)
ANDY BESSETTE: Thanks, Joan, and thanks for having us here today. It's a lot of fun.

(DESCRIPTION)
Joan steps away from the podium and sits next to them.

(SPEECH)
You know, it's interesting. As I think back through the whole last 22 years. Ya know, back in 2002, I didn't even know I was going to school again, but I did. And, in Minnesota, I befriended the CEO of the Minnesota Wild, Jac Sperling, the CEO of the now-- the now CEO of the Seattle Kraken NHL team, Tod Leiweke, and Eric Curry, who had corporate sponsorships for the Minnesota Twins.

And we had sponsorships with them back then in the early 2000s, but they taught me so much. I didn't even know I was going to school to learn, but they taught me so much about how to run a professional sports event. And I learned it quickly. I mean, it was a basic stuff that you might say, sure, of course it is.

But they taught me how to-- that a sports franchise is a business, and you run it like a business. You have financials. You have a profit-loss statement. And they taught me also that you treat your sponsors and your fans to world-class experiences as much as you can. And you just drive that home all the time and that you never stop getting better.

And so all of that drove us, and throughout 2002 to 2006, I was negotiating with the PGA Tour, which was very interesting, to get rid of a sponsorship we had from another company called the West Coast Swing, which was not a very good sponsorship. And so, I never forget the funny part is that I invited the chief marketing officer of the PGA Tour to come from Florida to St. Paul, Minnesota, in January.

JOAN WOODWARD: Oh, nice.

ANDY BESSETTE: Best negotiating strategy I could have ever had. He froze to death, but he just gave us everything we wanted, so it was really good. But then in 2006, when we took over or we were getting ready to take over the tournament. And you fast-forward to 2007, and I had all those conversations with Mike Tirico, Chris Berman, J.J. Henry-- the list goes on and on with players, broadcasters, caddies, anybody that would talk to us to let us learn.

Nathan and I would sit down and talk with them, and so we learned a lot. And that all built with this means to Travelers for the-- to be the title sponsor. This would be our 16th year. And in 2030, we will be the longest-running title sponsor of this-- I think it's one of the two or three oldest events on the PGA Tour. It has a lot of history here since 1952.

And it's so great. It's great for our brand. Our brand associated with a world-class sporting event and a world-class brand, like the red Travelers umbrella in Travelers, is phenomenal. But it also-- it gives us an opportunity for pride. And I always use the word "pride" because the word "pride" to me is so important in our employees, for our company, for the people in the community, for charities. Everybody is very, very proud of what we do here.

And the long-term stability that our renewal to 2030 brought was really important for a lot of elements-- one of them being the players always want to know they're participating in an event that's not going to go away next year. They always want stability in the event. So when Nathan and I go out, which we do three or four times a year to-- I'll use the word "recruit," or befriend more of the golfers, it's really important for them to know Travelers because a lot of them will say to us, thank you for renewing to 2030.

It means a lot to us. And so, they reward us by coming back, and that's been very, very special to us. So, it's a great sponsorship, and it takes a lot of work from both a lot of Travelers people and a lot of Nathan's staff and others to make this successful.

JOAN WOODWARD: Great, great. Nathan, you're up. So, Andy talked about the corporate side of it. You were kind of one of the first hires for the Travelers Championship and getting it going. So, from when you started, in 2007 or so, to where we are today, tell us what goes in from your perspective-- your staff, your volunteers. We've talked to the clubhouse folks. Just give us a little bit behind the scenes and maybe something people don't actually understand or know about.

NATHAN GRUBE: Gotcha. It's a fair question. I mean, it is a year-round job, right? I mean, people often ask, hey, what do you do the rest of the year? I say actually, there's 13 of us where this is all we do year-round. We think about this. We plan for it. But we have a group of probably 30, I think we're up to, committees and thousands of volunteers.

And, really, the business model is one that's not normal-- Andy mentioned a lot of the other leagues. It's not normal for other professional sports leagues. Usually, you have a company that manages it. They're trying to get as much profit out of it as possible, which is not a bad thing. It's just a different business model.

With us, we have a staff, but the majority of the help and the people that make it happen are all volunteers so that, at the end of the day, we can say, hey, we raised all this money from the tournament. We ran a good business. We ran our margins tight. We watched all of our expenses. We drove revenue. We ran a disciplined business. And guess what that means? That means that our charities actually get all that money.

And Andy and I talk about that all the time to say, it's such a business model that we talk about often, but it's one of the most unique ones out there because people think, oh, you know, somebody's got to be making money off this. No, no, no, no. The majority of the workforce is a volunteer team that actually will take time off work, get a volunteer package, drive in from out of state, be here from in state to make this all work.

If we had to actually hire all those people, there really wouldn't be the proceeds for charity. And so, it's a very unique business model, but it's a year-round job that we love. We sit there, and like I said, we think about this tournament every single day of the year and how we can make different pieces of it better.

JOAN WOODWARD: Wonderful. So, Andy, let's talk about this year. So, everyone is so excited. There's such buzz in the air. In 2020, obviously no fans, right?

ANDY BESSETTE: Mm, yeah.

JOAN WOODWARD: And then 2021, we had 10,000 per day or so.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yep.

JOAN WOODWARD: This year is what? Is it going to look like 2019 again?

ANDY BESSETTE: Oh, yeah, 50,000 a day.

JOAN WOODWARD: How many?

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, 50,000 a day. And the standing joke is Nathan I have a great relationship, and we beat each other up in a good way, positive way, throughout the year financially and every element of the tournament, right, Nathan?

NATHAN GRUBE: Yeah, that's true.

ANDY BESSETTE: But it's so good to have-- let me go back to 2020, when we had no fans. Nathan and I on Sunday night, when Dustin Johnson was winning the tournament-- looking around, we had 50 people, I think, on the hills.

NATHAN GRUBE: 37.

ANDY BESSETTE: 37, OK.

JOAN WOODWARD: 37 people.

NATHAN GRUBE: [LAUGHS]

ANDY BESSETTE: So, 37 of us, including Nathan and I, and we're open to giving each other a high five because Dustin Johnson just won. And it's like, I look to Nathan, and I can't quite report the-- I can't say exactly what I said to him, but I said, this stinks. I mean, this is terrible. I hate this. This is depressing.

