Lucas Foust:
All right. I think we're recording Casey.
Casey Jermyn:
Awesome.
Lucas Foust:
All right. Great. Hey, listen. Thanks again. We're here with Casey, pronounce your last name for me one more time, if you would, German.
Casey Jermyn:
Jermyn.
Lucas Foust:
Jermyn, Casey, Jermyn. I've called you Casey forever, so I apologize. Casey Jermyn here.
Casey Jermyn:
Oh, no worries.
Lucas Foust:
He's with the Bozeman Running Company. Casey and the Bozeman Running Company, are our business of the month here. And Casey, I've had a chance to meet you before. I've met you at the running shop, but I have just a few questions for you. This very first question I have, I ask everyone that I encounter. It's the same question, as important as they are setting your faith and family aside, and your business aside for that matter, what's the passion in your life, Casey? What gets you out of bed in the morning?
Casey Jermyn:
Well, I mean the easy one for me is running. Obviously-
Lucas Foust:
Sure.
Casey Jermyn:
... is one major passion of my life, and probably the great outdoors. I just kind of love everything outside, whether it's hiking, whether it's fishing, being in the mountains, running on the trails, those are kind of the things that I love.
Lucas Foust:
How'd your running journey start? How old were you? And how'd you get introduced to running?
Casey Jermyn:
It was years ago. I was junior high, probably six, seventh grade. We always had the school fun run day, where you'd go out and you'd run a mile on the track. And so there was always a little bit of drive there, but it was kind of as I got into junior high, a dear friend of mine and his dad kind of recruited me into running. Andres Brooker, who I ran with in high school and who actually owns a running store over in Missoula, and that kind of just got me into the sport. I didn't even really know what cross country running was until they kind of introduced me to it. And yeah, that's kind of where the journey started, way back then.
Lucas Foust:
Casey, where did you grow up? Where did you start running? And what started you off? Which town were you in?
Casey Jermyn:
I grew up in Plains, Montana. So a lot of people when say, Plains, Montana, they think it's Eastern Montana. It's the opposite. It's very Western Montana. It's about an hour west of Missoula, slightly north up there in the mountains. A little Class B school, beautiful, beautiful spot up there.
Lucas Foust:
And the Plains is a Horseman, is that right?
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah, the Horsemen, you got it?
Lucas Foust:
All right, I grew up in Columbia Falls, Casey, so there you go. I did not know you're a Western Montana guy. So you started running in junior high school. When did you start noticing, Hey, yeah, I'm pretty good at this. I want to take it on, keep going with it.
Casey Jermyn:
I think junior high, and even my freshman year, I think, I just complained about it a lot. If you ask-
Lucas Foust:
Sure.
Casey Jermyn:
... people that coached me. I didn't really want to do it, complained a lot. I think probably midway through my sophomore year, it started to click a little bit like, hey, this is pretty fun, and I'm fairly competitive at this, and this is really cool. And it started turning into the type two kind of fun, and-
Lucas Foust:
Sure.
Casey Jermyn:
... then it just kind of snowballed from there.
Lucas Foust:
So you saw some success in high school, did you run cross country and track in high school?
Casey Jermyn:
Yep. Yep. I ran cross country, yep, cross country in the fall, and then track in the spring. In the winter time, my freshman year, sophomore year, I played basketball, in the winter.
Lucas Foust:
Oh, sure.
Casey Jermyn:
And then eventually, as running got a little more serious, I quit basketball, and then just did my own training through the winter to prep for track season.
Lucas Foust:
Oh, good. Well, that's great. And how did you end up in Bozeman?
Casey Jermyn:
So I ended up signing with Montana State, so I was recruited by coach Dale Kennedy, and I signed in, ran here for the Bobcat's, 2000 to 2005, awesome experience. And that was kind of my real introduction to Bozeman those years ago.
Lucas Foust:
And did you run, did you run after college too? Did you do a tour after that as well?
Casey Jermyn:
I did. Yeah, it was short lived. It was small. It was just a couple of years, but I did some post-collegiate training. Trained with a good friend of mine, Scott McGowan, who ran for the University of Montana. We trained in Missoula, bounced around, ran a few road races, ran a few track races after college, and then decided to grow up and move on.
Lucas Foust:
And move on, and decided to... Used your passion to roll into The Running Company. Tell us a little bit about that. What made you decide to get into the business end of running?
