That’s right. We’re on a business trip to the Big Apple so that we can obtain updates for Drowning Pool, U2 and Green Day. But even though we’re miles away from Pollstar.com headquarters, it doesn’t mean that we can’t highlight the new tours, like the ones we posted for Social Distortion and The Epoxies. After all, thanks to the technology of the new millennium, the office is wherever we want it to be, and a desk, four walls and a zip code are sooo 20th century.

But technology has always been the Pollstar.com story, our secret to success, so to speak. Even way back in 1931 when Festus Pollstar started the little tour date company that bears his name, he realized that machinery held the key to a successful Internet company. “People may come and go. Employees will quit or pass away,” wrote Ol’ Festus shortly before he was carried away for a series of treatments that laid the groundwork for electroshock therapy, “but you can put your trust in machines.”

And therein lies the success story behind Pollstar.com. For over 70 years, management has made Festus’ dreams of building a concert-info empire into a reality by spending every hard-earned cent made from posting dates for acts like the Doves and John Mellencamp back into the company in the form of new technology. For it was our founder’s philosophy that money saved on business comforts such as secretaries, health plans and modern plumbing could be better spent on keeping up with the latest technological wonders available.

Oh, sure, they all laughed at Festus. IBM, Boeing, Hooters – all those successful companies pointed their fingers and laughed their hardy laughs at Festus as he went about scrimping and saving when it came to his employees’ needs. But dollar upon dollar spent on gears, pulleys, transistors and cattle prods proved Festus right over the years as technology set the pace while Pollstar.com grew into the mega-corporation known throughout the world for disseminating vital tour information like Jewel playing in Denver on June 15.

Of course, such a business philosophy takes a little getting used to, for unlike the other companies in the Fortune Top Ten, we don’t spend our profits on needless employee comforts. Take this business trip, for example. No first-class airline comforts for us when coach will do. No need for a rental car when you have two good feet to carry you to those important meetings, and no four-star hotels when park benches are still free. For just like when Festus used to wander the streets of Fresno ranting about dates for Bing Crosby and Rudy Vallee, we still operate a lean, mean tour-date machine, and business perks like the extra leg room found on first class flights, as well as balanced meals and hotel rooms with hot water for showers while traveling on the company’s dime are strictly verboten.

Instead, we put our money into bringing you dates for Judy Collins, Moby and Santana, not costly extras like heating in the winter and AC in the summertime. We may freeze, we may sweat, heck, we may even stink, but you, the Pollstar.com user, can access dates for Built To Spill and Gang Of Four confident in the knowledge that all our profits are on the screen in front of you, and nary a dime has been spent on unneeded luxuries like indoor plumbing or non-recyclable toilet paper.

However, all this cost-cutting, skimping and cash hoarding so that we can spend all our money on the latest in technology does have some drawbacks. This flight we’re on, for instance. Sure, we can handle flying coach from Fresno to New York. We can handle having our knees jammed up below our chins as we pound out dates for George Benson and Jack Johnson on our laptop. Heck, we can even handle the horrible peanuts and the hideous coffee served on these flights. After all, we work for Pollstar.com and we’re used to all that.

However, there is one item that we wish the company would splurge on when it comes to these business flights. Especially when we reach our destination.

You see, we just wish the company would spend a little more money, and buy the parachutes that come with both a main chute as well as an emergency backup. Oh, well, can’t talk now, for we can see the Empire State Building fast approaching, and our jumpmaster has given us the GO sign. See ya, tomorrow.

Oh, and one more thing. GERONIMO!