And so last year, we had 10,000, and they were running back and forth with the whole playoff. I was walking with Alan, and I said, look at this. This is great, all those people sprinting from 18 to 17. Gosh, I hope none of them fall. Gosh, [INAUDIBLE].

[LAUGHTER]

JOAN WOODWARD: Our chief risk officer is worried about people following.

ANDY BESSETTE: Because he's worried about--

JOAN WOODWARD: So, for those who weren't there last year, tell us-- there was an 8-hole playoff at the very end. That was the second time that ever happened in PGA history, the 8-hole?

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, the longest run in PGA Tour history was back in the late '40s. Late '40s. So in modern golf, I would say this is the longest that's ever been-- the longest playoff ever. And to watch Harris English battle it out-- and they just had a-- I mean, they were going back and forth, back and forth, and back and forth. And we thought it was over, and then they miss a putt.

But the excitement in the stands, I thought, was hilarious. And the excitement of the fans running back and forth-- and I shouldn't say this exactly, but we sold more food and beverage last year with 10,000 than we ever sold with 50,000. And I always laugh with Nathan because Nathan will always say 30,000 or 40,000. Of course, I'm always saying 50. So, he kicks me under the table, and then we figure out what we shouldn't say.

JOAN WOODWARD: I think we're going to have a huge crowd.

ANDY BESSETTE: Huge crowd.

JOAN WOODWARD: Tell us who's coming. Who's coming this year?

ANDY BESSETTE: So right off the bat, number one in the world, Scottie Scheffler. And Scottie's just a terrific, terrific young man-- had a long conversation with him at the Players Championship this year. And I said, hey, we want to do more with you. This is great. And he said, love it. Let's do it.

And the list-- Rory McIlroy-- and Dustin Johnson, our champion from 2020 when Nathan and I were high-fiving each other-- Justin Thomas, and the list goes on. And then this year, at one point, we had eight of the top 10 in the world. And it keeps shifting around week to week.

But our player field, I'll bet you from some of the people that have called me, one person called me on a Sunday morning a couple of weeks ago and said, gee, I need a house. Can you help me? I didn't even know he was playing. And I can't say his name, but ducks have webs, web--

JOAN WOODWARD: Webbed feet?

ANDY BESSETTE: Something. Webbed feet, web, web.

JOAN WOODWARD: Yeah, got it, got it.

ANDY BESSETTE: So, he's not announced yet, so Nathan kicks me about that too. But they're all coming down. We recruited a great, great field up until probably the middle of April. Now, I think we're starting, Nathan, to see some of the flow from the U.S. Open being in Boston and people—and players saying, geez, I'm right here, and Travelers does a great job. I think we're going to go down to Hartford.

JOAN WOODWARD: So that's helping us this year maybe with the U.S. Open being in Boston, and it's a short ride down, and--

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK, wonderful.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah.

JOAN WOODWARD: So, what changes did you do or protocols do you put in place during the pandemic or innovations over the last couple of years, Nathan, that maybe you can talk about are you keeping or you're going-- is there anything that we learned in the last couple of years that we can utilize?

NATHAN GRUBE: Yes, actually, the short answer is yes. It's funny. I wouldn't have been able to tell you, hey, here's what we're going to keep until we actually went through it because we had to, right? I mean, there was a certain way that we did food because we had to. And we actually learned, oh my gosh, actually, our sponsors will like this better than how we had been doing it before. So, we've been talking to our partners about that, how we built our menus, and how we just even deliver the food. It was a safety protocol, but then it became actually something that they liked even more.

Digital tickets was one, actually, that's obviously it's still migrating in the sports space. But we had to go to it to reduce touchpoints. And then some of our sponsors said, can we please keep that? And so we built out a digital ticket platform that I don't know that it would have come along as fast as it did unless we had to.

How we looked at our committees, the volunteer experience-- the bleachers is another one. When we couldn't build certain things, all of a sudden, these sightlines opened up that we hadn't seen in probably 12 or 13 years. And then all of a sudden, we're going, wait a minute. No, let's not put a structure back there. Let's do this because the fan feedback was just really, really positive that, hey, we've gotten to be able to get so close to the tee boxes.

So, I mean, those are just a few off the top that I could say that we wouldn't have done those unless we had to, but then after feedback, we're like, oh, yes, we're going to definitely keep those. The testing and the things like that, we're OK to let those go.

JOAN WOODWARD: Yeah.

NATHAN GRUBE: But, and the--

JOAN WOODWARD: Testing and masks, right?

NATHAN GRUBE: --crowd limits.

NATHAN GRUBE: I would say the crowd limits. Yeah, we're OK to let those go, but there were definitely some good things we're going to keep.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK, so let's talk just a minute again about contingency planning. Andy, you're the head of return to work and return to-- not return to work, oh my-- return to office.

ANDY BESSETTE: Return to-- oh yeah, I say that all the time.

JOAN WOODWARD: I think we were all working the last two years, probably harder than ever, but contingency planning and really just pivoting on a moment's notice when you were hearing different things coming in from the PGA and their protocols and their requirements-- give us a sense of that. And maybe even just talk a little bit about how our return to office is going here.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, the return to offices, I think, is going great. It takes time to get back in. When I came back to the office, I came back in early right after I had my boosters-- I’m sorry-- my first vaccines back in March of '20. And it took me like a few weeks to get my sea legs back in. And so, it takes some time to get used to it, but I think it's a safe environment, and I think it's going very well.

And it kind of runs in parallel to the tournament as well because Nathan and I for the last two years, three years, have been doing contingency planning, Joan, as you said, to figure out like, if we have to pivot at the last minute, what are we going to do? If all of a sudden, testing is required, or masks are required?

The good thing about this sport of golf is it's played outside in great wide-open spaces. And so that makes it much safer. I mean, all the medical professionals will tell you, if you're outside, you're pretty safe. And so, I think that element of it works to our advantage.

I think that the-- but Nathan and I being, but what if this happens? What if that? We have contingency plans on top of contingency plans.

