Thomas chuckled, but he remained reserved. “Now, you know you’re stereotyping a little bit there, Ivan. Some of us black folks still like a nice time out without all that funk and sweat.”

Ivan stopped and thought. He said, “You know what, you’re right. We do like nice affairs. So when I do a ballroom event for fifty dollars a plate and invite Jesse Jackson to speak, then I’ll promote it that way. But for a bar on the southeast end, this is how you promote it.”

Thomas looked at Ivan and asked him, “So, when did you become an expert on parties, after one damn event, Ivan?”

Ivan had to laugh at the audacity of it himself. After scoring just one lucky touchdown, the rookie receiver was already speaking as if he had been to five football Pro Bowls in Hawaii.

He said, “All right, you got me on that. I’m not the expert yet. I’m just following my gut on this. I’ve been around black people and enough parties to know a li’l something. I mean, I’m from LA, and my older brother partied hard all the time. So I guess I just picked up on a few things that I never had a chance to use before,” he explained.

Henry Morgan walked into the offices in the middle of their conversation and picked up one of the flyers to look at for himself.

“Hey, fellas,” he addressed them both with a nod. “So, this is your new event, Ivan?”

“Yeah. What do you think about that flyer?” Thomas asked him.

Henry studied it in detail before he answered. “It looks like it fits the audience.”

“And what audience is that?” Thomas questioned.

“You know, that Friday night, boogie-woogie-woogie crowd,” Henry answered. He even did a dance move with it.

Ivan broke out laughing. He said, “I’m trying to tell him, Henry. That’s the crowd that do their thing at bars.”

Thomas stopped the clowning. “Well, here’s my thing, Ivan: what crowd do you want to be known for? That’s the more important question.”

It was a good question, too. Ivan approached it from a different angle. He said, “The way I look at it, I want to have enough of a following for I.D. Promotions where I can promote different events to different crowds. My goal is to have three parties for three different crowds on the same night.”

The bigger ideas of Jeff and Paul were beginning to rub off on him.

Henry looked at Thomas and said, “Whoa, the man got big ideas. But I think it can be done. Especially how you have your website set up. You got it set up to appeal to a lot of different people.”