The podcast Guiding Growth: Conversations with Community Leaders from the Gilbert Chamber of Commerce, event and meeting venue Modern Moments and the Gilbert Independent/yourvalley.net explores the human journey of leaders. There are stories of humility, triumph, roadblocks, and lessons learned. This partial transcript of the most recent podcast with Tiffany Shultz has been edited for brevity and clarity     

Tiffany Shultz is a seasoned professional with a diverse background and a strong commitment to her community. A graduate of Arizona State University, Shultz has called Arizona home throughout her life. Her journey began in broadcast journalism before transitioning to a successful career in public relations. 

Shultz’s professional trajectory took a turn as she shifted her focus to organizing large-scale festivals, showcasing her versatility and ability to manage diverse events. In addition to her professional accomplishments, Shultz is a wife and mother. Married for 16 years, she and her family have been residents of Gilbert since 2007.  

Shultz is the owner of "Sip & Shop," a business that has flourished under her leadership for three years. What began as a popup at SanTan Village Mall has expanded to two stores, with plans for a third location.  

Beyond her role as a business owner, Shultz actively contributes to the community in various capacities. She serves as a member of the Higley Unified School District Governing Board, highlighting her commitment to education and community development. Additionally, Shultz is involved with the Gilbert Leadership Board and is a Gilbert Leadership Class 29 graduate. 

Let's go into the beginning. Did you grow up in Arizona? I did. I've been in Mesa since I was a year old. I grew up in Mesa my whole entire life.  

And Mesa High — was there any particular events you were focused on in high school or anything like that? I played golf in high school because my dad always told me that business deals happened on the golf course. I have yet to make a business deal on the golf course. However, I did enjoy playing golf. I actually got a scholarship for golf to Scottsdale Community College. I didn't take it. I chose to work at Boeing while I was going to college because I really wanted to earn money and live on my own.  

So ASU came into the picture. How did that happen then? I was working at Boeing. I decided I didn't want to sit at a desk forever. I wanted to get into broadcast journalism. I actually started at NAU, and back then, Channel 12 had a station, 2 News, Channel 2 News, they broadcast for Northern Arizona. And so I went to school at NAU at first for a couple of years. I decided I wanted to go to the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism. I wanted to intern at bigger stations down here. So I left and came to ASU I interned at Channel 10. I got my degree in political science and mass communication, and now I'm a member of the school board. 

I loved working in broadcast journalism. I worked as a producer for Channel 10 for a long time. I wanted to start in a smaller market and work my way up on air. However, I sort of chose my long-term boyfriend who became my husband at the time instead of moving out of state. 

How do you translate from or transition from broadcast journalism into public relations? It's a natural transition. Really many, many people that have been in broadcast journalism, media, so forth, then they transfer into public relations. I was pregnant with my daughter at the time. I didn't want to work at one o'clock in the morning. I didn't want to work Christmas and Easter. My husband works for the fire department. I saw our children with nobody on Christmas morning. I didn't want to do that, and an opportunity came along, and I took it to be a public relations account executive.  

After this particular part of your life, where are you going from there? I had a new baby and, no fault of my employer’s at the time because he was very successful and it was a small business, but he wanted me to go back to work right away. So when I hear about people that get 12 weeks of maternity, I'm envious because my employer at the time wanted me to go back to work the next day. 

So I was booking clients while I was actually in the hospital. It didn't work for me as far as what I wanted to do. I wanted to be able to be there for my kids. I still wanted to have a career. So I ended up branching off with someone, another person, and starting my own agency.  

I'm curious, if you can go back to that point in time where you have to make that decision, like do I give up a safe job and a career and go start something? Any regrets on that? This might sound cliche but you only have one life, and as far as being able to take that leap and go for it, I'm really happy that I did. I'm really happy for the things that I've been able to do on my own and also with the help of other people and to make my own path.  So as long as I can continue to move forward, then I think I'm always learning.  

Then the boutiques, this kind of happened now as well, right? Like when did this start? There's a little bit in the middle there where I was doing PR and marketing and then I started doing all these festivals, doing the PR marketing for the festivals. And I thought I want to do my own festivals. So I started producing festivals like Bacon Blues and Brews, Chandler Craft Spirits Festival. I did a festival called Messy Fest. We had food fights and shaving cream. I've done the PR for a barbecue festival. And currently I do Vintage and Vino, which I still have. But 2020, we couldn't do festivals anymore. It was March, and I had a brunch festival coming up that I was supposed to do in downtown Phoenix. And we thought, “OK, we'll push it back, we'll push it back, keep pushing it back.” It was either collect unemployment for a period of time or figure out what I'm going to do. That was a very scary time.  

Santan Village mall approached me about doing a six-week popup. I had done a smaller event in June with them. When the cities and towns in 2020 wouldn't let me do anything on their property, they let me do a little small event there in June of 2020. So they approached me about taking over the old Disney store. Disney had moved out and doing from November to the end of December, a store with a bunch of my vendors who were at my markets and festivals who didn't have a place to go as well. 

And I thought, “OK, let's try this. What do I really have to lose at this point?” And so, six weeks we thought, everyone came to me, all of the other small businesses in the store and said, “Can we stay? We want to continue this.” And then I said, “OK, I'll sign another six months” and then I signed a year, and then we just celebrated three years. So it was something that I never knew I wanted and that I love doing now.  

While you balance all of this, you also serve on a school board, and I'm curious where you find the inspiration to be involved so heavily in education and why that's important to you. Public education is extremely important to me. I believe in it. I do not want to see public education go away. I think in Arizona we have a lot going on, and I'm afraid that it will go away, and I want to be there to support it and support our teachers. I believe in our teachers and the programs, and being a part of Higley school district, I'm also doing it for my girls. I want to be there for them, and I want them to have a great district that has different opportunities for them too. 

What lessons have you learned about yourself or about the community in that time? So it is a difficult time for me to not always say what I feel. And I struggle with that every day in my life. I do it, and I don't want to, but I want to be respectful of everybody. I do feel there's a lot of outside noise trying to affect our school districts and public education and what our great teachers are doing because every day they're doing amazing things. There's amazing programs in our district. And so I've also learned listening, I think and just listening to different, more and more different points of view, and trying to understand where people come from and be more sympathetic of that. 

I've learned a lot about the district. I've also learned that what I thought I was going to be doing on the school board is not necessarily what I've been allowed to do or what we do do. I love supporting the district. I think so often we take positions like that or the work that's done within an organization at surface level, and it's not until you're in that seat that you really understand all of the decision-making and all of the investment and sacrifice that goes into running an organization — any organization, but especially school district — and the things that teachers face every day. We probably can't imagine half of them. They deal with a lot, and they deal with a lot of different personalities. They want the best for their kid, but that's a lot of different voices that teachers have to deal with at the same time.