And even this year, with our contingency plan-- right, Nathan-- was that, OK, listen. We have to make sure that all of the tents that we're building in the venues with air conditioning and closed sides, that those tent sides can be taken off within a few days, a week of the tournament, if we have to be open air. And so we had that contingency ready for this year. And some companies that buy them, they want to leave them closed, and they want to open them, but we have flexibility to do it.

And so, we're really excited that-- well, I think-- knock on wood, right-- we've taken care of planning around all the possible outcomes. You can never guess everything because we can't control COVID, and we can't control the PGA Tour. And so, we'll just work through it all and see how things progress.

But I think it's going to be a wide-open tournament. It's going to be a lot of fun. A lot of people are going to be out there, and hopefully are eating and drinking even more than last year, Nathan, so we can make even more money for charity

JOAN WOODWARD: OK, so eating and drinking is the goal, right? Making sure people are buying their-- I mean, definitely.

ANDY BESSETTE: My goal has been-- and Nathan’ll tell you. For the last three or four years-- because I do like to eat. You can tell I'm not a small guy. I love to eat. I think this should be-- I want this to be the culinary experience of the PGA Tour.

JOAN WOODWARD: I love it.

ANDY BESSETTE: I want it to have the best cheeseburgers and the best barbecue. We're not there yet, but we're getting there.

JOAN WOODWARD: Getting there. OK, let's talk at the heart of it all about charity, right? So we saw in the video a wonderful piece about the First Tee. And give us a little bit, Andy, from your perspective, and then, Nathan, I want to ask you about how other charities can get involved here, but first, Andy. How does it work when we say net proceeds go to charity? So, talk about that for a minute and how many total charities right now are recipients of the last couple of years?

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, every year, we have well over a hundred charities who are receiving funding from us. And, in every year, last year it was over $2.2 million. And since the beginning, since we took over in 2007, it's been over $22 million. And so, Nathan and I work really hard, and-- I mean, don't get it wrong-- Nathan runs the tournament. I'm just there to help him. But we work really hard together to make sure that all the net proceeds go to charity.

And it's so fits into the ethos of Travelers to connect it back for a second to our title sponsorship, where it's so connected to what we do. Marlene Ibsen and her team do such great work. We give(Travelers) corporations-- it gives over $22 million a year to different organizations to be helpful. And there's tons-- thousands, hundreds of thousands of hours of volunteerism and Alan Schnitzer's special projects that he does every year. And it's phenomenal the breadth of what we do here at Travelers.

So, the tournament fits right in. It's the ethos of Travelers. It's the ethos of the Travelers Championship. Ya know, we don’t-- I shouldn't-- why sponsor a sport that makes a wealthy owner--

JOAN WOODWARD: Wealthier, right?

ANDY BESSETTE: --wealthier.

JOAN WOODWARD: No, it's wonderful. And it really aligns with the Travelers Promise, right, is to take care of each other and communities that we serve. So, Nathan, to you, so what if you're a charity listening out there, and you're not currently one of the 100. Can they get in on a potential beneficiary of the proceeds as well?

NATHAN GRUBE: Short answer, yes.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK.

NATHAN GRUBE: Any nonprofit can get involved with the Travelers Championship that's watching because here's-- a few years back, when Travelers started, there is only so many net proceeds, right? I mean, in the tournament, there is a cap on how much the tournament is going to make. Like, that is a finite number.

What we then try to figure out was, how do we not have to ever say no to a charity? And so, the Birdies for Charity program is a program that we created where we can say yes to every single charity. And what we do is we help them raise money, and any money that they raise, we get them $0.15 on every dollar that they raise. So, there is a bonus pool of money that our sponsors-- Andy mentioned-- our sponsors chip in, to where any charity can get involved.

And we can help them-- two things. What we found out is this over this process-- charities need money, but they also need a platform to tell their story. There are some amazing charities out there where they've said, I just can't tell anybody what we're doing because I don't have a microphone. I don't have a platform.

JOAN WOODWARD: Platform.

NATHAN GRUBE: I don't have it. And so, what we do is we say, look, get involved with the tournament. We'll get you interviews during tournament week. We'll get you on the radio prior to. And so some charities might not get millions of dollars through the tournament. They get a $10,000 check, which is great. But then they said, oh my gosh, I got to tell my story, and I got X amount more donors.

So, we try very hard to give them a platform as well as funds. So, any charity, email us, go on our website, travelerschampionship.com. We can find a way to get you involved.

JOAN WOODWARD: I mean I think it's priceless because you're giving them that platform and the notice in the community, again, to tell the story that they would not have had. So, it's hard to put a value on that in terms of what they get in return.

So, let me tell the audience out here, we're going to take a lot of your questions coming up and online as well. So, submit them through the Q&A function, and we'll get to as many questions as we can.

But I want to talk about a program that-- I came to Travelers 14 years ago. And one of the programs we started in those early years, at least my being here, was Women's Day. And so, a special place in my heart, being among the group that started that with you, Andy and Nathan. And, Andy, tell us about Women's Day. When we started early on, we weren't sure anybody would come, right? And the purpose was to get more women out to the course, more women involved in golf.

ANDY BESSETTE: Right.

JOAN WOODWARD: I'll tell you a little secret. I never played golf in my life, and during COVID, I had a little extra time. Don't tell the CEO, but--

[LAUGHTER]

--took up golf, right? And as one of my friends says, you don't suck, Joan. So that's my new line. I don't suck at golf.

NATHAN GRUBE: Quite the endorsement.

JOAN WOODWARD: I know. You're a wonderful friend, and a few of my family members. So, getting more women involved in golf-- and, again, I would have never taken it up had I not had COVID hit. But have we been successful in getting more women out to the course over the years for Women's Day and then playing golf?

ANDY BESSETTE: You know, and, Joan, you're spot on in those early years. I wasn't sure. I mean, I knew we had a good plan because the PGA Tour had a version of Women's Day. We built our own version. And we've always had a high-profile guest speaker, right? And then we've had some other very good second speakers too.

And we're going to do the same thing this year. And we grew it from probably a hundred to a couple of hundred women the first year. Now, it sells out in 15 minutes, and we sell-- I'm sorry-- we have an attendance of 7 to 800.

JOAN WOODWARD: 7 to 800 last year.

ANDY BESSETTE: 7 to 800.

