Arkansas Business

This story is from the archives of ArkansasSports360.com.

Chris Wyrick was announced Monday as Executive Director of the Razorback Foundation. Wyrick has spent the last four-plus years in the Arkansas athletic department in a variety of roles, including overseeing the Razorback Seat Value Plan that helped increase the football season ticket base and raise an additional $6.5 million in revenue.

Wyrick, who lives in Fayetteville with his wife, Merrily, and two daughters, Caroline and Caitlin, worked at South Carolina and Vanderbilt before joining the Razorback staff in 2008.

Below is a Q&A conducted Tuesday afternoon with Wyrick. He outlines his plans for the Razorback Foundation and how he envisions the private, fund-raising arm working more closely with the athletic department in the future.

No, I didn't ask why you have such a lousy parking space ...

Q. Let’s just get this one out of the way right off the bat. You’re not an Arkansan. You’re not a former football player like the previous Foundation directors. This concerns a segment of boosters and fans. What do you say to alleviate that concern?

Wyrick: Well, I think the business of college athletics continues to evolve. I think the days of an alumnus being the AD or an alumnus of the booster club, are quite honestly more rare than they’ve ever been. What I’ll say to them though is I do respect and understand how they feel. I can truly say that because I’ve been here going on five years. I do have a pulse of the Razorback nation. I sat in a cubicle for 18 months and talked to some 4,000 Razorback fans about their football tickets, their most valued possession. I heard the good, the bad, the ugly of that. So I can truly say I am qualified to know what it is they are looking for. I understand the importance and the heritage of our letter winners and how it is special in this state. Truly, all I ask them to do is give me a chance. I’ve had a chance to get to know a lot of them. I’m confident that given that chance, the fact I’m not a letter winner from the University of Arkansas will become obsolete in the future.

If you look around the country right now there aren’t a lot of people that have come up through development that came through the University of Arkansas. There just aren’t. So one of the things I want to start immediately is an internship program where annually we hire one or two Arkansas graduates to come in and work with us for a year, get them placed in the development industry across the country. So that the next time these jobs come up, there will be qualified Arkansans in the marketplace to come back. We did that at N.C. State in 1992, we had four a year and it’s the most powerful pipeline in the country. Think about that, four people a year since 1992 that went to N.C. State that are now in this business. I want to start that for the University of Arkansas. There’s no reason we don’t do that.

Q. You mention being here going on five years, alluded to the Razorback Seat Value Plan (RSVP) program. If you look at your tenure here is the ticket licensing program the accomplishment you’re most proud of or is there something else?

Wyrick: Well, I think it’s the most accomplished because it’ the most public. Anything that is going to be the most public is what anybody is going to talk about. Because it was successful people are definitely going to talk about it. If it wasn’t, you’re not going to want to talk about it. I think the parallel I’ll make between RSVP and the Razorback Foundation is that the organization and the way we’re going to approach the Foundation as a whole is exactly what we did with RSVP. We’re going to listen to what people say. We’re going to interview people. We’re going to go out and truly get the pulse of what people want us to be doing in the Foundation. It’s the same thing we did with RSVP. Then we’re going to run it by focus groups, our board of directors, the board of trustees; we’re going to have everyone bought into what we are going to try to be. Then we’re going to go out there and try to sell it. It’s not a ready, fire, aim-type mentality. We’re going to be very purposeful in how we lay this out. I’ll tell you this, we’ve already done a survey. We did a survey last November and already have the blueprint of what our donors are saying. In my opinion, for various reasons, we haven’t had a chance to act on it yet. So I think all we’ve really got to do to begin with is go back and look at the results of that survey and start moving forward.

Tomorrow [Wednesday] we’re closing the office. Every staff member — we’re hiring a temporary person to answer the phones — but we’re going to a staff advance. I’ve asked every one of them — no holds barred — to list everything they like, everything they question, things they dislike. Write them all down. We’re locking ourselves somewhere in Bentonville and we’re not coming out until we have the blueprint. I’m excited about that.

Q. What’s the thought behind moving your office up to the front of the building?

Wyrick: Well, I did that when I went to South Carolina. Because when I went to South Carolina I found the person was locked way in the back and never got a chance to interact with the fans that want to be talked to. So, certainly there are going to be meetings and things when you can’t, but already today I just went and sat in the lobby to introduce myself to people as they were coming in the door. I think it’s very important that you are accessible if need be. More importantly, I think you’ve got to be transparent. They don’t have to talk to me to get the answer, but everyone on the staff is going to be singing off the same sheet of music. I’m not saying whether we are or aren’t doing that right now, but I know from RSVP that is paramount to gain the further trust and respect of the membership.

Q. What is the Foundation’s role as you see it?