Ricky Dickson, CEO Blue Bell Creameries: Leading with Purpose--From Fear to Faith

Get to know Ricky Dickson,  former president and CEO of Blue Bell Creameries--the best ice cream ever!  We discuss his new book "One Scoop at a Time: Stories and Lessons from Fear to Faith," blending professional wisdom with personal faith.  Ricky shares how he maintained peace amidst major business challenges, and his story in growing the ice cream brand by focusing on service, kindness and a sense of purpose.

Ricky shares the grittier aspects of leadership as Blue Bell navigated major challenges with integrity. Ricky's story is a masterclass in ethical business practice and the relentless pursuit of trust.

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https://www.amazon.com/One-Scoop-Time-Stories-Lessons/dp/1957616709

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https://www.instagram.com/rickydickson007/

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:24

Well, I'd like to welcome Ricky Dixon to the Pivotal People podcast. I'm really excited. He is the former president and CEO of Blue Bell Creameries For 43 years. He has written a great book, which I've read. It is called One Scoop at a Time Stories and Lessons from Fear to Faith. And when you look at the summary of his book, which is on Amazon now and you can pre-order it it comes out July 16th he says, few things bring us to our knees as quickly as fear, but sometimes that's exactly where we need to be.

Speaker 1: 1:03

And as I read his book, he has so many stories and so many lessons that take us through his whole career not just the highlights there were lots of them but some real challenges, and I told him before we started, I have two sons 28 and 30. And I think this book is an absolute must read for any young person starting out their career. It's good for all of us and you'll find out why. But if you're thinking about a graduation gift, this would be a great gift for them. So, ricky, thank you so much for joining us.

Speaker 2: 1:35

Well, thank you, stephanie. What an honor, and I love the podcast, pivotal People Podcast. Say that three times and you already had a great day. That's right.

Speaker 1: 1:44

I get to talk to interesting people every week and I love it. It is such a gift. But I'll tell you what. When I got, I got an email from Ricky's publicist asking if I would be interested in having him on the podcast, and I told him before we started as soon as I saw that he was the president and CEO of Blue Bell Creameries. Anyone who knows me knows that my favorite food on the planet is vanilla ice cream. I don't think there's any dessert worth of calories other than vanilla ice cream, and Blue Bell homemade vanilla ice cream is the very best.

Speaker 1: 2:22

So I've read the book and I've learned some great life lessons, but I also learned some kind of fun things about ice cream production that I really didn't know about. But, ricky, you're talking about your life lessons in this book and how we can. You know stories and lessons from fear to faith, and that's easy to say, but when you're in the midst of a real difficult challenge, that's hard to remember. So would you mind telling us a little bit about your background, how you started and anyone who is familiar with Blue Bell Ice Cream knows that it's not everywhere and I was really impressed by your company's story in that you chose to expand slowly and for a reason. So I'm going to be quiet and I would love for you to share your background and your story.

Speaker 2: 3:09

Those are all great questions, and again, thank you so much for having me. It has been an incredible journey to quickly go back, and, of course, all this is in the book, but we go in between the facts and get into the fun, I would say. But I actually chased a girl to Baylor out of high school, and we had dated for a while. As soon as we got to Baylor, though, we broke up and I found myself like OK, I chose this college, not necessarily for the right reason, but I think God had something even bigger planned, and I didn't know that at the time. But at Baylor, I was given an assignment to write a paper for a full semester on a company and how they relate to the consumer, and so I went back to the apartment, called my father and said I've got this project. Do you have any idea? And he said well, you know, I'm sitting here reading an article right now I have a magazine on this whole ice cream company in Brenham, texas. So he reread the article and I thought who doesn't like ice cream? This sounds like a fun opportunity, and so it was really through that going down and getting the facts about the company and writing the story and watching for a semester. You know, I just fell in love with what I saw. And you know it was not just ice cream, it was the way they went about their business and you know, as a marketing journalism major, looking at possibly going into either public relations or advertising or checking out this little ice cream company that's even though started in 1907, was really getting their feet underneath them. And so I thought I'm going to take a chance and do this, and that's what really opened the door, that paper.

