TLA25_AllPages_R

the Gerry Bertier Gymnasium and all of that,” Livesay says (Bertier was named
Defensive Most Valuable Player in the 1971 season when the Titans were 13-0,
including nine shutouts, and went on to win the Virginia State Championship).
“My dad actually did play under one of those coaches from around that time
but he would have been at the rival school across town.”
“I played mostly electric guitar back in those days” he says, while in college
“it was a lot easier to get people together with the acoustic [instruments] and
play little coffee shops and stuff like that.”
In addition to music, Livesay’s growing-up years were filled with sports,
mainly baseball and basketball.
By the time he was at Clemson, Livesay was “tracking” toward audio engineering,
“definitely one of the things I was most interested in and had a knack
for.”
At Clemson he obtained a Bachelor of Arts, Production Studies, in the
Performing Arts with a concentration in audio engineering with his minor in
business administration. However, he says, although “an audio engineering
degree is certainly a great thing to do and a fun hobby, you can’t expect to do
too, too much with that [as a career], I’ve found.”
“They really worked us in college,” he notes. “We were loading any show
that was coming in. We were building sets and pulling them off the truck and
honestly that’s not too different from what I do at the exhibit hall now” with
TCA events.
After college he worked as a media intern for an Alexandria marketing company,
RedPeg Marketing, which he says “had a big focus on touring and openings,
doing product demonstrations and setting up different social events and
tours.” There, too, “it’s funny how much cross-over I found there is” with that
job and what he does at TCA, he says, “like with the logistics of it all and getting
your teams in place. Then there’s knowing who to call and who can handle
what and just setting the plan in motion.”
Since joining the TCA team in January 2015, Livesay has discovered that the
work never ends: “You pretty much start [working on the next meeting] the
minute the previous one ends.
“There are so many different things to wrangle. You’ve got the hotel and
you’ve got your decorator for the exhibit hall to deal with; you’ve got to get
signs made and the programs made. You’ve got to do all your Web stuff and
tons of things people don’t think about” such as badges and lanyards, food
options, security measures, and on and on.
How long does it take to get to a comfortable place in planning and carrying
out the next big convention or event?
“Honestly,” he says, “for
me, I don’t think that ever
comes. I’d say once I get onsite
and everything is going I
finally allow myself to relax a
little bit.”
And scouting out a meeting
place is done far in advance.
“We usually try to get a
good idea of what the next
two or three years look like,”
he says. “You’re not necessarily
booking [the site]
but certainly you’re looking
at your options and taking
into account places where
we haven’t been recently or
maybe there are some renovations
happening” at a site
that might mean choosing a
different location. “You’ve
got to anticipate all that.”
The choice of meeting
location also has to do with
giving all members “the opportunity
to get out to a
Hunter Livesay and his sister
Lauren are shown as youngsters.
meeting,” Livesay explains. “I think Nashville was great. We hadn’t been there
in a really long time. There’s lots of tourism [opportunities] there and certainly
it’s easier for people to get excited about a place like that. We’ll also do the
[Gaylord] Palms and the Wynn [Las Vegas Resort] and I certainly think people
look forward to those types of places, as well.”
At the meetings he focuses on the exhibit hall and the location of the meeting
space and how it relates to “how far you need to walk from the general
sessions to the breakout session or going from there to get a meal. It’s all
factored in. Some of these things can certainly be a workout.”
And he really homes in on “the relationship we have with our associate
members, our sponsors and our exhibitors. I’m more the liaison with those
types of people, bringing in new sponsorship opportunities and evaluating
Q & A With Hunter Livesay
DATE AND PLACE OF BIRTH: May 7, 1991. Alexandria,
Virginia
MY TRADEMARK EXPRESSION IS: Who’s making coffee?
MOST HUMBLING EXPERIENCE: Volunteering and
helping families in coastal Mississippi rebuild after
Hurricane Katrina
PEOPLE SAY I REMIND THEM OF: My dad
I HAVE A PHOBIA OF: Spiders
MY GUILTY PLEASURE: Cartoons
THE PEOPLE I’D INVITE TO MY FANTASY DINNER
PARTY: My friends and family
MY GREATEST PROBLEM AS A PROFESSIONAL IS:
Wanting to do everything
I WOULD NEVER WEAR: Anything with a Gamecock
A GOAL I HAVE YET TO ACHIEVE: Buying a house
THE LAST BOOK I READ: “The Mysticism of Sound &
Music” by Hazrat Inayat Kahn
LAST MOVIE I SAW: “In Defense of Food” – Michael Pollan
MY FAVORITE SONG: “This Must Be the Place” by Talking Heads
IF I’VE LEARNED ONE THING IN LIFE, IT WOULD BE:
Make it happen
MY PET PEEVE: Texting in the middle of a conversation
THE THING ABOUT MY OFFICE IS: It’s next to the front
door, making me the de-facto TCA mail delivery person
ONE WORD TO SUM ME UP: Dedicated
38 Truckload Authority | www.Truckload.org TCA 2017