43. Lily Shimbashi: Founder of Sportsish, Not your boyfriend's sports news

16:54Lily Shimbashi:See if we can make it happen. Right. Yeah. No, it's, it's a wonderful part of the world. And I think outside gets a reputation for whatever it is that people decide, whether it's dangerous or smelly or crowded. It can be all of those things, but so can every other place. Every dangerous feeling I've ever experienced here in New York City, I've experienced somewhere else. So it really is, to me, it represents the best of humanity. I love New York City.

17:25Victoria:I'm with you. I love New York City as well. It's fabulous. There's no place in the world like it. Very few to no places will ever be better than New York City. So I love that you're there. You went back home.

17:38Lily Shimbashi:You went back home. Posted family. Posted family. Big old pregnant belly. Moved into this apartment. 26 years old. And I had my son. His name is George. He is now six. Best little guy ever. And I loved having a baby. There's hard, beautiful, wonderful, exhausting. All of the things you can imagine it is. It is. And when George was about six months old, I was feeding him and I looked down and it was almost like a wave washed over me. I don't really have these experiences very often where I feel intuition or like guidance. I've heard so many people talk about having them all the time. I just really don't have them.

18:25Lily Shimbashi:But this moment, and it was on my couch, which I can see right now, I'm looking at it. It almost was like a wave washed over me. You need to go pursue your dream. You need to go back and pursue your dream. Because how in the world will you teach this little boy to go chase his if you didn't chase yours? I had chills. It was really, really astounding because I wasn't my normal weight. I didn't feel good in my skin. I hadn't done broadcasting for a while. I was really just not in a place to go back and chase my dream. I was still breastfeeding. It was a wild time of life. but I really, really felt strongly about it.

19:15Lily Shimbashi:So the next few months were about me kind of thinking back to this business plan I had started when I was working at the Jazz, which was how to speak to women in sports media. And my husband and I doing like every possible financial crunch in the world of me leaving this part-time job of doing customer service and kind of launching something on my own while also being a full-time mom because there was no way in the world we could afford child care. But in my mind, I'm like, okay, well, it's social media. I can do it from home. I can do it while he naps. I can do it while he sleeps at night. It was like 7 p.m.

19:56Lily Shimbashi:Great. And then in April 2021, when he was a little over a year old, we launched Sportsish on Instagram. I love it.

20:08Victoria:And did you, when you launched, did you have, I mean, you say a business plan. So it seems like you kind of had everything laid out exactly how you wanted it to be before it went live.

20:19Lily Shimbashi:I mean, that's generous. I would say a business plan to someone who knew nothing about business. I would say I had a name. I had the name sports-ish came to me and I mean, like stuck with me. And I knew that was going to be the name. I knew it was going to be catering to women. I knew that it would be accessible for like casual fans too. You could enjoy the content without knowing everything about every stat or every rule. I knew that we were going to do a story-based reporting instead of like a stat-based reporting. That was really big for me. How we were going to generate money. I had no idea, but I had my phone.

21:05Lily Shimbashi:I had a glow light, as they say, and a little mic from Amazon and a lot of determination.

21:14Victoria:And you started with a lot of talking head content.

21:17Lily Shimbashi:Yeah. Because that's what I was comfortable with. That's what I had studied. That's what I knew was getting on a camera and writing a script and speaking to the script. I had like this teleprompter app on my phone that I used. Yeah. I mean, you should. It's really, it was great. And I would just go to this like corner of my apartment. And sometimes my baby was like at my feet, George, sometimes he was napping, sometimes he was asleep. And I would record, you know, whatever the stories were to me that day. And that's the key word, right? To me, I wasn't talking about how many points someone scored during the game necessarily, unless there was a story tied to it.

22:00Lily Shimbashi:That was compelling. And I did that for several months. The day of launch, I will say we had a thousand followers overnight, which was in my mind like, oh my gosh, we're really, really doing something. And then after that initial launch, the initial 1 ,000, it was like the snail's pace for a very long time.

22:26Victoria:Just a couple new, a couple gone, a couple new, a couple gone.

22:30Lily Shimbashi:We would gain a follower, lose five. It was the most exhausting thing I've ever done is watching the growth, those early days of sports-ish.

22:40Victoria:Yeah. I feel like it's almost like something you can't pay that much attention to because if you do, it's only going to just slow you down.

22:49Lily Shimbashi:Right.

22:50Victoria:Totally. You got to cover it up as much as you can. And I mean, Instagram analytics six years ago had to be good, but they definitely probably weren't as... They're great now. You can see everything now.

