For our 23rd episode, President & Chief Strategy Officer Ethan Whitehill chats with George Guastello, President and CEO of Union Station Kansas City, about maintaining the visual voice of our town, playing host to Princess Diana and Walt Disney, and why all roads (and tracks) lead back to Union Station.

Ethan Whitehill: Hi everyone. I’m Ethan Whitehill, president and Chief Strategy Officer of Crux, the un-agency. Welcome to episode number 23 of To the Point. We produce this monthly podcast to bring you thought-provoking conversations that get to the crux of it and to help entrepreneurial brands fuel growth. Today’s guest is George Costello. George has been president and CEO of Union Station, Kansas City, since 2008, and has spent more than 30 years in leadership roles with the region’s most iconic institutions, including the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce, Starlight Theater, and the American Royal. In the last 15 years, under his guidance, millions of guests have gathered for celebrations of all kinds at Union Station, from international exhibition successes like Auschwitz. Not Long Ago. Not Far Away. that welcomed more than 318,000 guests from all 50 states and more than 10 countries to a World Series and two Super Bowl parade celebrations to hosting the NFL draft. George’s hands-on efforts have left a lasting legacy on Union Station and the Kansas City community. George, it’s truly a pleasure to have you on the podcast today. 

George Guastello: Well, thank you so much. I think we’ll have a great time and we’ll learn a little bit. 

Ethan Whitehill: You’ve had a very interesting journey throughout Kansas City that all seems to have led to that moment 15 years ago when you were invited to join Union Station. Tell our listeners about that path. 

George Guastello: I’ve had a unique career, and I’m not gonna bore you with it, but I think as you said, all roads lead to Union Station and in my life, many people have helped me get on the right rail to have a great career. So I have the greatest job in Kansas City because I work for my passion and my passion is my work. And so I’m pretty blessed. Kansas City, born and raised, went to school here, went to UMKC, got my undergraduate and graduate, my very first job out of graduate school. I was a commercial lender at Commerce Bank, so I had the great opportunity to work for the campers who had a history and an engagement with Kansas City. So I had a great opportunity to be there for almost six years to learn all about Kansas City businesses and understand the business side of Kansas City and the history. 

But while I was there, I realized in my early twenties, I really don’t want to be an order taker. You know, I really want to be an entrepreneur and use my marketing background because I had an MB in finance and an undergraduate in marketing. How can I help non-for-profits be run like businesses, you know, serve your customer and have a way to ensure that you can be self-sustaining. So the bank gave me that opportunity and then I started to look out. All of a sudden there was an opening at the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce. And a gentleman by the name of Pete Levy was just getting ready to go there because the chamber was falling apart at a time they needed to reimagine themselves. And I’ve always been an entrepreneurial person. So Pete gave me the opportunity to join him and I was there for almost 10 years. 

We created all of our small business entrepreneurial programs, our seminar programs, and we built a for-profit entity that helped support the chamber. Had a great run there. And at the very end I was doing the annual dinners, and at that time was the last annual dinner that we wanted to be in charge of small business. And this was the first time a small business chair was gonna take over the chamber. It was a great accomplishment and we wanted to do something really big and exciting, and we reached out to Starlight. Then Bob Roth – God rest his soul, he just passed away – he said, “What would be the possibility Starlight could assist us in our annual meeting”? So we hired Cirque du Soleil, and we did this big three Ring Circus at Bartle Hall. 

And the reason why we did that was because at the time, if you remember, Walmart used to have their big convention here. And it moved out of town and everybody in the community said Bartle Hall was horrible. Why would you ever do an event there? We’ll never have a convention. Kansas City’s gonna fall apart. So I love a challenge. So we worked with then-Mayor Cleaver and we built the largest annual dinner, 2,500 people on a big show. But the purpose of it was to tell Kansas City that Bartle Hall was not a horrible experience and let’s make this successful. So we did that. And while on the way [there were] many people on the chamber board that I got a chance to learn from and lead, and one of those was a gentleman by the name of Jerry Cohen. And many people don’t know Jerry, but Jerry was a great philanthropist. 