Casey Jermyn:
I think it started, from I was a sales rep for a lot of years after that for Brooks. So I was selling running shoes to different running shops around the country. And that, I think, started triggering it a little bit. As a sales rep, you travel a lot, you're on the road, and for me, it was like, boy, being a running shop owner would be ideal. You're you get to be rooted in a community, don't have to travel all the time, you can stay home, and really foster a running community. And that's, I think, kind of what started it. And the people in Bozeman that have been here for quite some time, know that the BRC used to be a Fleet Feet years ago, and I purchased that store, and then converted it to Bozeman Running Company. Fleet Feet's a national chain. It didn't make-
Lucas Foust:
Yeah, okay.
Casey Jermyn:
... a lot of sense in Bozeman to have a national chain, when you could just independently own it and market it that way.
Lucas Foust:
Well, tell us a little bit about how you got started with Brooks first. How did you work as... Did you travel? Where did you go? Did you have a region you cover? What did you do back then?
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah, yeah. I had a region. So really, I was working in the store in Missoula for Andres and training, and I just was like, man, I could start seeing I needed to start looking forward towards a career and what I wanted to do. And as you're working in the store, you get to meet these reps. And I thought, what a cool job you get to travel around and sell running shoes all day long. That's like a dream job. So I literally just flipped the Brooks catalog over and they have all the reps listed on the back of the catalog. And I just cold called/ I said, "What are my three favorite companies?" And I just bing, bang, boom, and I said, "Okay, these are the three I'm going to call." So I flipped them over, called the company, just left voice messages on all their phones.
Casey Jermyn:
And it was probably a week or two later, I was confused, because you always think you work for Brooks directly. Well, it was an independent agency, and I get this phone call from this agency and I thought it was this spam call trying to sell me something. And I'm like, "Who is this guy?" And then he mentioned, he's like, "Oh, I'm with the," it was the Flirty Green Agency, "Flirty Green Agency." And he starts naming these brands and he goes, "And we represent Brooks," and right when he said, "Brooks," it clicked. I said, oh-
Lucas Foust:
Oh, okay.
Casey Jermyn:
... this is where I left a message. And so, I tuned in real quick, and it was by happenchance, he had his current sales rep, literally, they were in a meeting, when the phone rang and it was me calling, and he was giving his notice and I-
Lucas Foust:
Oh, no kidding.
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah. And I was the guy calling and left a message looking for a job. And so he said, "Just because, by chance, that had happened, you deserve an interview." So, I said, "Okay."
Lucas Foust:
You are sent from God, basically. Yes. This guy is perfect timing,
Casey Jermyn:
It was like, perfect timing. It was really weird. He goes, "I literally walked out of the meeting and I hit the message button, and you were there." And so he's like, "You get an interview." So I said, "Okay, great."
Lucas Foust:
Perfect.
Casey Jermyn:
His agency was out of the Midwest, so it was in Minnesota. And so, he covered the Dakotas, Minnesota, upper Wisconsin, Iowa was kind of my region, if you will. And so, yeah, I went out there, and interviewed, made the rounds through interviews, and then ended up getting the job. And then packed up and moved out, and, yeah, started that journey.
Lucas Foust:
You saw how other stores operated? Did you get ideas about how you'd like to see your store operate when you were visiting these other stores?
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah. I think you learn so much in that process, because of exactly what you said. Through my years of repping, I have literally been in every store from Seattle, Washington to Madison, Wisconsin. North of Wyoming, I've seen every single running store and it gives you a good sense, and you can take bits and pieces of really good ideas that these stores have implemented and you can bring it all into one. And so I learned a lot from doing that, just working with different stores. And you learn the good and the bad. In life, it's always good to learn from other people's mistakes.
Lucas Foust:
Absolutely.
Casey Jermyn:
And so you learn some ups and downs by working with different stores and doing different events. And working for Brooks, I was heavily involved in a lot of different events, like the Grandma's Marathon up in Duluth, Minnesota, and some of those things. And they sponsored the Twin Cities Marathon as well. And so there was a lot of cool things on the event side that I was plugged into as well.
Lucas Foust:
Well, speaking of events, how has the... It's 2020 when we're doing this interview, we got COVID going on. Hopefully, it will end one of these days, but how has it impacted your event schedule in the meantime? What's happened with COVID?
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah, the events pretty much have been pretty much non-existent this year. We've pretty much had to cancel almost everything. We were hopeful for a couple late season trail races, smaller controlled small groups. Of course, one of them is on the Foothills Trail, so everyone-
Lucas Foust:
Not this year.
Casey Jermyn:
Everyone knows what's going on up there. And so the forest service still has not said no, but they have not said, yes. And so we're kind of still working through with them on whether, we think that would be appropriate or not. I think on that race, we would probably donate the proceeds of that race, to the relief fund. You see a lot of those relief funds. And so, if the forest service will allow us to do that, you'll see us roll something along those lines out for that late fall race. But pretty much everything, yeah, was gone pretty much this year. And it started, we're big sponsors of Run to the Pub, and it started, literally, that weekend.
