INDIANAPOLIS — For any small business, getting a call from the Indiana Pacers means big business — at least that’s what the staff at Sweet Escape Cake Company was expecting when it took a call from a person it thought was a Pacers executive.
“On Monday, Dean Heaviland reached out to us, or what seemed to be Dean Heaviland reached out to us, and said ‘Hey, Game 4 is Friday, we have a booth opening up for you guys. We have a slot if you guys want to take that, totally fine. If not, don’t worry about it,’” said Styles McCorkle, a Sweet Escape staffer.
Sweet Escape has done work for the Pacers, Fever and Indianapolis Colts. So, getting an email from Dean Heaviland — the Vice President of Operations for Pacers Sports and Entertainment — was not out of the ordinary. The offer this time was to have a vendor booth at Game 4 of the NBA Finals. The cost for the spot was just 400 dollars.
“So, we were super excited for an opportunity like this,” McCorkle said. “So next day, we take that opportunity and decide we are going to go through with it, paid our invoice for the spot and everything, nothing was too inconvenient.”
On what is already a busy week for Father’s Day orders, the staff at the family-owned Sweet Escape called in extra hands. McCorkle, who does a bit of everything inside the shop, said the business made hundreds Pacers-themed treats.
Between labor and supplies, $4,000 worth of work went into getting ready for a big night at Game 4. But when Sweet Escape staff emailed the Pacers back to find out where its booth would be, the email bounced back. Sweet Escape had been scammed by someone pretending to be Dean Heaviland from the Pacers.
“I came into work the next day, I was devastated,” McCorkle said. “Like we were really excited to have this opportunity to put our face out there and be in front of Gainbridge Fieldhouse.”
What would have been thousands of dollars wasted was put to good use. When the real Pacers executives found out about what happened, they stepped in and bought all of the products that were made for Game 4.
“It gives me goosebumps because when my dad told me the next day, ‘Hey, by the way, I just got off the phone, Megan said they are going to buy everything,’ it was like a weight lifted off the chest and none of it was in vain,” McCorkle said. “We even got refunded for our initial deposit so, it was only gain.”
The Pacers are one of the two most-talked-about basketball teams in the world right now, and even as everyone has all eyes on Gainbridge Fieldhouse, the Pacers haven’t gotten too big to remember the mom and pop cake company on South Meridian Street.
“An organization as big as the Pacers to care about a small business like us, and have that attention, like ‘Hey we understand the situation, we like you guys already, so we are going to take this off of your hands, like whoever did the scam, thank you for that,” McCorkle said. “Like it worked out for us in the end.”