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45 B C B U S I N E S S . C A M A R C H 2 0 24 Illu s t r a t i o n s : i S t o c k / m s a n10 To understand the story of Optimal Planning Solutions, you have to go back to the late 1990s. Rick Stone, the company's founder and president, was working on building sched- ules for the manufacturing industry. As an avid sports fan, he couldn't help but think he could turn that personal passion into a professional pursuit. He started developing sports scheduling software as a side hustle. The resulting business, Optimal, quickly started working with a few minor leagues. At the time, the leagues didn't have spe- cialized scheduling tools. Schedules would be built on whiteboards in meeting rooms or, famously, in the case of the MLB, by a Game on How Optimal Planning Solutions makes matchups for the NFL, MLB and MLS work The Innovators The NFL is one of the most-watched sports leagues in the world. It creates billions of dollars for the U.S. economy. Its games are highly coveted events for television advertisers and fans alike (even if you're just tuning in to catch a glimpse of Taylor Swift). Its schedule is a high-stakes labyrinth: 32 teams play 17 games a year between Septem- ber and January, not including playoffs. There are millions of dollars at stake in each game. And a Vancouver company puts it all together. married couple at their kitchen table. The last thing they would want to do, acknowl- edges Stone, was put the schedule together. But thanks to what started as that side hustle, sports leagues suddenly had some- thing that made the process borderline appealing. Knowing he had an elite pros- pect, Stone worked to get his company pro- moted to the big leagues. He recalls parsing over NFL press items around schedule release time. Eventually, he found the name of the mastermind behind its game calendar. A call to the NFL switchboard eventually led to an answering machine. A few months later, Stone was on the horn with a league executive. To this day, cold outreach and word-of- mouth remain the company's go-to acqui- sition tactics. "We know who our target audience is," says Stone. "It's a lot easier for us to find them than it is for them to find us." It's certainly working. In addition to the NFL, Optimal has around 25 leagues on its roster, including Major and Minor League Baseball, Major League Soccer, the National Women's Soccer League and the Australian Football League.