Casey Jermyn:
And I think back then everyone felt a little kind of blindsided, like, "What's going on?" And you're so confused, as we're, when we're just like... Tyler Wilkinson, he's the race director for that event, and all of a sudden, it's like Thursday night and he's like, "We have to have a meeting." And I'm like, "Okay. Yeah." And at first you're thinking, oh, well, we're going to get ready for the weekend. And it's like, "The weekend's not happening." And you're like, "What?" So it was very strange, very strange back then. And I think now, we have a much better understanding of it, and why that was implemented back then. I think it just came as a shock ,so early on, but you get it now. You're like, "Oh, that makes sense."
Lucas Foust:
So some folks might not know this Casey, but one of the top distance races in the country is the Bozeman Marathon. Tell us about that, if you have any involvement in that program? Or what does BRC with that?
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah, we started that race, gosh, almost nine years ago, eight years ago, nine years ago/ it's a Boston qualifying marathon event. Yeah. I had that vision, as the Lewis and Clark Marathon was in Bozeman for a lot of years, and they were kind of phasing out. Bozeman didn't have a marathon or half marathon to just speak up. And a fall, long road race makes sense in Bozeman, because you have a great training cycle through the summer months, when it's nice out and beautiful and a fall race makes a lot of sense. And so I launched that race and tried to really come up with a really beautiful scenic courses. And to be honest, the reason the course is what it is, is that's what I ran in college, when I'd do my long runs. It would be, literally, get vanned out towards Gateway, dropped off, and run back to MSU, and that was my long run.
Casey Jermyn:
And I loved it, it was just such a beautiful view. And so I was like, that would be a good marathon course. And the first day I started planning it, I drove out the Gateway towards Ted Turner's property there, and I hit the odometer on the pickup, and started driving and drove almost the exact route. And then I got into town, and I literally got down to Main Street in front of the old store, on the corner of Church and Main, and the odometer clicks over at 26. And it was, literally, like it was like a meant to be. And I was like, "Yep. It's a marathon." And then the finer details came along.
Lucas Foust:
Casey, so how many people are you up to now that participate in the Bozeman Marathon?
Casey Jermyn:
Total between the half and the full, we're between a 1000 and 1500 per year now, which is a great number. It's growing each year. This was a bummer to have this year hit, because it was projecting to look like it was even probably get close to that 2000 person mark. I feel like once you get to about a 1000 people, you really start to see the snowball in events. They really start to gravitate. As you know, your friends talk you into a race and you're on the fence about it, and, "Well, nobody's doing it. Okay." And so it kind of has that effect to it. And hopefully this doesn't set us back too much with that race. But yeah, I think people are very... You're always surprised at how many people use that marathon as a Boston qualifier, and what a lot people-
Lucas Foust:
Really?
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah. And a lot of people don't realize is it's the last weekend you can run a Boston qualifier for that next year, so it's their cutoff. And so it's, literally, a lot of people's last chance. They may have gone to another marathon, didn't get the time they needed, or need to run a faster time, and then they come here to qualify.
Lucas Foust:
Casey when you use the phrase, Boston qualifier, maybe explain if you would, for folks that aren't familiar with the process, how does one qualify for that Boston Marathon?
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah. So Boston has a standard of times that you have to race based on your age. So they'll have age groups, and based on your age, you have to run a qualifying standard, so you even get accepted in. And now it's gotten so competitive over the years, you even have to run faster than your qualifying time to get in, because so many people are hitting the qualifying time. So you'll just see over the years, the times will just get a little quicker each year. And so, yeah, it's based on age group, male, female, here's a time standard you have to run, you run it, and then you get accepted into Boston. And you have to [crosstalk 00:14:39]-
Lucas Foust:
You hope to get in, that you're fast enough, even though you qualified, you still may not make it in, because it's so [crosstalk 00:14:44]-
Casey Jermyn:
You may not make. Exactly. And then you-
Lucas Foust:
And how many folks run that marathon every year in Boston?
Casey Jermyn:
I think it's between 20 and 30,000 somewhere right in that range, so it's a big number.
Lucas Foust:
They put a lid on it, though, and it's just made it probably tougher to get in-
Casey Jermyn:
Yeah. Correct.
Lucas Foust:
... every year. Absolutely. Well, listen, thank you so much for visiting with us Casey. We really appreciate it. Bozeman Running Company is located on Main Street in Bozeman, and they are The Foust Law Office Business of the Month. We much appreciate it, Casey. Thank you.
Casey Jermyn:
Awesome. Thank you, Lucas. Yeah, have a good one.
Lucas Foust:
You too.