Speaker 2: 4:43

And so from there, yes, the stories, in the journey there's many, many highs, but there's also been some definite deep lows. And so the book and the concept of the book is how do you find peace when you're really in the middle of the storm Not necessarily when the storm is over and you kind of see now what makes sense, and there are times that it doesn't ever make sense and we'll have to wait till heaven to ask those questions but how do you get the peace that passes, all understanding, in the middle of a storm? And so that, really, between those two, I thought, as I end my career and step into this new phase, I like to think I'm refiring versus retiring in a new season of life. I just want to be able to share what I've learned, not just, again, the fun times and we can talk ice cream all day, but also, when it does get difficult, how you can anchor to a rock. And again, in my case, my rock is Jesus Christ and it's been there and he's been there, and so that's kind of it in a nutshell.

Speaker 2: 5:46

And again, the book is just filled with a lot of fun stories, a lot of things that I did not necessarily write but learned from, and my wife didn't read until I was completely finished and she realized she was part of some of those chapters. And luckily we're still married. It's all good. We've had some great adventures together and have been truly blessed.

Speaker 1: 6:07

I said at the beginning that I would love for my sons to read this book, and I think people would, because a couple of things that I took away from your book that you also talked about. It's so much more than the product, so for you, the experience of working with Bluebell was more than selling ice cream. Working with Bluebell was more than selling ice cream, you said. It was about creating memories and touching lives, which we can do with any product or service. It all depends on how we look at it. So I also thought it was interesting that you were the first non-family member who is the president and CEO of the company, which has to be challenging. Could you begin for the people who haven't read this book yet, which is everyone, because it's not out yet. I've read it. How would you describe the values and culture of the company? That's what struck me as so special.

Speaker 2: 7:00

Tremendous question, and not just the culture, but how do you keep the culture? I think it's so imperative that you teach the basics, the foundation, but then also be mindful of how the world is changing. We've talked about the cartons being shrunk. We've talked about how you can make compromises, but the one thing that I have found, through not just writing the paper but also working for the company, is we kind of have a motto that we want to consistently meet.

Speaker 2: 7:29

The expectation that drives the passion. It's kind of a wordy, but if you think about every time you go to the store and you pick up any product, when you get it home, you have this expectation of what it's going to be. Now, if you've never had it before, that's one thing. But if you pick up homemade vanilla and you get home and you scoop out three or four big scoops and you bite into it and it's not what you expected, then we've not done our job. And so the culture is to consistently, on a day in and day out, every time you come into work, to be able to take the mindset that, look, we're going to be the very best we possibly can be.

Speaker 2: 8:04

And another phrase we use is make it as if you're taking it home, because usually when you make something for yourself, you don't cut any corners and you do all the steps and make it the very best. And so people have embraced that. The people at Bluebell, I will tell you, is the reason why it not only brought me there, but, as great as the product is, it's the people behind the product that really motivate me to get up in the morning, or did? I will be honest, it's been a little weird waking up and thinking, you know I don't have to go in, but I will tell you, it's the people that I do miss. But culture is everything.

Speaker 1: 8:41

He's been retired two months as of the recording of this. I've been retired a little longer than that. I'm going to say kind of like, sink into it. It's so hard for a person like you who's been running a company and I don't know you well, but I'm going to guess you might be a type A personality it's so difficult to say take a deep breath and just do nothing. You think it's nothing but it is something. And then, at least for me, I've seen new doors open that I never would have predicted if I hadn't been quiet. So I think God speaks to us.

Speaker 1: 9:13

But that's enough of my advice to the CEO of Bluebell Creameries. A couple of stories.

Speaker 2: 9:20

Great advice.