JOAN WOODWARD: Right.

ANDY BESSETTE: I mean, that's unbelievable. And you know what the good part is? Yes, in the beginning, it was to get women more exposed to golf and come out and see what it's all about because this is not the LPGA Tour. It's the PGA Tour. And so, I think that's worked very successfully. And even my wife, who doesn't like golf at all, loves coming out because it's just a fun day. And that's all OK. That's great. That's what we want to do.

And I've seen-- what I've seen build over the-- oh, god-- 14 years already. I think we started in 2009-- is I see collaboration, and I see the women of Travelers, because we have a lot of our own employees attending, like to the 250 to 300 level. And they're talking to each other. They're collaborating. They're talking. They're getting exposed to really good leaders.

I mean, yes, part of Women's Day is entertainment, but a lot of it's educational, like how a young woman can succeed in-- I mean, there's a young woman, Amanda Balionis [Renner], who is one of the announcers on the CBS team. She does terrific interviews. She's a terrific person. And she's going to help us out with this year.

But if a young woman wants to listen to a young woman who has become successful, boy, I'll tell you, Amanda would be a really good model. So, we've tried to do that over 14 years, and it's grown into one of the best on the PGA Tour, I believe.

JOAN WOODWARD: Yeah, and there's a lot of buzz about men wanting to get in and see what's all about and [INAUDIBLE]

NATHAN GRUBE: That's true.

ANDY BESSETTE: We have more men that come--

NATHAN GRUBE: Yeah, that's true.

ANDY BESSETTE: --every year, a lot, actually. It's quite few.

JOAN WOODWARD: That's good. All right, Nathan, I want to talk to you about the military aspect of this because I know a couple of years I've been involved in Operation Shower. Tell us what that is about. And also there's an outpost, correct? So, if you're in the military, and you come to the tournament, what is your experience?

NATHAN GRUBE: So, hopefully, a very good one. I will say that. And one, that you feel taken care of. And this goes back to-- Andy mentioned the word ethos of Travelers as far as-- I mean, there is a care and a concern and a place for the military within this company, and there is at the tournament as well.

And I grew up as a military brat. I grew up-- my father was in the Navy. And so, I have a special place for the military in my heart. And so, when we started looking at the military appreciation platform at the Travelers Championship, it was an easy marriage partnership to say, hey, what can we do to say thank you to men and women in and out of uniform for what they've done and just a small thank you? I mean, obviously, you can never thank them for what they're dedicating their lives to the service of our country.

So, then the most basic way, how do we get the tickets taken care of, getting sponsors to subsidize that? How do we get an outpost where they get free food and beverage and a place to go during the week to just come out and experience this and spend time with their family? Maybe they've been deployed.

JOAN WOODWARD: So, if I'm in the military, I can bring my family and go to-- and get a free lunch at the tournament?

NATHAN GRUBE: Absolutely.

JOAN WOODWARD: And where is that and what's it called? What is it?

NATHAN GRUBE: So, it's called the Outpost, the Military Outpost. And we actually moved it this year, one of the things we learned during COVID.

JOAN WOODWARD: Yeah.

NATHAN GRUBE: We're actually going to put it over on the ninth hole, so right near one of the gates-- a little bit more easily accessible, still a view of golf. There's some tournaments that have an Outpost, but maybe you can't actually see golf. We really felt that it was important to make sure that having a view of golf on the golf course was good.

So that is a piece of it, but then you mentioned Operation Shower. We kind of took the military experience and we said, how do we do more? And so, you've been a part of this. You've seen this. We throw a surprise baby shower for 40, 50 military moms whose husbands/partners are deployed. And they come out to the golf course, and we throw them this baby shower, and they get all these gifts. And they just get-- I mean, we try to love on them and say, hey, thank you so much for your service.

And, again, kind of remembering the stories that my mom would tell when my dad was in Vietnam. Like, she was alone, you know? I mean, she had multiple kids. I'll never forget, Joan, one of the moms one year said-- I was talking to her, and I said, how's it going? She said, well, my husband's deployed.

And I said, do you have any help? And she goes, oh yeah, oh yeah. My son, he helps. Like, he does this, and she was pregnant. And I said, oh, how old's your son? And she said, 2. And I went into my mind, I'm going, I have two 2-year-olds, and "help" is not a word that I would use to define. But she was figuring it out, right?

And just to be able to say thank you to those moms for the role that they play in this whole military ecosystem is-- it's a really special day. And so, we have Operation Shower, and that's a group that we just can't say thank you to enough. But we're really, really proud of that aspect of the event.

JOAN WOODWARD: And that's outside of what we're talking about, the charitable-- that's in addition to, right?

NATHAN GRUBE: Yes, yeah.

JOAN WOODWARD: That's in addition to that.

NATHAN GRUBE: Separate.

JOAN WOODWARD: So, what about the Birdies for Charities? So, Andy, talk about this because I know on the Inside page for a lot of our employees, what is the Birdie for Charities? How can people get involved there?

ANDY BESSETTE: Well, I'll let Nathan explain the details of if. Basically, it's a great program where a charity can sign up to participate. And then they run their program, and they get matching dollars. The tournament matches $0.15 on the dollar.

NATHAN GRUBE: Correct. You've done your homework.

ANDY BESSETTE: Right? Is that good?

NATHAN GRUBE: Nice job.

ANDY BESSETTE: Well, I'm never sure what changes, right? It changes in a pivot. So they're getting $0.15 on the dollar. So it behooves all these charities to go out and have all kinds of campaigns around the tournament. And they raise tremendous amounts of dollars.

Matter of fact, last year-- I'm stealing your thunder, but I'm going to say it about it. Nathan and his staff have taken the Birdies program from where it was in year 1. And where it was on year 1 was, like, $10,000, $20,000?

NATHAN GRUBE: I mean, that's a generous-- yes.

ANDY BESSETTE: Generous? OK.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK.

ANDY BESSETTE: So $10,000 to $20,000. And I said, Nathan, like a typical business guy, benchmark that for me. What's that mean? What's that compared-- oh, well, the one in Arizona has, like, $5 million. Whoa.