Or you may know him because it’s the Jeanette and Jerome Corman stage at Starlight Theater. And he was the Kansas Citian of the Year that was given to him by Crosby Kemper; all the dots connect. We did the show. And then after that I got a phone call from Bob Rolfe and said, “I think you really want to be in in Broadway.” He said, “We’re getting ready to build a new theater at Starlight.” And he said, “Would you like to come and be a part of it?” So I said, sure. And I had to tell Pete Levy, after 10 years, it’s time for me to move on. So I did. I went to Starlight Theater, then I had a chance to really learn all about Broadway. We built the Broadway Theater; we landed a helicopter for Miss Saigon and developed a great relationship. 

And that was my theatrical learning business. Civic, theatrical, bigger than life. And so we did that and I was there about three years and, to build a new stage, we opened it up and I was getting ready to go to New York as we were working. So I had a chance to go to New York and the day before I could go to New York, it was 9/11. This was 9/10. So I never got to New York to help that process and to look at the opportunities that were there. And then two weeks later, we had a chance to go to Boston for a theater league program where we would select different theaters with producers. 

And on that night, if you remember, it was anthrax. I was in a cab driving to see a show that was getting ready to go to Broadway that was opening that night during a pandemic in a historic Broadway theater. And that was Mama Mia. So we saw that, and then I went back to the conference and I got a phone call and the phone call was from Pete Lemke. Then the last chairman and small businessperson at the chamber who had a research firm and said, “I have this opportunity for you. You’ve always been number two. They’re looking for a new president, [the] first paid president of the American Royal.” I said, “Wow, that’s me.” You can see I got my cowboy boots on. I said, sure. And I thought about it and I went into the interview. I didn’t know anything about livestock horse show rodeos or barbecue, but I sure did go over to my friends at Nigro’s and they dressed me. 

So I spent six years there creating and reimagining and pulling the American Royal out of bankruptcy and fixing their problem. And that was an opportunity of a lifetime. And then my mom was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and I thought it was appropriate for me to pause. So I took a year off and spent that with my mom. And then at the end of that term, I was getting ready to get back into the world and I created my own advertising agency and I started to build small businesses. Then long story short, I was heading off to go back into the world and I was gonna become a chamber executive in Lawrence. I was driving to Lawrence, [and] I had a chance to go interview. And when I was there on my way back, I got a phone call. And the phone call was from a gentleman by the name of Lee Darrow. 

Lee was on the board at the chamber for many years. But also he was my first client at Commerce Bank where he was in charge of Worlds of Fun. At the time when I was in college, I did standup comedy at Worlds of Fun. And Lee was the guy that was running it and he never forgot it. And we had a great relationship and he said, “Union Station’s falling apart. It just hasn’t been successful. You are the guy you need to go speak with.” Mike Haverty, a gem of a Kansas City historian, the man that really saved Union Station, and Bob Rene – we had a conversation there. That was 16 years ago. I remember looking at the financials and thinking it was okay. Then I looked at the financials and I had to go back to them and said, “We can’t cut fast enough and we can’t grow fast enough to save this organization, but we will give it a try.” So, long story short, I told you every dot connects another dot. 

Ethan Whitehill: And clearly you’re not afraid of a challenge. 

George Guastello: No. No, I’m too stupid to be worried. Right. And a challenge just means you have to do the right thing for the right reasons. And that will happen. And you need to look out and always rely and call upon people that have set a seed in your life. And it’s your job to make that seed grow. 

Ethan Whitehill: So you mentioned several, what I would call iconic, places in Kansas City as you were talking. When you think of Kansas City, I think few buildings are as iconic as Union Station. In fact, in our previous conversation, I love how you referenced it as living breathing icon in its 100 plus years. Union Station has seen World War I soldiers returning home from war, infamous mobster shootouts, World Series and Super Bowl parades, countless visitors as the epicenter of transportation in Kansas City. And I could go on. How do you balance honoring that storied history while continuing to remain relevant in this crazy, fast-changing world? 