Speaker 1: 9:21

A couple of stories you shared that I thought were really such a metaphor for all of us. You talk about the value and culture of the company, people really caring about what they do, and that's not just about the product you make, that's about the people in the company. So I was so impressed by the story of you were young and you went into sales and you were settled with your family and then you were offered, the company started to expand to other states. I believe even at this late date, you're only in 23 states. Is that right?

Speaker 2: 9:55

That's correct, right.

Speaker 1: 9:57

So, even with less than I told my husband this morning, even with less than half of the states in the country, they are still what the number two brand in the country, or maybe higher.

Speaker 1: 10:06

So the idea of when you were young and you were asked to make a kind of a personal sacrifice by transferring to another city but you were promised or given the impression that you would be promoted rapidly and you would become the regional manager, district manager, whatever it was called. You were surprised after a period of time when your senior management was with you and you sat down to have a meeting and he was expecting that they were going to promote him and instead what they really had was a coaching and counseling session with you. That's right. Two things that I noticed. One is how many of us in Ricky's position would have said okay, fine, that's what you think I'm out of here. What would he have missed?

Speaker 1: 10:51

He was the president and the CEO. The other piece is how much easier would it have been for your managers to say you know this guy's young he's, you know, we'll just get rid of him and get someone new? How many times does that happen in a company who view their people as commodities? But instead, could you tell us a little more about that story? I imagine that was one of your greatest challenges.

Speaker 2: 11:14

No, and I appreciate the question, and it was probably the most pivotal experience of my 43 years in defining me not just as a salesman but as an individual I've tried to walk in the path of which I truly believe God has opened the doors, and really that's where the name of the book came one scoop at a time, so as we finish one scoop we go to the next. I'm going to have to do a double dipper on my next book, I guess, but that's exactly what happened. We had opened up into a brand new market it's the first time Bluebell had ventured with a branch outside of Texas, and so the opportunity to become, you know, the next position up was there, and so I truly believe that was going for the right reason. When we left San Antonio it was where I grew up with all my family brothers, sister, mom, dad, grandparents and I believed God opened that door to take, and so the problem, though, I truly believe, happened with me not, I can admit it today. At the time I probably wouldn't have, but I got ahead of it the focus became the promotion instead of the performance, and so, therefore, as I thought about the things that were going to be happening, I lost sight of the things that should be happening. And so, when they sat down, I did, I thought this is the moment. You know, we've been up here now and we said, as soon as I walked into the room, I could tell this was not going to be one of those. Hey, you know, this is a great opportunity.

Speaker 2: 12:42

The mood of the room was definitely different and probably for 30, 45 minutes, one and a half pages of single-spaced, handwritten things, of things I should be doing and that I, or things I wasn't doing that I should I'd lost my focus. At the same time, I remember going back to my room, we were at a kind of a retreat, or whatever you want to call it, and so we were all at hotel rooms. I remember sitting on the bed thinking, god, you know, I've thought I heard you, you asked me to come here. I thought this is what was really ordained for me in my life. And as clear as I was making those thoughts, it came back to me and I truly believe it was him speaking, not necessarily audibly, but he said you're here for me, you're not here for you, you're here to do what I'm asking you to do and not to do the things that you do. And so it was really that moment that I thought you know, that's exactly right.

Speaker 2: 13:34

No matter what the title is, you've given me an assignment and I need to be the very best I can possibly be, and that means if I'm here the rest of my career, then that's fantastic to his glory. And it also helped me with my management style when I managed others, because so often people are very good at what they do, but when they move up it may not be in their skill set, and so we have that balance or battle back and forth. But it was an eye opener. I thought you know, I need to focus and not worry about the title. You know, I never dreamed at that time that one day I'd be sitting here as a CEO of the company, but it sure helped me refocus my life to live it for God. If I'm proclaiming that, then why am I not living that? Yes, no question. Probably the most pivotal moment in my career.