So this past year, we actually surpassed-- Nathan and his team surpassed a million dollars in Birdies for Charities. And I think that's just so special. That means a ton to a lot of different charities. And we're matching $0.15 on the dollar, and we have corporate sponsors who sponsor the match. I believe Webster [Bank] is still doing that.

NATHAN GRUBE: Mhm, yeah.

JOAN WOODWARD: And so, wait, does-- the players have to get a birdie, right, in order to get the match? Where does the birdie part come in?

NATHAN GRUBE: Kind of actually just a fun name.

JOAN WOODWARD: Oh, it's a fun name. OK.

NATHAN GRUBE: Yeah. If the guys shoot 84 over, the charities still get their money.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK. OK, good.

NATHAN GRUBE: But it's one thing I have to say thank you to Taylor Whiting on our team on the staff. She, again-- we think about the tournament year-round, she thinks about the charities year-round and is answering questions and helping hold their hand and say, why don't you do this? Why don't you do this? And she is-- all design material, donations, credit card fees.

We cover 100% of every expense. So a charity can literally-- a charity of one person can knock on our door and say, look, I have no money. How can I get involved in Birdies?

And we can say, here's your marketing material. Here's letter-- draft letters to your board and your donors. Here are some prizes. Here is the-- we'll take care of all the credit card fees for any donation. And we'll give you free money, and we'll give you a platform to tell your story. And charities will stop and go, I'm sorry, what?

JOAN WOODWARD: So you just give them this whole packet? It's on a silver platter?

NATHAN GRUBE: This entire packet.

JOAN WOODWARD: They don't have to hardly do any work, right?

NATHAN GRUBE: They don't really have to other than they have to have a cause, and they have to be a registered 501(c)(3).

JOAN WOODWARD: Right, right.

NATHAN GRUBE: But what it is, is-- I mean, we have found there's all these amazing groups doing these phenomenal things in Connecticut and in New England. And but it goes back to, Joan-- I will never get tired of saying this-- it is the mission of the PGA Tour.

We get-- as a tournament, not as a title-- as a tournament, we get evaluated by how much money we are raising for charity every year. Obviously, it's important, but the PGA Tour looks at it and says, what are you doing for your community? What are you doing for the nonprofits within a 100-mile radius? And how are you helping them all grow money and awareness? That is who the PGA Tour is.

JOAN WOODWARD: Wow, now that, I'll bet a lot of people in this audience did not know, that you get rated by the PGA. So what other professional sport do you know--, raise your hand. Is it basketball that's doing this in charity? Is it baseball? Is it hockey? I mean what other professional sport is doing it all for charity?

ANDY BESSETTE: Zero.

NATHAN GRUBE: I'm going to expand on that, Joan. If you combine what Major League Baseball, the NBA, NASCAR, NFL-- if you combine in a year what they do for charity and what they give away, the PGA Tour gives in one year more than all of those combined. Like, let that sit for a second and think about that. To anybody listening, that is a massive number.

Because what we're doing right here-- and we're generating this money for charity, and it's going out in our community-- is happening every single week. So the PGA Tour as a whole, when you align with that brand and what they're doing-- very, very different mission than the other professional sports organizations out there.

JOAN WOODWARD: So, Andy, as a Travelers employee-- I mean, just stop for a minute because we could be sponsoring NBA or national MLB or hockey teams or other things, right? And to align ourselves with a professional sports team that's about charity-- I mean, that really is our fabric, in our DNA. So--

ANDY BESSETTE: [INAUDIBLE]

JOAN WOODWARD: --as Travelers employees out there, you should all feel very proud.

ANDY BESSETTE: There's no other choice. I mean, there's only one choice. And when we first started this back in the early 2000s, we surveyed-- right? We're Travelers. We survey things. We surveyed, and golf is the number one sport of insurance. Our agents love golf, right? Our brokers love golf. Our customers love golf. Everybody loves golf, it seems like, around insurance.

And so, it was the game that was most important for us. But then when you look at that, Joan, you're right-- you look at that and align it with the ethos of who Travelers is and the Travelers Promise and what we want to do and give back to the communities we're in as far as volunteerism and charity and financial. I mean, it's just aligns so, so well, and it has so many helpful--

Here's an example. One quick example is, a couple of years, we brought dogs.

JOAN WOODWARD: Dogs

ANDY BESSETTE: And they were service dogs, right?

NATHAN GRUBE: K-9s for Warriors.

ANDY BESSETTE: And I think I actually was crying a little bit because, I mean, when they give the dog to the military person, I'm like, are you kidding me?

JOAN WOODWARD: Wow.

ANDY BESSETTE: Really. And the dogs are so sweet. I love dogs. Anyway, I think we all love dogs.

JOAN WOODWARD: You're a softie, Andy.

ANDY BESSETTE: And, well, Nathan loves dogs too. But I think that when you look at that, and you say, oh, we should-- and each dog cost $20,000.

NATHAN GRUBE: Yeah.

ANDY BESSETTE: Was that [INAUDIBLE]?

NATHAN GRUBE: Had them trained and everything, yeah.

JOAN WOODWARD: Turned into a service dog?

ANDY BESSETTE: Turned into a service dog. But to do that--

JOAN WOODWARD: Ah, what a gift to give.

ANDY BESSETTE: We should have that every year. So anyways, we have things like that really move you. Operation Shower always moves Nathan and I. We were crying together the first year we did it.

JOAN WOODWARD: I think I was there crying with you once.

ANDY BESSETTE: I think you were crying with us.

JOAN WOODWARD: I'm a crier.

NATHAN GRUBE: I pretty much cried at every event, so yeah.

ANDY BESSETTE: [LAUGHS]

JOAN WOODWARD: It's OK. We have a ton of audience questions coming up, so we're going to get to those. But I want to ask you rapid fire, OK?

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah.

JOAN WOODWARD: What was your favorite moment from any of the years-- player-wise, a wife maybe, what she had to say? By the way, Brooks Koepka's wife said our tournament was one of the best in a number of the wives, right?

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, [INAUDIBLE].

JOAN WOODWARD: Why do the wives love our tournament? Answer that first, then I want your best memory.

NATHAN GRUBE: Oh, gosh. I would say that I think one, they know that Andy and I are out there on tour, and we ask how to make it better.