23:00Lily Shimbashi:Yeah, truly. I think you could see like top three cities, which were ironically like New York city, like my friends, Provo, Utah, my friends from college. And then I think it was like Connecticut, which is where I'm from. And it's like my friends.

23:20Victoria:So it's like a high school friends, college friends, childhood friends.

23:25Lily Shimbashi:Family. Husband's friends. My husband's friends. Yeah. Canada has always been like kind of up there in terms of country engagement. And I'm always like, well, there's my in-law. Yeah. But it's great. It's great. But I do think, especially, you know, I didn't monetize this business for four years. And so you're kind of counting on analytics and growth as your measurement of success. Right. And because when you're not making money, you're just kind of looking for anything. Right.

24:01Victoria:Like, tell me to keep going. Like, tell me something's working here. Yeah, totally.

24:06Lily Shimbashi:So that's, I relied heavily on those metrics for a long time. Now I'm not as concerned. Yeah. Yeah.

24:13Victoria:Now you've got to roll it. Got a couple of big deals in the books. Like, Like it's, yeah, it's on, on has momentum, which I feel like is super helpful. When did you see kind of, was there like a second jump? So you started, you get your initial thousand, you're like, I'm killing it. Then you're like, okay, we're just, I'm just going to keep going. Like, I know I have to do this. Um, was there like a second moment where you went from a couple thousand to like, you know, maybe a hundred thousand or something like that. that's notable? I would say, and roll your eyes as much as you need to, but September 27th, 2023.

24:57Lily Shimbashi:Do you know why that's important? Do you know?

25:01Victoria:No, I don't know. Tell me.

25:04Lily Shimbashi:Taylor Swift showed up to an NFL game.

25:06Victoria:Oh, yes. Yes.

25:09Lily Shimbashi:And I have laid down for a nap because at At this point, by the way, should mention I had had a second child. OK, so in October of 2022, I had my second. Her name is Rose, color Rosie. And so this was to do almost a year later. She was like in sleep regression, not sleeping through the night. And so on Sunday, I took a nap and I was like trying to remember to like get up for the NFL games for the big games that night. But I woke up to approximately 47 text messages. And everyone was like, she's there, she's there, she's there. Because there had been rumors about her and Travis Kelsey for a while.

25:53Lily Shimbashi:And I will fully embrace the fact that I am a Taylor Swift fan. I love her music. I've always loved her. She, to me, has guided me through really hard parts of my life. And I understand that she's not everyone's favorite. it. I understand it. I get it. I'm even empathetic to it, but it's just not me. Like I, I really do enjoy her and I do enjoy her music. And I think of course she has faults because she's a human being, but at the end of the day, it wouldn't be true to me to pretend like Taylor Swift wasn't some, someone that I really loved. So there's been speculation about it for a while. And I'm telling you when I wove in, I mean, I weave in pop culture to almost everything we do, but I tried to weave Taylor Swift into sports for a very long time.

26:43Lily Shimbashi:I mean, we would do like, if she would release an album, we would do a weekend recap with song titles. We're talking in like 2021, 2022, long before this ever happened. And so the fact that she was like coming in seamlessly to the sports world going to football games was crazy but along with her she brought a crazy amount of new fans new eyes when interested in football which again it causes lots of eye rolls but i have plenty to say about that we won't get into it but when she showed up to a football game i think all of a sudden it allowed many of her fans to be like oh taylor Swift is out and about.

27:26Lily Shimbashi:First of all, we don't get to see that a lot. She's watching football. Maybe I should watch football because this thing they loved was associated with football. So what is she liking that maybe I should hop onto? When a celebrity wears a lip color or talks about their favorite, I don't know, perfume, there's a genuine interest because people idolize celebrities. And I think that's what happened here. There's a genuine interest in football by people who had maybe felt like it wasn't for them before. And she came in and the next week, the Chiefs game had 1 million new women who had never watched before, particularly young girls, like preteen, teenage girls.

28:09Lily Shimbashi:And that's impact. And these women were looking for a place to learn more about sport, to enjoy sport, to have sport presented to them in a really kind of intentional, authentic way. And they found sports. Yeah.

28:28Victoria:It's very almost serendipitous, maybe is the word, that you had already been weaving Taylor in just because you're a fan and you love her for some time. Because then if people go back in your content as well, it's not like you didn't jump on a bandwagon, essentially. you had already woven it in previously. So when girls went to your page too, they could see, oh, she's already talking about the things that I want to talk about, including Taylor, if they're scrolling and, you know, deciding if this is content that they want. So I feel, yeah, I feel like that's serendipitous. Like you were already in it.