Speaker 1: 14:20

And I found it to be the most touching part of your book. Well, there's actually another story too, but because I think the majority of us are focused on performance. You know, when you look at social media today, I almost feel sorry for the people who are at the prime of their career who have to rely on personal social media in order to further their causes, because it's so hard to balance just the focus on excellence with performance. I mean, when I read your book, your company's values and culture remind me very much of Chick-fil-A, which is a company I have a great deal of respect for. And you talked about the whole idea of focusing on what you're doing and not necessarily the title. And what Truett, cathy, said was focus on excellence, not success. What is success? I mean, if we just simply react to what the world says, the success metric is our whole career. We're going to be going back and forth. My husband calls it, you know, the dog wagging the tail. We're at the end of the tail. But if you focus on, like you said, your faith, why does God have me here? And excellence the rest of your book shows me why God had you there. I mean, you faced some pretty difficult things that you must have handled beautifully because they came out so well.

Speaker 1: 15:39

Two stories I'd love for you to share the story of. Really a hilarious part of the book are these letters he shared from consumers, eight-year-old children writing stories, letters about why they were upset that their favorite flavor had been discontinued. Very hilarious. But there is a story about a woman whose sister was just about to die of cancer and her sister's dying wish was that they would serve Blue Bell homemade vanilla ice cream at her funeral and that they would serve it with the little wooden spoons, because she wanted to have a Bible verse printed on the paper wrapper of the little wooden spoons. This was her dream. She was just a few days away from death and it happened to be a Friday, the last day before the holiday break.

Speaker 1: 16:35

So around Christmas and New Year's at 4.30 PM, ricky's assistant administrative assistant got a phone call from this woman's sister, 4.30 PM, like everyone's leaving at five o'clock. And this is the culture of the company. Her name was Tally, your assistant. She answers the phone, she listens to this woman's story and she kicked into gear, contacted a branch manager. It was also probably 15 minutes before the last day of the holiday week and he kicked into gear and this company got 200 cups of ice cream with 200 wooden spoons it makes me cry, free, of course, because that's who they are to the woman's funeral and the woman had Psalm. I think it was 39, 38, 4. My eyes are blurry, I can't read my page, taste and see that the Lord is good and that was the message that this company responded to. I've never heard a story like that about a company. I really haven't.

Speaker 2: 17:40

And it is incredible.

Speaker 1: 17:41

And I bet that's just one of many how you touch lives, created memories and touched lives. And I look at the 200 people who went to this woman's funeral and I just wonder, wow, that Bible verse. We'll never know at the sight of heaven, right, what the ripple effect of that was.

Speaker 2: 17:58

And really and you'll see in the chapter what followed after she had two wishes One is to live to 59 years old, which would have been on Monday, and she accomplished that. And they were also able to tell her that when the day of celebration came, that they would have Blue Bell at the celebration, and so that kind of lit her up. It was definitely she was it rapidly was taking her life and so, but really to me the story as beautiful as that is, it was what took place after, because Tally and her sister stayed good friends and that story was shared on Facebook and I think, from my memory now 14 different countries have reached out. I mean, it's just an incredible number of opportunities. That story was shared with people and again, her faith, and again, that's who you know, and I won't say it's just who we are, but it's the core of what makes us work.

Speaker 2: 18:51

You know, I think that the ice cream is just, is the conduit, maybe, to reach people. I think that the ice cream is just, is the conduit maybe, to reach people and if we say it's, whether you're having a great day or having a terrible day, ice cream could help you both ways. You know, it can erase a loss of a baseball game or, you know, helping the celebration of it. So when I finished that chapter I'll be honest, I had to just shut everything down and call it quits for the day, because, even though I was living it, tally and I kind of talk about it because we can't talk about it together we started reading that chapter out loud, we both. We just start sobbing. It's like, okay, this isn't working. But it was very, very touching and just one of those moments in time that we were just so thankful that we were there when she called. I think you'll really enjoy that chapter called Tanya, yeah.