George Guastello: You know, that’s a really good question. And you left other stuff out, such as all the immigrants that started coming to Kansas City, that built Kansas City in the 1940s. How do you balance it? You stay true to it. This is Kansas City’s icon. And if I can think back many years when The Kansas City Star used to say, “We don’t have an Arch; we don’t have the Statue of Liberty.” Well, guess what? We do. And on every picture of everything is this majestic building. But it’s more than a majestic building. It means something to our community. Everybody that walks through those brass doors has a story. What we always have been is the visual voice of Kansas City. Very rarely does a building evoke emotion because it’s the emotion inside the building that sends it out to the rest of the community. And that’s what we do. And we take that brand very seriously. So everything old is new again, everything is different, but everything is still the same. And the thing that’s the same are the people, their memories and their emotion. 

Ethan Whitehill: And kind of taking that idea of a story arc. Union Station is again what it was. It’s a real hub of activity in Kansas City now. I think about it as an entertainment district of sorts with shops, a movie theater, a planetarium, Science City. We have civic organizations like our friends at the Chamber located in Union Station. And I know this mix is not by accident. I know this is something that your team has designed and supported and facilitated. Talk about that a little. 

George Guastello: That’s a really good question. And I kinda said, everything old is new again. We are almost exactly what we were some 110 years ago. Only thing we don’t have is a police station, we don’t have a morgue, we don’t have a hospital, but we do have restaurants and businesses and the center of entertainment. So we just morphed into what our community is today. The way we got out of the challenges that we looked at, we said, “How can we make this the place? Wouldn’t this be great if we had parades? Wouldn’t this be great if this is the place where Kansas City celebrates?” And so we said, “How do we create that [and] stay true to the strategy of a science center?” And what we figured out was that we could be that, but we had to have other things to happen. 

So we had nearly 150,000 square feet of office space. That was the brilliance of our team to say, “Let’s put civic organizations in there.” So the first thing I did when I heard about it was I worked for the Chamber. I heard the Chamber wanted to move. So we went out and tried to promote that. Said this is the place where the Chamber is. What do you want on your business card? You want 911 Main, or do you want this icon as your home? And we convinced them along with the Kansas City Area Development Council. We wanted every businessperson to come here for every business meeting to see and experience it. So when any major corporation was trying to come to Kansas City, you come to this place of beauty. And we did that. We got the election board in because every time they go on television to report the election, it’d be at Union Station; every time the governor would come in at the chamber, at Union Station, you start to build the story and then you build the image. But at the same time, you’re paddling like heck underneath to ensure that the attractions are successful. 

Ethan Whitehill: Let’s talk about the attractions. You’ve done a fantastic job with that sort of permanent placemaking for those institutions and organizations that call Union Station home. But now you also have these exhibits on, I don’t wanna say a short-term basis, but a more temporary basis. So talk about why that’s important, and what does that mean to the experience in Union Station as a whole? 

George Guastello: When I had the fortunate opportunity to take over, there was this image that it was a failure. It was a waste of tax dollars. What a waste. Well, we don’t receive any state, federal, or local money in order to operate Union Station. 90% of our operating income is from earned income. I’m only beholden to my customers and to ensure that they have the greatest experience. And then that elevates the image of the Station. When we came and began that strategic plan in basic bankruptcy, we developed this very focused strategic plan. Consider it a three-legged stool. One of the legs was rental income from all of the different restaurants and coffee shops. We get a percentage of that. So the more people that come in, more money that comes stays at the Station. The greater these iconic experiences for Kansas City, and not one tax dollar has come to us for standing operating procedures in 15 years. 

And I don’t think there’s many people that can say that. But first one is rental income, second one is attractions. That’s Science City, the movies, our live theater, our planetarium. And then the last one are touring exhibitions. That big story, the big exhibitions that bring recognition to Kansas City. You got Auschwitz; you got Disney, you had Princess Diana’s clothes and her dress. Now I want you to think about where’s the money gonna come to put a million-dollar rehab on the roof? Where’s the $450,000 gonna come to pave the front? Well, what we did was we set up a strategy that we ran the business on two legs of the stool. If the third leg of the stool was successful, we plan to break even. But we have a known zero in our budget. So when we do really great, all that money goes back into the business of the preservation of the building. 

