Tom Grossi Brings ’30 in 30′ Tour to Jacksonville, Raises Thousands for St. Jude
Tom Grossi hasn’t slept more than two and a half hours a night in nearly two weeks, but he’s never felt better.
The 2024 NFL Fan of the Year and YouTube personality returned to Jacksonville Wednesday for stop 13 of 30 in his second “30 in 30” stadium tour, arriving in Duval County after stops in Miami and Tampa Bay.
Grossi first hit the road in 2023, visiting all 30 NFL stadiums in 30 consecutive days while raising more than $500,000 for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. He promised a sequel if he reached one million YouTube subscribers — he hit that milestone in early 2026, and by May 29 he was back on the road again. With EverBank Stadium closed for reconstruction, Wednesday’s stop landed at The Block Jax, a newly renovated outdoor venue 12 miles southeast of downtown.
Repping a St. Jude T-shirt with the message, “This Shirt Saves Lives,” Grossi appeared before over 200 fans chanting his name.
“I got my name chanted. I still got goosebumps right now, man … people are so excited and they’re hyped to be here,” Grossi said. “There are people waiting six hours in line … to have people spend their time, their effort to get out here, I have to pay that back, because that’s what they deserve.”
To pay it back, Grossi met with every person queued to see him, exchanging conversation, autographing items and taking photos and videos with fans.
Yet, Grossi never sees the task to connect with his fanbase as tiring. Across the seven-hour event, Grossi cherished each individual interaction.
“I’ll spend time with every single person, you get a handshake, you get an autograph, you get a picture, video for your friends, whatever you want, and I will just stay until it’s done,” Grossi said.
Grossi began posting football content in 2015 after the Packers’ NFC Championship loss to the Seattle Seahawks, while working as a high-school social studies teacher at the time. What started as reaction videos and podcasts grew into one of YouTube’s largest football communities, eventually helping him surpass one million subscribers and launch fundraising efforts that have raised millions of dollars for St. Jude and other charities.
In the process, Grossi proved any platform, big or small, can make a difference with the drive for goodwill and a community behind kids with cancer. “It’s the greatest thing I could have possibly built,” he said
In Jacksonville, fans in Jaguars teal, Packers green and gold, and other NFL jerseys braved the heat to wait for hours outside in a single-file line for the event.
“People are able to come out and they want to represent their city, especially Jacksonville, who I don’t think they’ve ever gotten over the small-market comment … that’s awesome and that’s the beautiful side of fandom,” Grossi said.
Inside the event, there were no VIP upcharges, no ticket tiers and no sponsor backups. Grossi describes the environment as deliberately non-transactional: a meet-and-greet built around time, not money.
Callan Kruma, a fan who first stumbled onto Grossi’s YouTube while hunting for Packers’ live streams, says watching a creator turn online energy into real-world impact hits harder in-person.
“It feels good to watch somebody that wants to do good … it should inspire all of us that are watching him and other YouTubers to want to do this exact thing,” Kruma said.
By the end of the night, the Jacksonville crowd turned that energy into real money for St. Jude – a few thousand dollars raised in a single stop, including a $500 in-person donation triggered by a running bit where Grossi shows his bare feet on stream for big gifts.
“Anytime someone donates $500, I show my feet,” Grossi said. “Is it weird? Sure. But it’s delightful now, because my feet have raised millions of dollars — that’s just how this fanbase is.”
All of the lines, chants and inside jokes only matter if they point back to one thing: helping families hear “your child has cancer” without also hearing “you might lose everything.”
St. Jude offers at least one piece of solid ground in a chaotic moment. They step in and cover bills, housing, food and everyday needs for children with cancer and their families.
Dawn Barrack, a St. Jude representative for Eastern Florida, said Grossi’s efforts move the needle in two ways. “What Tom is doing absolutely helps. It raises money that makes a significant difference, and it gets our name out to people who wouldn’t usually know about St. Jude,” Barrack said.
The initial “30 in 30” tour led to an international trip on St. Jude’s behalf, hospital visits, and conversations that reshaped how he thinks about the work.
“When you’re having those conversations with a parent whose kid went through cancer treatment at St. Jude, or unfortunately did not make it, it’s a sobering reminder [that] these are kids and the very real issue that’s going on,” Grossi said.
Those stories reinforced his belief that the focus should be on people, not on credit or branding. He calls the approach of raising money without telling the charities in advance“chaotic good,” letting communities surprise them with the result.
The surprise checks and quiet gestures are the point for Grossi. Viral moments and subscriber milestones may fuel his nationwide tour, but he says the real measure is what ordinary fans choose to do with their shared love for football.
“You don’t have to have a million subscribers just to be a good person, and go do cool things just because,” Grossi said. “Go do good things because it’s the right thing to do.”
For Grossi, Wednesday night in Jacksonville was proof enough before visiting Charlotte on Thursday and Atlanta on Friday.
“Communities of people are very much needed right now,” he said. “When we can actually bring people together in a public space, and do it with no strings attached, not trying to sell them anything – let’s just go and do more of that.”
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