29:10Lily Shimbashi:Right. Right. Exactly. Yeah.

29:12Victoria:And then the girls just had to find you.

29:14Lily Shimbashi:Right. And they, they found. I mean, I think about Swifties. They're on the internet. They are active.

29:22Victoria:It's so true. They're so on the internet.

29:27Lily Shimbashi:So we quickly, I think, reached 100K that year. Because, of course, then Taylor Swift won the Super Bowl. And it was bank busters for content. So that's when we hit 100K. And I felt like, oh, this is maybe really something. but ironically someone had by the end of the super bowl people were like is this a taylor

29:51Victoria:swift fan account or what is happening when i started the game i got like a couple dms and they were like this better not be a taylor swift football pod i was like whoa i was like you guys i just want to talk to women i want to like amplify feminine voices i want to like you know, bring out to the world that like women are intelligent and smart and incredible. And of course we're going to talk about Taylor. I'm a girl. I'm a 31 year old woman who loves music, who is a romantic and who appreciates a pop culture, female icon. Of course she's going to come up. I was like, don't DM me this.

30:29Lily Shimbashi:Like either way, like she's not the only one who's going to come up. You're also going to talk about Sierra and you're also going to talk about Cardi B, although I think that relationship has not ended well, according to my research. Allegedly. That is part of the allure and part of what you're doing that I think is so cool. And part of what we try to do at Sports-ish is shine a light on women adjacent to the game, right? Whether it's an owner, whether it's a coach's wife, whether it's a flag football player or a girlfriend who happens to be a celebrity. That's intriguing.

31:05Victoria:Yeah.

31:05Lily Shimbashi:And it's

31:06Victoria:interesting. And maybe you've had the same experience with sports-ish. When I started the game, I thought about men who watch The Bachelor and they're never actually locking in in the beginning. When you're getting them into it, they're like, I don't want to watch that. And then you find them in the doorway or at the top of the stairs. And then you'll be having a glass of wine after and he'll say like, I cannot believe Jen. And you're like, wait a second. You're like, I don't even remember who Jen is. Right. Right. But it's like the men care too, even if they don't, even if they're not going to admit it to your face, like I'm sure you have, you know, majority women, your branding is very like pink and girly and feminine forward.

31:49Victoria:But there's also men who like enjoy the content and like everyone loves a good story, no matter what. Everyone loves a good story and everyone loves a good storyteller.

31:59Lily Shimbashi:And they, they say it to me in a way when men tell me they like or follow, they say it like they're ashamed or like it's a secret. They're like,

32:12Lily Shimbashi:and I'm like, amazing. Come on in. Like the water is great, but yeah. the vibes are so good here but the whole point of this is that there was no place that was authentically speaking to women right and that is what i wanted to change and i think a lot of people were scared like even new media companies that started before me they didn't want to brand themselves just for women because it like eliminates this male fan base and you don't want to hold back or limit yourself. But I said, even my husband was like, well, like, do you need to be so forward about not your boyfriend's sports news? Because like that could make men feel like it's not for them.

32:57Lily Shimbashi:And I point blank said, it's not, it's, it's not for them. If they want it to be great, if they want to digest great, if they want to follow amazing, I'll take it. But there are so many places for them and where they are the center and where they are the target demo. Let me make something that's the opposite.

33:17Victoria:Yeah, because everything around sports is men's target demographic. Right. And everything, I mean, we even look at like clothing. Like finding an outfit that you actually feel hot in.

33:31Lily Shimbashi:Not possible.

33:33Victoria:It is excruciating. And like, you know, Kristen Juszczyk has her brand now. And we're seeing a lot of like rework brands come out. We're seeing like Bobble Bar has a line and things like that. So it's like growing a lot, but everything is like so male dominated and it almost takes the complete opposite to, to like make, make the change. I'm like, yeah, it's okay if it's not for you. It's not for you.

34:01Lily Shimbashi:It's not for you. And you like it great, but I'm not thinking of you when I make it.

34:06Victoria:And that's okay because you weren't thinking of me when everything else was created. Exactly.

34:10Lily Shimbashi:And I really have been unapologetic about that.