JOAN WOODWARD: How to make it better for them?

NATHAN GRUBE: I would say-- for them. I mean, how can we make your experience better? So what we started to do-- I'll talk about the wives specifically. We found out our daycare program in '07 and '08 wasn't the best, so we flipped the location, flipped the experience, and now kids come in from daycare because what happens is these players travel with their families, but they want to make sure the kids are getting an education, they're in school-- so they go to daycare three to four days a week of the tournament.

JOAN WOODWARD: Really? Oh, wonderful.

NATHAN GRUBE: And so there is a location that we work with the tour, but the tournament is responsible for food, location and activities outside of their education programs. So, some tournaments are like, hey, here you go. Let's pop in a video, and they can do that. We completely rebuilt it.

And the kids come in from daycare with their faces painted, holding a milkshake and a Travelers dog, and like, (HIGH-PITCHED VOICE) this is the best experience ever, you know? And you get a mom or a dad going, oh my gosh, my kids had a great time this week, like, for the smallest reasons, how the waffles were. They talk about them for six months, and we hear about it.

So, we did 50 little things like that, Joan-- parking, hotels, refrigerators, making sure they were equipped, daycare, but that was a big one too. And they pay attention to that. Like, oh, they actually care.

JOAN WOODWARD: Of course, they care.

NATHAN GRUBE: They listen, you know?

JOAN WOODWARD: Yes, yes.

NATHAN GRUBE: And that's a small story, but it doesn't matter because--

JOAN WOODWARD: No.

NATHAN GRUBE: --I could tell you 10 more.

JOAN WOODWARD: That matters. OK, favorite memory. Andy, you first.

ANDY BESSETTE: You know, I got two.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK.

ANDY BESSETTE: So one, and I know you're going to think I'm a wimp. But we send out onesies--

JOAN WOODWARD: Onesies?

ANDY BESSETTE: --to all-- baby onesies.

JOAN WOODWARD: Baby onesies.

ANDY BESSETTE: With our umbrella on the chest, pink for girls, white if we're not sure, blue for boys, whatever, right? And so we-- I always write a personal note. I write the note. And I always write it-- I love this. This is one of the most fun parts of what I do. Don't tell Alan this, but I say, "Dear Azalea"-- because I did write this to Sergio García's daughter when she was born.

I said, "Dear Azalea, welcome to the world. I think you're going to have a great life. Your mom and dad are really nice people. They're going to take care of you. Here is a onesie for you to enjoy. I only ask one favor in return, and that is to ask your mom and dad to bring you to the Travelers Championship so that we can give each other a hug."

JOAN WOODWARD: Legit.

ANDY BESSETTE: It was legit, and I write hundreds of these. And Matt Bordonaro can attest to it. I mean, I write these things.

JOAN WOODWARD: So any time a pro player has a baby in their family, you're sending them a onesie, a Travelers onesie.

ANDY BESSETTE: To the baby. To the baby.

JOAN WOODWARD: To the baby.

ANDY BESSETTE: Not to the parents.

JOAN WOODWARD: And asking them, please bring your parents.

ANDY BESSETTE: And then--

JOAN WOODWARD: Good.

ANDY BESSETTE: What do you think happens next? Sergio's wife writes me back a note. And she said, "Dear Andy, you made me cry. I'm going to keep your note till Azalea gets older, and she can read it, because it was so good. I'm so emotional." And she's going on, and I'm like, you know what? That's exactly--

JOAN WOODWARD: You want that feeling.

ANDY BESSETTE: And that's it, right? That's the feel-- we treat the players and their wives. Like, people say, what's the secret sauce? We treat people like human beings, and we treat people like we want to be treated. And that's always been my motto in life-- treat people the way you want to be treated, and you'll be pretty good. You'll never go too far off.

OK, so the golf side, I have maybe two. I think when Jim Furyk shot his 58. Oh my gosh, I've never seen such calamity in my life and people running around, hey, here, here, on the front nine, he shot, like, 52 under. I mean, he's like-- it was crazy. I love that. That was great. And at the time, he came up to shoot when he was done, and he stopped and talked to Jay Fishman, and Jay passed away a couple of weeks later.

JOAN WOODWARD: Couple weeks later.

ANDY BESSETTE: And I just thought it was such a special moment in golf and in sport with an athlete, with a fan, with a title sponsor, but I just thought that was such an emotional time. I looked at that and, to this day, I still picture it, and it moves me every time I think of it.

But I think, too, Patrick Cantlay-- I love it when young guys, young athletes do well. Patrick Cantlay is an amateur at UCLA, and he shoots a 60, first amateur to ever shoot a 60 in a PGA Tour event.

JOAN WOODWARD: Wow.

ANDY BESSETTE: At our event. People are equally going crazy. It was a Friday night, and people were running around. It was dark out, and everybody's trying to get their head around what just happened.

And, of course, you have the Spieth chip-in, and you have-- who got 8-hole playoff last year. But those are the things that move me. I think there are some really moving things that happen around the Travelers Championship. And the more-- we bring the most agents, brokers. We bring the most guests the tournament week of any PGA Tour event in the country.

JOAN WOODWARD: Is that right, for agents and brokers?

ANDY BESSETTE: Yep.

JOAN WOODWARD: Community?

ANDY BESSETTE: Yep.

JOAN WOODWARD: That's amazing.

ANDY BESSETTE: Most in the country by far. Some countries-- [INAUDIBLE].

JOAN WOODWARD: You know all the agents and brokers on the call are going to be calling you, Andy.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, I know.

JOAN WOODWARD: You know this, right?

ANDY BESSETTE: I can just see this now, but

JOAN WOODWARD: Our favorite agents in California and Chicago, they're going to be calling you.

ANDY BESSETTE: I should have thought twice before I said that. But still--

JOAN WOODWARD: It's OK.

ANDY BESSETTE: --it's a badge of courage. It's something we're really proud of on the tour that we can have that many guests.

JOAN WOODWARD: Yeah.

ANDY BESSETTE: During tournament week.

JOAN WOODWARD: Wonderful, wonderful. All right, Nathan, you're up. So Andy had four or five favorite, I think.

[LAUGHTER]

[INTERPOSING VOICES]

NATHAN GRUBE: Right? I think he misunderstood the question.