Speaker 1: 19:38

And then there's another PS to that story. Which was you selected that story for? Was it an annual company meeting to share that story with your employees?

Speaker 2: 19:50

We usually try to incorporate what's going on, you know, especially internally. Incorporate what's going on especially internally, the people that work the production lines and behind the scenes. They're not in the field to where the consumers that come up and share their stories of how their ice cream affects them. But on that particular day we had not only of our sales individuals from all over the country but our production folks and I shared it with them and barely made it through. But I did make it through. But it just again drive the point home of what you do is more than just making ice cream. You are having an impact and, as simple as that may sound, it's so, so true in the letters back it. And so we have a commitment and a responsibility to be the best we can be, even making ice cream.

Speaker 1: 20:37

Well, I think that is such a good lesson because so many people feel like their jobs aren't meaningful. You just said it Our jobs are a conduit. They can be if we want them to be. They can be a conduit of our faith. And that means you might have to make a hard choice Do I want to go home right now, or do I want to try to move a mountain right now, even though it's half an hour before closing time? She had no idea that your company was going to get all this attention and recognition for it. That wasn't her heart. She was just responding with her faith. So it's so beautiful and I think it's so neat that she stayed in touch.

Speaker 1: 21:14

There were a couple of other. I so love your stories and, by the way, we're only scratching the surface, so you're all going to buy this book. The Butter Pecan Ice Cream Story what a great metaphor for everyone's life, and I'm going to let Ricky tell this because he's going to do a better job. But this was such a story that the Dallas Morning News even had an article saying what would you do if you were the CEO of Blue Bell Creameries and you had this particular situation? Butter pecan ice cream.

Speaker 1: 21:42

The price of pecans went up like crazy. So all of a sudden the company is faced with a decision Do they raise the price of the product like crazy? Do they shrink the size of the carton? We already said they're the only ice cream company, the major ice cream company, who did not shrink the size of the carton. We already said they're the only ice cream company, the major ice cream company, who did not shrink the size of the carton. I'm the coupon mom. I noticed stuff like that. Everyone else went 48 ounces, they stayed 64 ounces. So hats off to you for that. Do they shrink the size of the carton? Do they raise the price or do they just put fewer pecans in? What would you do if you were the CEO of Blue Bell? So I'm going to be quiet, Ricky what did you do and what was going on in the company when you had to make this decision? I didn't realize what a big decision it was until I read this book.

Speaker 2: 22:29

Well, when you have flavors like butter pecan that are really your staple, it's important to have it in the market. You know, if it was a cake piece or another kind of inclusion, it may not have been as tough of a decision. But with butter pecan being one of the top-selling flavors and really this story goes back way almost when I first began my career it happened two or three different times. But the good news is is we stay consistent with how we went about it. When you again eat that expectation that I talked about earlier, to consistently meet that expectation, we just felt like if we were to take the number of pecans that you put in butter pecan and reduce the number, people would notice that. And the problem with that is, once you make that, once you've made that decision and you share that decision with your employees, you've just opened up a door that you can't go back through, because if you're willing to compromise here, then why don't you compromise here or here or here? And yes, making money is important as a company, but it also I go back to that expectation. So, yeah, we had the dilemma of do we shrink the carton? Do we cut the number of pecans back? Do we put it in its own price category and ironically it did make the Dallas Morning News I think it was in the late 80s because all of a sudden at that time we just quit making it. We just couldn't afford to make it because the cost of the pecans had just skyrocketed. And that hit the market saying okay, now if you're CEO, what would you do?

Speaker 2: 24:03

We eventually put it in its own rim. The color of the rim is actually what determines the price of whatever goes into the product. So it's all the same quality. But it's easier to say, make a vanilla flavor than it is a pecan flavor. And so we have a couple of different price points. We have a gold rim and a brown rim. In this case we made it kind of an orange rim and it had its own price category because we felt like we had to have this flavor in the market. And so a lot of roundtable discussions, but the bottom line was we were not going to compromise. Either we're not going to have it or we're going to make it like it's supposed to be made. And so that's what we did. We made it like it's supposed to be made and fortunately we've had some great years where the prices come back down, but tons of the harvest, because they do fluctuate due to the seasonality.