34:14Victoria:I love, I think that's probably had a lot to do with why women are so invested in, in you and your brand as well, though, is because we need more unapologetic women, right? You know, just say, this is what I'm doing and this is why I'm doing it. And if you like it, stay enjoy, we're having a great time. And if you don't like it, that's okay. There's plenty more. There's other room, there's more, there's other things. I would love to take a moment to thank our sponsors over at Kuso Cuts. I'm in one of those phases of life where literally everything is changing. My job situation changed. My state has changed.

34:54Victoria:I am in the middle of pretty much everything going in a different direction than it was a month ago. And I am so grateful to have Kuso's in my cabinet. I've actually run out of my two favorite, which are Southwest Sand and Lemon Pepper. And you know when that happens, but you have like other good stuff that you haven't really tried yet. You get a little adventurous. So I have been going in and trying some of the ones that I haven't had yet. So today I use dust to make my taco meat for a little taco lunch bowl. It just doesn't disappoint. Their flavors are bold. There's no preservatives. It's so easy this morning.

35:29Victoria:I was in a rush. I needed to like pick up some stuff at the grocery store, just that I could eat for lunch today. And I was so glad that I already had the seasoning in my pantry. I didn't have to go to a new aisle in the grocery store and I knew that it was going to taste delicious. So if you want to get on the Cusos train, they are seasonings and blends with no added ingredients, no preservatives, bold flavors. So good for you, good for your gut, and good for your smile. You can head to Cusocuts.com slash the game or use code the game at checkout, no spaces for 10 % off your order. Thank you, Kusos, for supporting us here at the game.

36:08Victoria:So you talk about, you know, kind of having this be for women and that you wanted to create this space and media for them. Is there anything else with sports-ish that you are really trying to accomplish in the media world specifically outside of kind of the gender role in media.

36:27Lily Shimbashi:Totally. I think my favorite content on the internet right now is like midform and where I see people not in their natural habitat, right? So when they're on hot ones or when they're... You should go on hot ones. I love to go on hot ones.

36:46Victoria:How do we get you on?

36:48Lily Shimbashi:I was eating spicy noodles the other night. I was like, I wonder if I could go on how it's like, I wonder if I could handle it, but probably I would probably kids. You can handle anything. That's so true. Thank you. I also have to say not to go on a tangent. No, I love tangents here, but I, I really felt like after I had my first empowered in a way I'd never felt before confident in a way I'd never felt before. And ironically, like I had, I had put on weight and like I had bags under my eyes and I was like leaking from my boots. Sorry.

37:27Victoria:No, it's the girls.

37:30Lily Shimbashi:They get it. But I had really struggled finding my own confidence and voice and purpose before I had a child. And one caveat I always like to give is I I think women are, especially like this rising generation, are much better at that now and better at that than I was. And I have a lot of friends who didn't need to have a child to find their own worth. And it's almost like, oh, it's like sad to look back on. But it changed my life. Like having a baby, knowing I could grow a human and give birth to a human and take care of him and raise him was so empowering to me. I finally felt like I had the confidence to go back and to do this thing I had been thinking about for a long time and to launch a business.

38:20Lily Shimbashi:And so being a mom is such a big part of my story. And we live in a world where not everyone wants to be a mom. And I think that's beautiful that women find purpose outside of it. But it would not be authentic for me to sit here and say, I just did this on my own. I just like one day woke up and had confidence. No, for me, like it really did come after I did the hardest thing in the world, which is having a baby.

38:53Victoria:Right. And then raising your baby and working while you're raising your baby and learning about your body and learning about yourself and because you're learning about your kid, but yeah, you're also learning yourself and how resilient you are and how strong you are and how capable you are. And it's like, if you can take care of them, of course you can take care of you. You're so powerful. I think, so I'm not a mom yet. Might be, we'll see. But a lot of the mom content that I get fed is really hard mom content. And I don't know why. I'm like, Instagram, like, do you not, like, am I, am, do you not, what's going on with my algorithm?

39:29Lily Shimbashi:Do you influence me about this? Because, because like, I'm feeling a little stressed. I'm not going to do this yet. Totally. I'm not even married yet.

39:38Victoria:I'm feeling stressed out about this.

39:42Lily Shimbashi:I get it. I get it. But I do think it's hard, right? Because you want to be authentic. And I would be lying to you if I said like, this is easy, but I have never one time in my life had anything that was worth it be easy. Like the best parts of my life have been challenging and challenging to get there. Motherhood is no exception. I mean, kids are the best part of my life. Rose and George, like, I can't even explain in words what it's like when, like, you take your three-year-old and, like, they cuddle up to you and put their arms around your neck. Like, it is, it feels like you're not even in your own body.

