NEW! Agency Spotlight Article for Campus Activities Magazine:

Wally's World Entertainment is an outstanding example of a boutique agency that is small enough to really care about and be connected with their customers but still large enough to accommodate their entertainment needs.
As one of the most value-oriented music agencies out there, Wally's World has a unique entertainer to match just about any genre of music your students might like to see, or any that you would like them to see for that matter.

"We are a music specific agency that was founded in 1997," says Kelly "House" Junker. "Wally personally has been involved in campus activities for 30 years this year, dating back to his days in the Red Willow Band in South Dakota. Since then, he has worked with various agencies, but has always been involved with this industry and this market in some capacity."

The focus of the roster of Wally's World Entertainment is generally on coffeehouse and smaller acoustic shows for various venues and colleges. "We also have a couple of bands on the roster, but the general concept is to take young and fresh artists just out of school and nurture them to help build a fan base. We have found the college market and the fans therein to be very loyal and will usually stay with an artist for life once they become a fan. It is a great way for them to build a foundation for their career."

"We sort of call ourselves a music driven agency," comments George Hornick. "I think we are one of the few agencies out there serving only colleges and handling only music, whereas many of the other entities in the marketplace handle comedy, novelty and various other forms of entertainment. I think this gives us a unique insight and specialty in what we do. We have managed to carve out quite a niche by staying true to music only, with mainly singer/songwriters."

One of the major benefits to schools in using Wally's World Entertainment for music purchases is that they are able to save significantly from what many other agencies offer. "That is sort of our M.O. We are able to pass the savings on to the schools when we have artists that are hungry to play as many shows as possible. Most of the people we represent are interested in playing their music, not trying to get rich. They want to do more volume because the more shows that they play, the better they get at what they do and the more they can hone their skills. That allows us to go to town so to speak on booking college shows. This allows us to keep our prices down and opens the entertainment options up to a lot of schools that otherwise couldn't afford live entertainment for their students."

Another specific skill that makes the guys at Wally's World especially adept at offering affordable entertainment options to a variety of college campuses is their incredible ability to be masters of routing. "We do a lot of routing, it's a rarity that we actually do isolated situations, or one-offs as they call them," House says. "They do happen of course, but we work really hard to route these things because it turns into a win-win. The artist gets to play more shows with less travel and the schools get a better deal."

Another aspect of keeping the shows they provide as economical as possible is the thought of providing schools more diversity in entertainment. "At the lower performance fee, we hope we can allow schools to present more than one artist throughout the semester to their students, because we understand music is so subjective. There are so many different tastes out there, whereas with something like comedy, humor is a little bit more universal.
With schools that are just starting to do music we would like to see them host more than one artist and give it a try as opposed to passing on it after one show where they might not have gotten a good turn out. Hopefully by keeping the talent cost low, we allow schools to try multiple artists throughout the year and build the program as they go along. If there is one thing most of the schools and administrators want to get out of their entertainment buying, it is for it to be a learning experience for the students while they build their programs booking these shows and figuring out what works and what doesn't. That has always been a goal here, to kind of educate through the process and help the students in all the ways we can."

BOOK IT! For more information on booking the high quality yet affordable options from Wally's World Entertainment, contact them at 800-476-0442. For virtual links and samples of media from their great artists, check out our website at www.campusactivitiesmagazine.com

Wally's World of Entertainment is a booking agency for musical artists who believe the college market is the foundation of their career. The company was founded in 1997 by Wally Saukerson, a twenty year veteran of the entertainment industry, and relationships based on honesty and mutual respect have resulted in equally great rapport with clients and performers over periods of many years of commitment and cooperation.

Wally Saukerson's involvement with NACA began in 1976 as a performer playing colleges and showcasing at the 1978 NACA National Convention. Since then he has accumulated two terms on the Associate Member Advisory Council, Regional Leadership Team member for the Upper Midwest, Heart of America, Wisconsin and is a current member of the Illiana RLT.

In 1987 Wally was presented the Founders Award and the Lifetime Membership Award by the Upper Midwest. It was also in 1987 that he left the Midwest and headed to Nashville, TN where he would spend the next ten years working at becoming a national agent. He left the William Morris Agency in 1996 to explore the feasibility of opening his own agency.

He brought with him 20 year relationships with managers, label presidents, agents, artists, and other music industry executives, convincing them that the college market is necessary for building a career foundation for their new artists. The college benefits by having the best new talent available at such low talent fees. The artist benefits by gaining exposure and building a grassroots following that stay throughout their musical career.

Today we have Wally's World of Entertainment. You may hear Wally say,"We're the Wal-Mart of college tours!" That's because the prices are low everyday, not just a few times a year. It might be funny, but Wally likes to have fun!