Speaker 1: 24:52

I love that story because of the metaphor for life and it just makes me think of when we have ethics, when we kind of have rules for ourselves, and then this happens a lot with money, right? People are like. They say things like I'm fudging on my taxes, you're not fudging on your taxes, you're breaking a law. But I don't say that. Okay, I'm not the person who says that. But it's easy for us to rationalize why something is okay, but then it's a slippery slope and then you're you know, I just loved how you're like hard, stop, this is our standard. If we can't meet the standard, then we're not going to come out with anything at all. And you know what then you did and you raised the price because it's worth more. Okay, so yeah, don't ever. I'm just going to say this as one consumer do not ever discontinue your homemade vanilla. Charge me $4 million for it, but do not discontinue it.

Speaker 2: 25:48

I promise, even if I'm not there, I will make sure that I will go back and break the door down if I have to. But funny.

Speaker 1: 25:55

And the last one I really would love for you to share this because it was so interesting your Listeria Challenge. Is that how you pronounce it? I'm probably mispronouncing it, so many companies have had to deal with this, but I think it's important for us as consumers to understand what the company goes through when this happens. And that really opened my eyes in your story of what your company went through. If you could kind of elaborate on that a little bit.

Speaker 2: 26:21

Sure, and obviously it was heartbreaking, to say the least. It drove us to our knees. You know, ice cream is a fun product we've talked about and it should also be a safe product and it's being a frozen item or in a frozen category. It's really what we consider a low risk. But when this was identified it was pretty much all hands on deck. We brought in experts from the industry. We thought we could make the product and test it as it went before we made it to the market, in which we do today.

Speaker 2: 26:53

Everything we make, we do test and make sure that it's in good shape, along with an unbelievable robust environmental program light years ahead, and we're very, very proud of that program. What we also really tried to do is to not just finish it on the back end but start on the front end, and what I mean by that is work from the top backwards, from the time you walk through the door to the time the product goes into the front end. And what I mean by that is work from the top backwards, from the time you walk through the door to the time the product goes into the carton, and identify the best you can, using microbiologists to come in and to really examine your facilities and say, okay, here's where you could have an issue, here's where you could have an issue and then redo your whole program. And so, with that, we took, took majority of the floors, came up the walls, came down the ceilings, we took all the equipment out and we really did rebuild the way the facilities were to put us in a position to really be able to test and give assurance that we've done everything that we can. And we shut down at the end of April and it took till really September this is back in 2015 to get the product back into the market.

Speaker 2: 28:02

But we thought what would take three to four weeks ended up taking a lot longer. But we thought that let's do it and let's do it right. A lot of praying, no question, and we were humbled. I mean, I've never been so humbled on the day when it came back in the market and people were waiting, you know, lined up from the freezer aisle all the way up to the front of the store. I never will forget that and, again, that's what pushes you to continue to do the right things, the best you possibly can, and it's eyes wide open, you know, as long as you're giving it all that you can. So it was definitely one of those fear to faith moments. Let's put it that way.

Speaker 1: 28:38

Fear to faith. So what you know, to summarize your company was product was found contaminated, you don't know where it is. You recalled everything millions and millions and millions, shut down all other operations, redid the floors and all the ceilings and all the walls and all of the equipment and had the experts come in and they didn't have product. They didn't sell for four months. And so the metaphor I love, ricky, is that when you just said it, when the product came on the market, you were flooded with consumers.