40:22Lily Shimbashi:It's so joyful. But that comes through really hard work and really hard days and really sleepless nights. But nothing, especially sports-ish, is a really good example. worth having has ever come without hardship and challenge. So just think of it like that. Everything we do that is hard is worth it at the end. That's how motherhood is. Yeah.

40:45Victoria:That's a beautiful reframe. And I'm sure that there are some girls listening, kind of considering like, do I want this? Do I not want this? It is going to be, obviously being a parent is hard. Being a mom, especially as a whole other part of of parenthood that is really challenging, but I'm sure there's a girl out there who needed to, to kind of like hear that and, and have that reminder. And I mean, frankly, me too, as somebody who's on the, on the, I don't sleep. Totally.

41:16Lily Shimbashi:Yes. I know. I know. And I have the utmost respect for people who say like, that's not for me because what I want more than anything in the world is for women to feel like they can authentically be themselves, live their lives. And that's what's most important, whether it's having kids or not having kids, being married, not being married. Like you go do you. That is like true. Feminism is supporting women who want to do whatever they

41:39Victoria:want to do. Whatever they want. Yeah. Without having to explain why or why they don't want to as well. Just say, that's not for me. And we all say, okay, sis, what else are you up to?

41:49Lily Shimbashi:Yeah.

41:49Victoria:What do you, you know? Yeah.

41:50Lily Shimbashi:Cool. Tell me about your job. Tell me about your promotion. I'll give you like a shower, like a baby shower when you get a promotion, you know, like what's

41:58Victoria:My sister did the most iconic thing. So she lives in Texas and she bought a house and she is not married yet and doesn't have any kids, but she's in her thirties. And she was like, I have spent so much money and so much time, which are things that we love to do. And she said that she's like, I love spending money and time and energy celebrating my friends. But she's like, I have never had that kind of celebration thrown for myself. And she's a teacher and she bought her own house and her house is gorgeous. That's the perfect backyard for a dog. And she hosts her friends all the time. And so she said, I'm having a housewarming party.

42:40Victoria:She sent out the cutest invitations, like had a whole photo shoot invitation and put a registry on there.

42:47Lily Shimbashi:Yes.

42:48Victoria:And she, yes. And like her realtor came and her best friends came and our family flew out for it. And we like all made this big deal. And not to say that like she won't get married and have all of those celebrations as well. But you know, when you get to 30 and you're, you are unmarried or you don't have kids, like there's a lot of celebrating that goes missed because we're, we're often like, we have like seven weddings a year, which I love a wedding. So don't stop inviting me to your wedding. I love a wedding.

43:17Lily Shimbashi:Yeah. But I thought that was deserving of a celebration as someone who's getting married or having a baby, if not more serving because she did it on her own. And that's insane. That's incredible. Like celebrate women no matter what. Yes.

43:32Victoria:Yeah. Like this is your sign to have a promotion party for your friends. Even if it's like dinner and picking up their bill for the wine, like, or just going out and saying, you got a promotion. Like you're not staying in on Friday. We're going to celebrate you or we're coming over or whatever. And yeah, it'll amplify community and make everyone happy because like, who doesn't like a girl's night?

43:51Lily Shimbashi:My fave. That's what I live for these days. Yeah.

43:58Victoria:What are you most excited for, for sports-ish over the next year? We're in one of like the biggest years of sports ever. We had the winter Olympics. We have FIFA world cup in the U.S. There's just like sports galore this year. So what are you most excited for, for sports-ish, whether it be like an event or something internal with the company?

44:18Lily Shimbashi:I think so. We have this new partnership with Together. You're the best humans on the earth and also a collaborative partnership with ESPN. So very different partnerships, but both very exciting. I feel very honored. But I really would like to start doing mid-form content to kind of humanize athletes. And so everyone keeps asking me like, when are you bringing the podcast back? probably not as it ever was before, but maybe in a new kind of different format coming. Okay.

44:53Victoria:That's really exciting. Okay.

44:57Lily Shimbashi:Can't say more. Yeah.

44:59Victoria:I am teased. I can't wait to see what comes next. I'll be watching like a hawk.

45:05Lily Shimbashi:Yay.

45:06Victoria:Okay.

45:06Lily Shimbashi:I'll tell you. Well, I'll text you. Okay.

