Ryan Middleton and Hunter Homistek dreamed of building a permanent home for their combat sports promotion business, 247 Fighting Championships — one that would aid their expansion into live concerts and performances.
They just didn’t expect things to take so long or become so expensive.
Their venue, Sunny Days Arena, is a 27,000-square-foot complex in the former Stadium 18 movie theater in North Versailles. It opened 10 months ago with a Mixed Martial Arts card headlined by UFC fighters Khama “The Death Star” Worthy and Luis “Violent Bob Ross” Peña.
The name might seem incongruous for a place hosting such fare. But it’s a simple matter of naming rights: One of their sponsors is Sunny Days, a local in-home care service for seniors.
The venue took Middleton, 48, of Upper St. Clair and Homistek, 35, of Liberty more than two years to build after it broke ground in 2023. Middleton said the arena cost several million dollars to renovate and outfit with high-tech audio and visual equipment, accounting for a decade’s worth of lease payments and loans.
Sunny Days has received largely positive feedback from performers and maintains a 4.8-star rating on Google based on 41 reviews. It has, however, yet to turn a profit.
Middleton launched 247 Fighting Championships as a solo venture in 2016. Homistek joined him after more than a decade reporting on martial arts for DK Pittsburgh Sports and Bleacher Report.
They’re learning together that running a business can be similar to surviving a cage match.
To date, Sunny Days has hosted about two dozen performances. Behind the scenes, the business partners have dealt with one challenge after another, from an eight-month delay in getting a liquor license to parting ways with their original food and beverage team.
Sunny Days continues to play to Middleton and Homistek’s passion — hand-to-hand fighting events — even as they seek a foothold in the music industry.
One of the arena’s first major events was its Jiu Jitsu tournament in October hosted by Flo Sports, the sport’s largest broadcaster, that drew about 500 spectators, Homistek said.
“We can host this multimillion-dollar company and live up to their standards, so we’ve got something here,” he said.
Men in the arena
Sunny Days’ centerpiece is a custom-built hexagonal MMA cage on the downstairs level, which can convert to a 24-by-21-foot rectangular concert stage when needed.
The downstairs setup can accommodate roughly 1,000 spectators for concerts and 1,300 for fighting events, while a smaller, 300-seat stage upstairs is tailored for more intimate musical performances and comedy shows.
The downstairs stage’s unique design was a collaboration involving Sunny Days’ in-house jack-of-all-trades, Monongahela native Josh Lemon, and 247’s longtime audio partner, Rob Thomas, a 35-year entertainment industry veteran from Pittsburgh who maintains an office in Elizabeth.
Thomas also handled Sunny Days’ complex lighting and sound systems on both stages, which he engineered to switch into different modes for combat sports or concerts. Sunny Days has more than 40 moving lights and Italian-made RCF loudspeakers operated by Midas digital mixing consoles to “energize the crowd” during fighter entrances, for example, he said.
Pittsburgh-based guitarist Byron Nash performed in front of 100 fans on Sunny Days’ upper stage with his soul-rock band, NASH.V.ILL, in April.
Nash said the venue’s dynamic lighting and crystal-clear sound system elevated the show, giving it the feel of a national touring production. “What they did really took it up a notch,” he said, noting that the band could easily hear itself over the crowd.
Sunny Days’ snack bar was still under construction when the venue opened, so Middleton and Homistek brought in food trucks to cater the early events. After splitting with the first food and beverage team in May, they are working with a consultant to start offering a basic menu of cheesesteaks, fries, chicken tenders and the like.
Finding the right pitch
Although Middleton and Homistek had never promoted a concert before opening Sunny Days, they assumed the transition would be relatively simple after navigating state regulations, licensing requirements and paperwork needed to stage MMA events with dozens of fighters.
Sunny Days’ comedy shows on the upstairs stage are even more hands-off in terms of production, since they typically require only a microphone, Homistek said.
Sunny Days’ biggest challenge with concerts has been promotion, rather than logistics. Since the venue isn’t yet a known quantity in the music industry, Middleton and Homistek have turned to pouring money into Facebook, Instagram and Google ads to drive traffic. They’ve found some recent success posting in community Facebook Groups in North Versailles, McKeesport and Murrysville, among others.
“We still talk to people all the time who say, ‘We didn’t even know you existed,’ ” Homistek said.
Sunny Days’ MMA events have 10 to 14 fights on any given card, so while audience members typically value certain fights over others, they’ll still show up for the entertainment, Homistek said.
On the other hand, a concert is essentially all-or-nothing, he said.
“It’s as if we’re having a one-fight card — you’ve gotta want to see this one fight, or else you’re not coming,” he said.
A number of local bands have helped boost Sunny Days’ reputation by heavily promoting their shows, making fanbases aware of the venue. But not all bands make that effort — a “learning lesson,” Middleton said, as they lost money on sparsely attended shows.
Things may be getting easier for Sunny Days on the promotion side, as the arena is on the brink of securing more artists from outside the Pittsburgh region that “the average Joe would know,” Homistek said.
Homistek added that, due to its sheer size, Sunny Days is better positioned in the long run to draw in big-name performers than local competitors like The Lamp Theatre in Irwin and Jergel’s Rhythm Grille in Warrendale.
“At the end of the day, we can fit more people here, and that’s going to be appealing to bigger national acts,” he said. “We’re going to fill that void.”
‘Trying to do it right’
Most of this summer’s large concerts were already booked by the time Sunny Days became fully operational, so Middleton and Homistek will have to wait until 2027 to truly take advantage of peak touring season for the first time.
Despite the costs associated with high-end production equipment, Middleton and Homistek remain convinced that Sunny Days’ commitment to quality will pay off in the long run. They view the venue’s strong Google rating as validation of their approach and believe it will eventually help attract larger crowds.
North Versailles Township Manager Joe Varhola said he has built a strong working relationship with Middleton and Homistek over the past several years and is confident Sunny Days will eventually draw crowds both to the arena and nearby businesses through their leadership.
“I’m going to be honest with you: They are awesome,” Varhola said.
The pair also emphasize that they are not entertainment giants like Live Nation Entertainment or Ticketmaster, which they say burden customers with excessive fees.
“We’re two Pittsburghers trying to do it right,” Homistek said.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source triblive.com ’