Ethan Whitehill: You talked about how you sort of promote the exhibits by merchandising them on that corner. I want to come back to that. But before I go there, you’ve done an amazing job attracting these exhibits, bringing them into Union Station. How do you do that? 

George Guastello: I learned several years ago, through the days of Starlight or the American Royal, I used to have to go out and book acts for many years at the American Royal. I had to figure out what the hottest country act was. So I got Keith Urban after rehab at a really cheap price. And it took off for our rodeos to sell tickets. Same way at Starlight. You had to negotiate with touring exhibitions and you had to convince them that Kansas City wasn’t just good enough, but it was the place. And then you have to deliver on that. So when we did that with Diana, we went and we connected to different touring development folks. When we did that, that created a huge long-term relationship. There was a company called AEG in Kansas City. 

Well, AEG that ran the Sprint Center had this little arm. It was a touring exhibition arm. Then Deb, who ran Sprint Center said, “Hey, I saw they’re doing this exhibit called Diana.” I said, “We’d love it. How can I do that?” So we set it all up and then they went back and they agreed to bring Diana in here. But no one knew why. The why was there was a son, and the son was gonna get married. And I wanted the exhibition in Kansas City for the publicity. And we got it. And we had 30 days to put it on sale. It was one of the most financially successful exhibits in the station’s history because it took us off on media hype. Everybody came down to film the stuff about Diana. And on the day of the wedding, we told everyone, this is the people’s princess in the people’s house of Kansas City. 

We want everybody to be able to experience it. So from midnight till five o’clock in the morning, Kansas City time, right before the wedding starts, the tickets are free. And people came out in the middle of the night and lined up. It was huge. It was a big success. That started the opportunity to build that relationship with corporations and with touring exhibitions. I spent time going to Europe and around the world to find the exhibitions to build that relationship 1-on-1 because what I want them to do is say, “Kansas City’s got it. We like the Station. We see the grandeur that they can market and we wanna do business with them.” Instead of saying, “well we gotta take it to Chicago or New York or LA.” 

The thing that’s different is it costs you huge amounts of money to buy billboards and stuff like that. But in Kansas City it’s more cost-effective. And if you’re a good marketer, they’re only interested in making money. We can make them money and we can keep money here in Kansas City. And that’s how it is. So that’s how I found Auschwitz at a conference with a gentleman who had an idea in a corner. His name was Luis Fierro. Nobody really wanted to talk to him. And I said, “I’ve heard good things about you and I’m impressed with this story because this is the first story of Auschwitz that didn’t talk about the horrific pictures you saw.” You play a horrific movie in your mind. But we wanted to tell the story of the artifacts and the people and we developed a relationship. We talked about it and we landed it. Well that was pretty risky. We’re always on the edge. I want you to think about doing an Auschwitz exhibition in a community with antisemitic hatred years before. Then 50,000 people from all states and 10 countries came to Kansas City. That’s the story. And you can’t tell the story unless you connect all those dots. 

Ethan Whitehill: So we talked a lot about the past. Let’s talk about the future of Union Station. 

George Guastello: There’s many things on the horizon. We have FIFA coming and how that happens and what happens when everyone comes. I’m working diligently to ensure that I have an exhibition that welcomes people to Kansas City. We’re still [bringing] 400,000 people in Science City. We have a new exhibit show. We went out a few years ago with Burns and McDonald, [and I] thank them immensely. So we looked at the reimagination of Science City. So we spent almost $15 million over the last few years in Science City. And we looked at it and changed it. So each area of Science City is tied to a strategic plan. Energy, which is a primary business in Kansas City, engineering and architecture, another monstrous building, human health and animal health. Another one is entrepreneurship or Maker Studio. That’s what we have built Science City to be, to be relevant to the kids. 

But when we started this project, we always said, if you’re gonna stay customer-focused, and you have to be customer-focused, you should always ask yourself what do your customers want? When do they want it? Where do they want it? And at what cost? If you can answer all of those questions, you’ll be successful. So we go out with Burns and McDonald and we ask the customer, which are the students, to create the next exhibition in Science City, which is called Battle of the Brains. We have 800 students in schools that compete to create the next exhibition. So each year, Burns and McDonald, we select one school’s idea. Burns says, “Okay, it’s a great idea. We’ll give the school $50,000.” And then we agree that we will spend $1 million to bring those students’ ideas to reality. Now that’s living your passion and that’s what’s made it happen. 