45:09Victoria:Okay. Great. Okay. So we have the Together partnership, which you are posting content with Together. If you guys don't know what Together is, it is a female athlete form company. They have the Everyone Watches Women's Sports sweatshirts, which I'm sure everyone's seen at least one time. And so you're posting content with them, but with ESPN, you are on the red carpet. it. You were like their content interviewer. Yeah. Does that feel so full circle?

45:42Lily Shimbashi:Yes. Ironically, because we frame ourselves as not your boyfriend's sports news. And like, what do you think of when you think of your boyfriend's sports news? Yeah. But the before ESPN know that they are trying to do something different. They know they haven't been speaking to women. And so they're trying to for the first time, hence the partnership with Sports-ish. And so I can ask a football player about fashion on the red carpet. And it's not strange. It's not out of the ordinary. And it works now for ESPN's content. However, five years ago, people would have looked at me like I had multiple eyes.

46:22Lily Shimbashi:They would have been like, why are you talking about fashion at the NFL honors. We're here to talk about football, but that has changed dramatically. The landscape of sports, I cannot emphasize enough in the past three years has changed so dramatically because they saw, and I'm not going to give all of the credit to Taylor Swift. She just, it just kind of was like right place, right time. But they saw the way that women paid attention when storylines were told, that women wanted to watch more when they found more out about these athletes, these humans. They wanted to cheer them on more when they talked about, you know, wives or girlfriends, women were interested more.

47:08So I think traditional media

47:11Lily Shimbashi:has taken notice of not just places like Sports-ish, but places like Together, places like the gist places like I'm trying to think of other like platforms that I love I off ball is a newer one but they do very similar content to what we do and it is off the court off the field out of the pool off the track who are these people and in turn that creates a sports fan because it's like It's never just the sport for women, at least, or for a new fan.

47:46Victoria:It's so hard to watch an NFL game if you know nothing about the NFL. And they're like, this is the sixth time in 14 years that this running back ran one extra foot. And you're like, I'm bored. Tell me what they were doing this weekend. Tell me why they're important. Tell me what they're doing in the community. Tell me who their wife is. Mention Chloe Kim when Myles Garrett gets the stack record.

48:08Lily Shimbashi:Amen. Yes. and her multiple gold medals. I know.

48:13Victoria:Chloe Kim is one of my favorite people to bring up.

48:16Lily Shimbashi:I love her. She is the wag that we... I just love her. She's so, so, so crazy talented. And also, when they first stepped out, I was like, whoa, how did they meet? Like, what?

48:29Victoria:Yeah. And it's so cool to see this football player

48:33Lily Shimbashi:in this winter Olympian. I would have never expected that, but I love it. Right.

48:37Victoria:Yeah. And the, I think she posted yesterday, like the photos that miles took of her. Can't. I love it. It's really too much. It's so cute.

48:46Lily Shimbashi:It's overwhelmingly cute.

48:49Victoria:Okay. Is there a sports event that you're looking the most forward to this season to like attend either with ESPN or just something that you are excited for personally?

49:00Lily Shimbashi:I did pitch to ESPN, the Met Gala. I don't know if it will happen, but think about it. there are always athletes there and it feels important to cover. I'm not sure that will happen, but if not the SB awards, I did go last year and it's basically like the Oscars, but sports. And that is a sports-ish dream come true. That really is like prime sports-ish content. So I will all say SB awards, but I genuinely, this is so funny, but Milan was on my vision board for like three years. I didn't get there. I didn't get to go. I like, I'm regretting not doing more beforehand to prep for it, but, or like to get myself there, but I just didn't get there.

49:46And while I'm disappointed, 2030 is in the French Alps.

49:50Lily Shimbashi:And I'm like, you know what? That's my new vision board. And so I am like so set on the winter Olympics, 2030 in French Alps.

49:58Victoria:I can't wait. Can't wait to see you there.

50:00Lily Shimbashi:Yeah. Yeah. Meet you there. We'll share a hotel room. Great.

50:04Victoria:Let's go. You do not. It is one of my best and worst qualities is that if anybody jokes about going to Europe, I'll be serious about it.

50:15Lily Shimbashi:That's the best quality. That's only. Yeah.

50:18Victoria:Yeah. My bank account is like, hey, but I don't care. Yeah. I went to Berlin for the NFL game and then went to Paris after. But that game was it's like one of the highlights of my entire life. And financially probably should not have gone, but like did it. And it was, it was, I met two other solo women travelers going to the football game. It was amazing.

