My show in Anaheim finally ended at about 1:30 am this morning. It was about 2:15 before I left. Trace and I struck the stage and called it a night. These pictures are from my vantage point at the Front of House (FOH) mix position.
The client is a company called Royal Prestige. They are based out of Madison, Wisconsin. It amazes me that the majority of their sales force is Spanish speaking both here and throughout Latin America. The MC was a guy named Jim. He reminded me of my Dad. He was obviously not a native speaker of the Spanish language, but did a great job communicating and keeping the evening festive nonetheless.
Dinner began at 8:00 pm followed by speeches and awards from 9:00 pm until about 11:20. It reminded me of a Spanish language service growing up in Texas. It was a night that would not end. At 11:20 a comedian started his set which lasted just under an hour. At about 12:15 we started the musical portion of the evening which ended at 1:30. The musicians were a salsa band fronted by Johnny Polanco. Much to my surprise no one left even though they had been there for over four hours already.
It was basically a celebration of the last year for all of the territory directors and executives from the company. They raffled $100,000.00 dollars and gave away many awards for sales, company growth etc.
Some of you may know, that I am Mexican American. That is part of the reason I was at the show. It was in Spanish and I could understand it all. Having said that, I was proud to see how many of "my people" were making a living selling a product and working hard to earn, in some cases, a lot of money. I actually saw a company that knew how many dollars exist in certain areas of the Latino community and were making a concerted effort to tap into it. On the other hand I felt as if it was some kind of marketing scam going on.
The best part, or worst part, was when a guy from Oakland gets up and says in Spanish...
"Keep working, don't give up on your dreams. I am 28, have a beautiful family, have a $500,000 franchise, increased my sales by 163% and I am doing it all "sin papeles". 'Sin papeles' is Spanish for living in the United States without proper documents. On one hand I was glad he had found success in America without being on the public dole, but on the other hand the way he arrived in the United States is still illegal.
It is tough problem, but Mike Huckabee has the solution: Chuck Norris.
Billy
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