So now when kids come, they say, I did that. A lot of people don’t know that’s really happening inside Science City. And that’s our mission. [We’re] on the hunt for some big ones. I hope they’ll come to reality. But you never know if they’re gonna be big or not. The movies are back, so right now, because we have the Disney exhibition, Disney allowed us to open up their vaults. So we are playing all the old classics that you could only see on your DVDs or on Disney Plus or not at all. So there’s always something happening. There’s always something new and creative and it’s really exhausting. As you can tell. 

Ethan Whitehill: Well, George, if Union Station is the beating heart of Kansas City, I think it’s very clear you’re the beating heart of Union Station. 

George Guastello: Oh, that’s very kind of you to say. You got a great team. 

Ethan Whitehill: And I’m just grateful because for those who’ve been to our offices, they know that we look out across Washington Park and there’s the beauty of Union Station, right there in front of us. 

George Guastello: Who knows what will happen next, but it’ll be the right thing for the right reasons, because we listen to our customers and we open our hearts to our community. That’s the most important. 

Ethan Whitehill: So I wanna shift gears with my secret question. So I prepared you a little bit. I’m gonna roll my 20 sided die. And we have a 13. I think is gonna be good. I think you’re gonna have a good answer for that. That’s what I hope. So, especially with all your tales, what is your favorite urban legend that you believe is true?

George Guastello: Favorite urban legend that is true? I can tell you an urban legend that’s not true. 

Ethan Whitehill: Okay, we’ll take that.  

George Guastello: Too many people believe the story says that the bullet holes are in the front of Union Station. I want you to believe that of course is where the FBAI was created by J. Edgar Hoover. But when you go back and read the redacted stories, when they came to get John Jelly Nash in there with the gunfire everywhere, if you look at the pictures and they’ve done research, all of the gunfire came from inside the car because there was one gun. And the FBI agents at the time, or there were no FBI agents, they were just federal  tax folks. They didn’t know how to operate guns. They were not allowed to have guns; connect the dots.  

Ethan Whitehill: Hmm. All right. I love it. There you go. That was a doozy. Thank you for that. 

George Guastello: And it was the worst terrorist attack on American soil at the time. And if it wasn’t for that, we wouldn’t have the FBI. 

Ethan Whitehill: We had the privilege of doing the FBI Citizens Academy. Yeah. And they told me that story, but they didn’t give me that angle on it. So 

George Guastello: They didn’t give that angle because they didn’t let you see the redacted documents that just recently came. Hopefully I gave you a good story. 

Ethan Whitehill: George. Thank you again. And how can listeners connect with you or learn more about what’s going on at Union Station? 

George Guastello: Unionstation.org is our website; follow us on social media. We have a very powerful social media that listens to the community and it is also an area where people can share their thoughts and their opinions and their memories. So go to our Facebook page or Instagram. It’s a great way. Or just come down and get a cup of coffee at Parisi. Then you’ll see me down there with my name tag, I am a team member and I’ll talk to you. I’ll talk to anybody as long as you pay for parking. 

Ethan Whitehill: Thank you. Fantastic conversation. You’re welcome back on the show any time. I feel like we could probably have a hundred more stories if we gave you that time. 

George Guastello: It would be fun. Kansas City is a great place to live. But more importantly, it’s a great place to save and to tell those stories. And we need to tell everybody’s story. And we’re a lucky community that can do great things and have done great things. But the greatest thing is just in front of us. We’ll see it soon. Thank you. 

Hosted by Ethan Whitehill

Ethan has made a career out of building agencies and growing brands. He founded the firm Two West in 1997, running it as an independent shop for nearly 20 years before combining his firm with an AdAge Top 100 Agency, where he served as CMO. As an agency founder and entrepreneur, Ethan brings a business owner’s mindset to marketing, working on a host of diverse brands, from packaged goods and professional services to hospitality and healthcare.