50:43Lily Shimbashi:You know what? In four years, you'll be, this podcast will be rolling in the dough. You will have that trip funded. Okay. So don't even worry. Don't stress.

50:54Victoria:No stress. I'm not, I'm not worried about it. It's going to be great. It's on the vision board. Yes. Okay. One more sports is question. and then we'll get into our rapid fire. How do you, so you have a very lean team at Sports-ish.

51:07Lily Shimbashi:That's a nice way. I love it.

51:11Victoria:Small. I've heard another entrepreneur say that, or like startups say that they'll be like, we're very lean. And I'm like, oh, I'm not going to sleep at this job. Okay. Yes. Okay. Yes. How do you keep up with A, just the sheer amount of content that you put out, but be with the pressure because something is always going on in whatever sport and you pretty much cover all of them. So how do you keep up with the content and how do you keep up with the pressure?

51:40Lily Shimbashi:I don't mean to be ironic, but I, I work all the time. I work all the time. I feel very, very blessed that I've been able to turn this into something that I can do. Like I am off between two 30 and four 30 PM every day because I'm picking my children up from school. I'm bringing them usually to like, my daughter does dance, my son does hockey. But like while they're on the ice or dancing, like I'm working again. And then we're home. I'm usually off from like six to eight or six to 7.30. Then they're in bed and I'm back on. I'm not shy about the fact that I work really, really hard. And I can't lie about that.

52:21Lily Shimbashi:But I also have found women because we're an all-female team that also are energized by this and work really, really hard. And it's like we are this group that just has seen the potential from the beginning. The three women I have working for me as employees have been here since like they were interns first. And they have all been here at least since 2023. And so like I just value them. And we're very loyal to each other. We're texting each other at 1 a.m. and no one's like complaining about it. It's just we just see the potential of this brand and are willing to work really, really hard. In terms of pressure, I feel it every second of every day.

53:07Lily Shimbashi:And I think weekends are the hardest because, you know, my kids are home and you like want to spend time with them. But also a lot of times weekends are the busiest time in sports. I have a really, really great spouse who is like taking the kids to the playground sometimes when I'm like, I just need an hour to make this video, et cetera. But I also, at the end of the day, can sit back and say, if I post something two hours after it happens, as opposed to 15 minutes after it happens, the only person who's really going to notice is me. And I think maybe engagement doesn't get as high of a reach, but you know what?

53:44Lily Shimbashi:Tomorrow I'll make an outstanding post and it will get great engagement. And I think the benefit of having kids is like they force me out of it sometimes. Because you have to look in their eyes. You have to help them go to the bathroom and get dressed. And you physically have to be so present and in it that you have no choice other than to set your phone down and unplug. And so I'm forced out of it all the time. I jump back in it every chance I can get. But I think in terms of pressure, they say pressure is a privilege. And I fully agree with that. But I also think if you're unable to give yourself grace and space, you're doing something wrong.

54:31Lily Shimbashi:So I've been really holding on to that the past year. Yeah, that's really sweet.

54:37Victoria:And it's a cool through line too that your kids and having kids and becoming a mom built your confidence. And now that same stimulus, having your kids is helping you be present, take a step back, take a little bit of the pressure off of yourself.

54:55Lily Shimbashi:that's really sweet i love it and i love their names too it's very regal thank you yeah you know my full name's elizabeth which is like an unknown fact about me but queen elizabeth when she was a baby they called her princess lilibet lilibet and so they like called me that when i was little because she was part of my namesake and so then it just dropped to lily

55:18Victoria:and here we are oh that's cute yeah i tell people i'm named after the queen but i'm totally not own that own that energy i mean listen i'm embodying it but it's not where it came from

55:33Lily Shimbashi:that's i i think it's a great story keep telling that yeah yeah i'll just be like hey mom dad if anybody ever asks you just say yes exactly i actually love victoria and her husband albert i could i could yap about them all day they're a very sweet part of the royal family yes yeah

55:51Victoria:Yeah. So cute. Okay. Let's do our rapid fire questions so we can get you onto your next thing and your next piece of content. What sports team are you the biggest fan of right now?

56:05Lily Shimbashi:So the Buffalo Bills, I have no ties to Buffalo and I know that the mafia is very protective of their fandom. So I always hesitate in saying something, but I can't fight it. Like I love the team. I love the culture. I love the fan energy. I would say I'm a wannabe Buffalo Bills fan. I just cheer for them more than I, harder than I cheer for essentially everyone else. And since it's a football podcast, I'll say the Bills.

