How to Turn Customers Into Raving Fans with Savannah Bananas Owner Jesse Cole

September 22, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

Jesse Cole, owner of the Savannah Bananas and founder of Fans First Entertainment, spent a decade running a college summer baseball team in Gastonia, North Carolina that started with $268 in the bank and 200 fans per game. That failure—and the lessons from it—became the foundation for a business that now has over 4 million people on a ticket waitlist, fills stadiums larger than the Super Bowl, and has spent exactly zero dollars on marketing since opening day in 2016. The operating system behind it is radical, not incremental.

Fans First Is Not a Slogan—It's a Decision Filter

Cole's company is named Fans First Entertainment, and he means it literally. Every decision runs through one question: "Does it make fans?" This is not about customer satisfaction surveys. It is about structural choices that most businesses would never make. When the Bananas accidentally sent a ticket offer email to 44,000 people instead of 4,000, the company issued an immediate apology and offered free tickets to any game in the country. The total cost: $6 million. "That's more money than the team brought in the first seven years," Cole says. But the fans who received that offer became fans for life. "Do you stand for making money or stand for creating fans? If you create fans, you will drive more money than you ever imagined."

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What you'll learn

1 Timestamped Outline
2 (03:01) **Jesse Cole Introduction & Origin Story** - Ed Mylett introduces Jesse Cole, owner of the Savannah Bananas, and sets up his credentials as a culture and customer experience expert
3 (05:59) **The Gastonia Failure and Savannah Launch** - The 10-year grind of learning how to get people to come to games, then the move to Savannah
4 (08:53) **Rock Bottom: Selling the House** - The moment Jesse and Emily had no options left and went all in
5 (10:43) **The All-Inclusive Ticket Strategy** - How Jesse created a frictionless fan-first experience from day one
6 (12:44) **Zero Marketing Spend Since Opening Day** - The experience itself became the only marketing engine
7 (16:29) **Fans First Philosophy: Customers vs. Fans** - The core operating principle that drives every decision

+ Full timestamped outline available in the app

Show Notes

Customers come and go. Fans will drive 40 hours just to be in the room with you.

I've wanted Jesse Cole on this show for a long time, and this conversation went further than I hoped. More than 4 million people are on a waitlist for a ticket to one of his games. He's drawn crowds bigger than the Super Bowl. And he's done it by obsessing over the thing I believe matters most as AI moves into every business: how people feel when they deal with you.

This was not an overnight success. Jesse's pro baseball dream ended with a torn shoulder. He spent ten years running a team almost nobody came to see. Then he and his wife, Emily, bet everything on a college summer team in Savannah, and in the first three months, they sold two tickets. What happened next became the Banana Ball Championship League and one of the great American business stories.

I asked him the question every entrepreneur in a hard season needs answered: why didn't you quit? I share what it felt like when my own baseball dream ended. I push back on founders who build companies just to sell them, and I explain why most big exits aren't what they look like. And I challenge Jesse on what separates great entrepreneurs: they keep improving even when everything is already working.

We finish with what Jesse and Emily are building off the field, and it may be the most powerful part of the whole conversation.

Here's what you'll gain from this episode:

Fans vs. Customers: Why one is transactional and the other will defend you when you make a mistake.
The Friction Question: The one question that sparked Banana Ball, and how it applies to a realtor, a dry cleaner, or any business.
Attention Beats Marketing: Why Jesse hasn't spent a dollar on marketing since opening night, and what he does instead.
The Energy List: How Jesse found what fuels him, and why it changed the way he shows up as a leader and a dad.
Lessons from Walt Disney: Two principles Jesse built his company on, including the one that explains why he won't sell.
Learn, Change, Plus: The nightly habit that keeps a sold-out business from ever getting comfortable.

Two tickets in three months. That's where this started. Whatever season you're in right now, get to the next day, then the next one. You are much closer to your dreams than you realize.

Apply for up to $500,000 in same day business funding in under 3 minutes at Cardiff.co/ED

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