Speaker 1: 29:12

And I kind of think, if we apply that to our own lives, we all make mistakes and we all have human failings. But because of the credibility your company had and everyone knew this was not intentional they completely trusted you. After that, they forgave you and trusted you. And can we be like that? Can we just like you said, can we pursue excellence? Can we really say, god, is this your will for my life and really try to follow that path? And so that when we are human and we fall off that path, our loved ones know that they can regain their trust in us? And we weren't the ones cutting the corners, we weren't the ones living a double life, we just had a human failing. And can we look at the people we love in the same way? We know that they were doing their very best, they had a human failing and when they put it back together, that we are there for them.

Speaker 1: 30:12

I just love the whole idea of the people who love your company, not necessarily because your product is delicious, but because it's a whole culture. It's a whole. As you said, there are lots and lots of stories of your employees somehow touching the consumer in a kind and loving way, and I love that, and so I cannot believe that I'm talking to CEO of a company and I just looked at the clock and I realized I've gone over my time. So there are two questions I wanted to ask you. What advice would you give a young person starting their career today?

Speaker 2: 30:49

Great question, I would say. And again where I was, you know I start with prayer. You know I pray God, you have a will for my life and I just pray that I recognize, when the doors open, that I see it, I recognize it and I kind of tag onto that. I pray for a passion that you give me, God, to do that job. And I go back to the one we talked about. If this is what you want me to do, then put that passion within me to be the best I can be, whatever that is, and be patient.

Speaker 2: 31:18

So much I see today is the patience of and I hate to say younger individuals. They're wanting to move fast, and so much of our growth comes from setting our roots in versus growing straight up. So when the wind does come, when the storms hit you, you're able to withstand that. And so those are my two. You know, I believe God put a passion in me. I did not grow up dreaming one day I'm going to work for an ice cream company, but when that door opened I was so thankful that I recognized it wasn't necessarily something that I would have sought out or planned, but it was actually God opening that door and I'm so, so thankful that I followed, and the journey has just been incredible.

Speaker 1: 32:00

I love that. So what's next for you? You've been retired a couple of months. What are you looking forward to?

Speaker 2: 32:06

Another great question. The book has really helped with the transition. I will say I thought I would have tried to do this after I retired and I was told that once you retire then all of a sudden the value of you can start to slip, which I thought was an intimate. But I sure understand. But we're at a place in time.

Speaker 2: 32:25

My wife and I obviously do some traveling, but I'm trying to really immerse myself in our grandkids the best I can. We have eight. Four are under 12, the other four teenagers, so we love them just as much. But at the same time there's nothing like a three-year-old when they grab your little face and you can't do wrong. And so we've been to more baseball games and piano recitals than we've been to in a long time and actually had the opportunity, because we do have the time. But just really be open again to that same. You know the passion of purpose and that's that's what you know. Whether this store, this book, opens up more books or speaking engagements, I just want to be used as a vessel to be able to spread the faith that I have, but not only that, that God is real and he loves each and every one of us. And if I can be that vessel, then that's to His glory.

Speaker 1: 33:16

Well, I know you absolutely will be and I'm so thankful that you were willing to spend some time with me and I got to know you a little bit. And I'm so thankful that you were willing to spend some time with me and I got to know you a little bit and I look forward to. I'm going to pay attention because I'm sure you're going to be. I'm in the Atlanta area. I'm sure you're going to be booked for a speaking event somewhere here and I'd love to meet you in person. Well, fantastic.

Speaker 2: 33:34

I would look forward to that very much. So Well, thanks so much.

Speaker 1: 33:38

Thank you and good luck with your book launch. You can get the book starting July 16th and how can people get in touch with you?

Speaker 2: 33:47

Well, right now, onestepofatimecom. One scoop, I said step, my mind just went one scoop at a time. It's important to name the book right OneScoopAtATimecom. And then RickyDixoncom also will be up and running here very soon, to where you can not only learn more about the book but also speaking opportunities.

Speaker 1: 34:09

Good, and we'll have that on the show notes. Thanks so much. Enjoy retirement.

Speaker 2: 34:13

Sure, do appreciate it. Okay, thank you, have a great day.