56:31Victoria:Okay. Have you been to a Bills Mafia tailgate?

56:33Lily Shimbashi:No, I want to go so bad.

56:35Victoria:It's just like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. They are the best fans. They don't even care if you're bandwagon. I'm not even a Bills fan. I went there. There is no better group of women that I've met who are like a more down to chat with the girls, like hang out, bring you in. Like it is the best. I'm going to be going to another games here. I'll text you when I go.

56:54Lily Shimbashi:Okay, please. Because I love, I like feel like a loser. I'm obsessed with them. I'm obsessed with the fan base. I'm obsessed with the mafia. I'm like, listen, I live a few hours away. I get it. But I genuinely cheer for them. My kids wear Buffalo Bills gear. Like I am, I'm a fan. I just don't know if they would consider me.

57:12Victoria:No, no. That's what makes you a fan is that you're nuts about it because they're all nuts.

57:17Lily Shimbashi:Yeah. In the best way. Yeah. Yeah.

57:23Victoria:Who is your favorite athlete at the moment? Okay.

57:26Lily Shimbashi:So coming off the heels of the Olympics, like it would, I would be remiss not to say Hillary Knight or Megan Keller, just like the U S women's Olympic hockey team in general during football season, is Josh Allen. I love him. You can't not like Josh Allen. He's the most likable athlete in the world. Yeah.

57:46Victoria:It's impossible. And his family and his baby, it's really too much. Okay. And final question, who is one woman in sports or not in sports that more of the world need to know about?

57:59Lily Shimbashi:This is such a good question. I just think as a white woman, I want to use my platform to like show exposure to and make sure that black women are platform just as much as I am. And so my good friend, Adriana runs an account called black girls love football. And since this is a football cat cat podcast, I'd give her a shout out. She works so hard. She's also a mom and she's become like a great friend to me in this space. So the account is called black girls love football. You should have her on the pod. She's so wonderful. Oh, I'm DMing her immediately

58:40Victoria:after this.

58:41Lily Shimbashi:I mean, the thing is sports have been, and sports culture, like really have been built on the backs and like the pressure of black athletes and everything that they have faced and dealt with and been really met with is they have overcome with grace and sports culture, and black culture are very intertwined. And so as someone who is white, like I just, I would be remiss not to show light as much as I can to black creators, to black athletes, to black women in this space. I am such, if you don't know who she is, my other one would be Nicole Lynn, who is an agent for Clutch Sports Agency. And she is Jalen Hurts' agent, but I think maybe she's Miles Garrett's as well.

59:35Lily Shimbashi:Okay. Definitely Jalen Hurts. I think she might be Males Garrett. And she continues to sign record-breaking contracts. She's like really, really, really an incredible agent. Excellent at her job. Excellent at her job. So Adriana from Black Girls Love Football, Nicole Lynn, an agent from Clutch Sports. Those are my two women who I think everybody in the world needs to know about. But there are so many women. I had a list of like 20 that I could have given.

59:59Victoria:It's a really hard question. That's why I give it to you in advance because...

1:00:03Lily Shimbashi:Yeah. I was thinking like just stay in football, but if we got other sports, like I could give you 2000.

1:00:10Victoria:Right. Right. Yeah. Cause they're all out there. So hopefully if we do one to two, every episode will at least over time, build up a couple hundred and get the girls out there.

1:00:19Lily Shimbashi:Totally. I love it.

1:00:21Victoria:Wow. Well, Lily, thank you so much for coming on, on the game. This has been an absolute pleasure. I'm so grateful that you're here and can't wait for the girls to hear this episode.

1:00:29Lily Shimbashi:Thank you. I could have yapped for hours, honestly.

1:00:31Victoria:Yeah. All right. See you later. Thank you so much for listening to the game and being a part of our community. If you want to follow along, head to our all girls group chat on a sub stack at the game, the podcast dot sub stack.com. You can follow us on Instagram and tick tock at the game, the podcast. You can follow me at Hey, Victoria Henderson on both Instagram and tick tock on Instagram, lilyislily.bets. And obviously you can find her over at sports-ish on Instagram and on Substack as well. We are so glad to have you here. If you haven't yet, make sure you like and subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode from us.

1:01:14Victoria:Thanks for being here. The game's on every Wednesday over the off season of the NFL. Love you. Bye.

1:01:25Lily Shimbashi:You a patty, baby.

1:01:26Victoria:You gotta own it on a style in your grace. You better own it on.