JOAN WOODWARD: I'll give you the same anyway.

NATHAN GRUBE: I would say, I'll do one. I think when Bubba Watson won his first PGA Tour event, and it was here. And he's standing on the green. He ended up winning it on 16, and he just loses it. He putts in. He's hugging his wife. As before, they had adopted their children, and it was before his father had passed.

JOAN WOODWARD: Passed, yeah.

NATHAN GRUBE: And I'm standing on the back of the cart, trying to get them back up to sign his card and kind of do that whole deal. And he's on the phone with his dad. And, I mean, I'm going to get emotional talking about it. He is bawling crying and saying, Dad, we did it.

And his dad was sick at the time. And he's on the phone, and Bubba talks about that. He goes, my dad died after that. I never got to-- like, he got to have that moment with me, that I won on the PGA Tour. And I'm saying I felt embar-- like, I'm standing on the back of the cart. I'm like--

JOAN WOODWARD: Awkward, yeah.

NATHAN GRUBE: I should jump off, like this is a personal moment, you know? Like, right? It happened. I'm like, this is amazing, and I'm leaning out. I'm leaning in. But you have moments like that where-- I mean, their lives are happening in the midst of the tournament, and so it was pretty impactful.

JOAN WOODWARD: You can have another one. Have another story?

NATHAN GRUBE: I think, honestly, when Furyk walked up the hill and stopped-- I mean, Jim just set history, right? PGA Tour history.

JOAN WOODWARD: He's from my hometown, Jim Furyk.

NATHAN GRUBE: Oh, really?

JOAN WOODWARD: Yes. He was in the neighboring-- we didn't belong to a country club, but yeah. So yeah, that was very special.

NATHAN GRUBE: So he does that, and he-- it's a record that probably is not going to be broken for 50 years, right? And he's walking up, and the media is just in his face. And this is Jim's moment. He is going into the World Golf Hall of Fame [INAUDIBLE] everything.

And Jay-- as many of you know Jay, he was quiet, sitting at the top of the hill. And Jim walks up and sees Jay, takes off his hat, and it was no longer Jim's moment, it was Jay's moment because Jay--

JOAN WOODWARD: Jay Fishman.

NATHAN GRUBE: Furyk knew that if Jay hadn't have stepped in with Travelers to take over the title sponsorship, the tournament was gone and over, and Jim never could have had this moment. And to see Jim put himself aside and look at Jay-- and it was so sincere, to Andy's point. It was like, that is a phenomenal moment. And it was-- that was pretty cool as well.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK, guys, it is that time. So, we're going to go really rapid fire, OK? You have to have short answers here.

NATHAN GRUBE: One.

ANDY BESSETTE: OK, one hit.

JOAN WOODWARD: One question we have.

ANDY BESSETTE: I got it.

JOAN WOODWARD: How are the player pairings on Thursday picked? So, on Thursday, how do you get paired up?

NATHAN GRUBE: So I don't know if everybody knows this-- every player is ranked by the television networks on their popularity, call it. There's a certain amount of rating. And what the Tour does is they work with Golf Channel, CBS, NBC, and they break the groups up from a television standpoint.

So Andy and I wish we could say we were super smart, we had something to do with it, but we don't. Actually, that's the Tour and CBS and the Golf Channel, NBC.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK, good. So then we're going to go-- oh, Andy, this one's maybe for you: How many different sized blue blazers do you set aside? And I assume for the Masters too. So we got a 42 regular. We got a 46 long. I mean, what are those jacket sizes that you can anticipate for all the players? How many do we buy?

ANDY BESSETTE: We go from 30 to 52 and half sizes. And so, do the math.

JOAN WOODWARD: Really?

ANDY BESSETTE: Oh, yeah. We must have 40 different plus blazers in all sizes. And then you have to go long/short, right?

JOAN WOODWARD: Long/short, yeah.

ANDY BESSETTE: So then you have long/short. We have a lot of blazers.

JOAN WOODWARD: OK, all right, audience question. Go ahead, Jessica. Why don't you read one off there?

JESSICA: Yeah, our audience wants to know: Will there be any concerts this year or special fan experience events?

NATHAN GRUBE: So I can touch on this. So the Fan Zone is something we, I would say, introduced years ago, right? How do you have things for people to do that-- outside of golf? And my kids were part of it. They were going down. They're getting their face painted and doing all these activities. So the Fan Zone finally is back this year, which we are thrilled about. We haven't had it for two years. So they're going to have a chance to do that.

The concerts-- we're not going to have the concerts on property this year. We're actually looking to do some stuff in Hartford. But actually, on the golf course this year, they won't be, but that will be something you can look forward to, hopefully, in the future.

ANDY BESSETTE: But the Travelers Chipping Challenge is back.

JOAN WOODWARD: Good.

ANDY BESSETTE: We haven't had that--

NATHAN GRUBE: By popular demand.

ANDY BESSETTE: --two years.

JOAN WOODWARD: I'm going to be good this year, Andy. I'm going to be good.

ANDY BESSETTE: Go chip it right on there, and you get a free prize.

JOAN WOODWARD: [LAUGHS]

ANDY BESSETTE: You could get a putter or whatever. But, yeah, but it's back. It's back in full force. We're going to have some of the PGA Tour pros down there on Wednesday because they're working Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. But on Wednesday, we’ll have them down there pitching with you.

JOAN WOODWARD: All right, Jessica, do we have another audience question coming in?

JESSICA: Yeah, the audience wants to know where they can get Travelers Championship swag.

(DESCRIPTION)

Nathan glances at Andy and Joan.

(SPEECH)

JOAN WOODWARD: Swag.

[LAUGHTER]

You can buy it at the tournament, right?

NATHAN GRUBE: Lots of different ways. You can answer cool trivia, I would say, online. No, but yeah, we have a huge merchandising operation that we set up during tournament week. And we partner with TPC River Highlands, and it's overlooking the practice facility. And it will-- you can only get certain things at the tournament, which is pretty cool. So it'll be tournament week. There's a huge merch stand that we have all kinds of fun stuff.

JOAN WOODWARD: All right.

NATHAN GRUBE: Good swag.

