Erika and Gary Rolf, who lived on the Alaskan frontier before buying a house in Seward without previously stepping foot inside, are obviously no strangers to leaps of faith.
These whimsical jumps have fueled their lives, not to mention an undeniable entrepreneurial spirit.
That spirit was on display Saturday, at the entrance to Pinnacle Bank Arena parking lot No. 18, where they made their Husker football debut selling Nebraska's Best Kettle Corn, a brand they created more than a year ago.
They referred to Saturday as an experiment, a wait-and-see endeavor, but there are few products that seem more like a slam dunk than kettle corn — Nebraska's Best, mind you — at a Husker game.
Consider this local couple is using state-grown corn, their own "secret" recipe and selling it before the state's franchise team — the Cornhuskers, no less — takes the field.
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Has there ever been a more perfect scenario?Â
"You never know," Gary says with a wry smile and a shrug.
Oh, he knows. And so does his wife.
"I think we will be here forever on gamedays," she says.
What started off as a hobby for Gary, a retired U.S. Air Force pilot who now is a compliance officer with Cattle Bank and Trust, is starting to have the look of so much more.
This little adventure began when Erika and her sisters bought an RV, stripped the inside and equipped it with women's clothing that they would take to fairs and festivals. Gary would tag along on the weekend jaunts to help the women set up, then found himself bored out of his mind.
"I couldn't do anything to help them," he said. "I was just in the way."
To pass the time, he would walk around the fairs. On one occasion, he noticed a man selling — you guessed it — kettle corn. He was struggling to keep up with all of the business that was coming his way.
"He was flailing," he said. "It was terrible watching him. I thought, I can do better than that and it would give me something to do while I was here. So I bought this just to tag along with my wife and her sisters."
Originally, the plan was to buy a tent and a kettle maker, but when he called an in-state popcorn supplier, Thomas Johnson, the farmer in Hastings offered to sell him his business — a trailer, kettle maker and names of the businesses between Lincoln and York that would carry his product.Â
And with some grit, hustle and the so-called "secret" recipe — "It's all about the ratio of corn, salt and sugar," Erika says — Nebraska's Best immediately became more than a turn-key business.
The corn itself, a mushroom popcorn that pops bigger and more plump, sets the new brand apart. Erika researched it a few years ago while making something called Glacier Corn — a recipe she brought with her from Alaska — for the holidays.
"It has a better surface area," she said. "It pops a big kernel and it holds your toppings better."
This is not exactly the restaurant Gary envisions someday opening. In his dream of dreams, his restaurant would be called Pup's, an homage to his Air Force nickname, because it was often joked that his last name sounded like a dog barking. Pup's would be a retro 1950s joint with lots of neon, a jukebox and enough personality to spark a revival of the teenage malt shop experience.
Unfortunately, Erika, a former middle school math and science teacher, wants no part of the restaurant industry. She has no intention of working a flat-top stove or being a soda jerk well into her golden (and graying) years.Â
Kettle corn is the compromise. It scratches the entrepreneurial itch without causing a full-scale rash.Â
"If this helps us to put our kids through college, it's a great thing," said Erika, who looks at the kettle corn business as one more ball to be juggled in a three-ring life that she embraces. "My life is a circus and they are my monkeys."Â
Saturday, they planned on making up between 50 and 60 pounds of popped corn. And if all went perfectly, they would walk away with as much as $800 in profit, which would set them up for a return engagement at lot No. 18, which leads into Pinnacle Bank Arena, for the Sept. 29 game against Purdue.
"It’s you’re here once, you’d better be here every week," Gary said. "People are creatures of habit. There might be a handful of people who are looking for it next week. They get disappointed if it’s not there. You have to be consistent.
"Once you’re here, you have to keep coming back."