JOAN WOODWARD: Good swag. Jessica, do we have another audience question?

JESSICA: "How do you measure the success for the Travelers Championship?"

ANDY BESSETTE: Well, that's actually pretty easy. I mean, we look at the quality of the field because, remember, back to those people that taught me everything about sports management, you always make sure you provide a world-class experience for your sponsors and your fans. And so having a world-class field-- and some years, we have eight of the top 10. Some years, you might have three or four of the top 10. But we always have people in the top 10. So we always have great fields, and to me, that's a measure of success.

And then, of course, the net proceeds-- giving to charity is really, really important and giving back to the community. And I think-- I can't measure this, but pride, right? We always want to do things that create pride by our employees, by the communities, by citizens, by people, golf fans-- just be proud of what's happening here. So those are kind of things. Nathan, I don't if you think differently.

NATHAN GRUBE: I would agree with all three of those. It's funny. I will tuck my badge in my shirt and pull down my hat, put on my sunglasses, and walk through the crowds, measuring that pride factor, right? Just listening to how people are perceiving it, listening to what they're talking about.

And I just get so excited because people are so proud of the event, you know? It's contagious. You walk around, and you're like, oh, yeah, I'm proud of it too. And people are like, calm down. Calm down.

ANDY BESSETTE: He always says this, and it cracks me up and it’s like, really, Nathan? Just because you pull your hat down, and you walk—

NATHAN GRUBE: I do! I’m totally incognito.

[INTERPOSING VOICES] [LAUGHTER]

ANDY BESSETTE: People don't know who you are?

JOAN WOODWARD: You better try that, Andy.

NATHAN GRUBE: Nobody has any idea who I am.

JOAN WOODWARD: You should try that, Andy.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yeah, I'll try that [INAUDIBLE].

JOAN WOODWARD: No, we're so grateful to have you running the tournament. I mean, really, Nathan, your leadership has been-- and I know Andy echoes this, but your leadership has been your creativity and innovation, right, to always make it better for the next year [INAUDIBLE].

ANDY BESSETTE: And I'd be remiss if I didn't say our teams. I mean. Nathan and I can only do so much. We can lead our teams, and, hey, listen-- Nathan and I are best friends. I mean, we would do anything for each other, but at least I'd do anything for you. No, we're kidding.

But I think that our teams are what's so important. Nathan's team is world class. Our team at Travelers that supports us-- I mean, in total, you probably have 50 people working part time, not full time, but part time on this. And without that team, we can win any awards we want. We can call anybody, whatever, blah, blah.

But I think that what's really important is that the Travelers companies as a title sponsor should be very, very proud of what our teams are doing and what's creating and what Nathan's doing with his team. And Nathan's team runs the thing, and they're world class by all measures. I cannot think of one that's not.

NATHAN GRUBE: I have to say, I appreciate you saying that. And, Joan, I appreciate you calling. I have to say that we are so lucky. There are two senior members of our team, Tara Gerber and Kevin Harrington, and they've been here as long as I have, 16-plus years.

JOAN WOODWARD: Wow.

NATHAN GRUBE: And to have your core leadership team be here for that long, you're not relearning. You're not rebuilding. We're literally going forward a step or two every year. So to have them be this committed to this event and to have the three of us and then, to Andy's point, the Travelers' resources behind it-- there's a reason why things are happening. It's not by accident. And we wouldn't be able to do it without that.

ANDY BESSETTE: You get Matt Bordonaro, my team now, and he's been involved through the whole communications world for a long time, and John Morris in advertising, and the list goes on and on. We've got so much great leadership with Travelers. In the Travelers way, we don't just give you money and do something. We're always going to be a part of it.

JOAN WOODWARD: We're going to be a part of it. We're going to be engaged.

ANDY BESSETTE: Yep.

JOAN WOODWARD: So our time has come to an end, and we could go on and on. We're going to do this again next year and bring you back. But, really, good luck this year. And we're really excited about the field, certainly. And I know more players will be announced. We're not going to give that away. We'll announce the Women's Day, a keynote speaker coming up, so a lot of things to watch your inbox for.

But I want to also ask my audience, if you would be so kind, help us out. So, we have a survey in the chat feature. We'd love to know what you thought of today's program and also what you thought of this video, right? Should we do more videos, these 10-, 15-minute videos on our Wednesday sessions? So please give us some feedback because we like to improve. Also, let us know whether there are topics you'd like to hear, insurance or not insurance. So, I want to thank my guests today-- really, really great stuff. And thank you for being here.

(DESCRIPTION)
Text, Wednesdays with Woodward Webinar Series. Upcoming Webinars: May 25 - How's My Driving? Telematics and the Insurance Experience. June 1 - Storm Warning: Managing the Risk of Increasing Hurricane Catastrophes. June 8 - Hacked! What's Your Plan? June 29 - The Exponential Rise of Nuclear Verdicts. Register: travelers institute dot org

(SPEECH)
Upcoming webinars on May 25, everyone. We have a telematics webinar. And then June 1, of course, the kickoff of hurricane season, so we're going to talk about kicking off hurricane season and protecting your valuable assets. Then June 8, we're going back to a very, very popular topic on our webinars, which is cybersecurity. And we're going to talk about if you've been hacked, what you do first, second and third. And then June 29, very, very important topic on nuclear verdicts in the insurance space and in the jury system, so the exponential rise of nuclear verdicts in litigation.

So thank you again for joining us in person, online. We hope to do a lot more of these in person. And connect with me on LinkedIn or take our surveys.

(DESCRIPTION)
Text, Watch Replays: travelers institute dot org. Connect on LinkedIn: Joan Kois Woodward. Take Our Survey: Link in Chat. #Wednesdays with Woodward.

(SPEECH)
Tell your friends about our sessions. We're really glad to have all of you join us. So, again, Andy and Nathan 

[APPLAUSE]

ANDY BESSETTE: Thank you, Joan.

NATHAN GRUBE: Thank you, Joan.

JOAN WOODWARD: Thank you, my friends.

NATHAN GRUBE: Thanks for your questions. Thank you.

JOAN WOODWARD: Great.

[PIANO MUSIC]

(DESCRIPTION)
Logo, Travelers Institute, Travelers. Travelers institute dot org.