Young professionals in Lawrence have their own organization for networking and socializing.

The Young Professionals Network is giving workers in their 20s and 30s a chance to discuss the personal and professional issues they share as relative newcomers to the business community.

The group also serves as a social outlet — whether it’s gathering to see a play at the Lawrence Community Theatre, traveling to Kauffman Stadium for a Royals game or crowding into The Sandbar for a heavy dose of Jimmy Buffett and a spritz or two of piña coladas or simple sodas.

Ryan Wedel, a vice president for commercial lending at Central National Bank in Lawrence, has been checking out the network’s events from the beginning and finds comfort in the common ground that its nearly 150 participants share.

“It sometimes feels like you’re a little bit alone out there as a young professional in Lawrence,” said Wedel, 29. “I constantly face the, ‘Well, you’re a young guy. How much could you know?’ This group can help you overcome those obstacles and help you build the confidence to say, ‘Well, I am young, but I’ve had these experiences and I know what I’m doing.’ “

The group started in April, with notices circulated among members of the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce.

Chamber membership is not a requirement for joining the network, and chamber members are encouraged to bring nonchamber members to events, said Bobbie Clark, a network co-founder who works as the chamber’s director of membership development.

‘It always pays off’

Unlike chamber membership, joining the network is free, although organizers are contemplating an annual $15 fee to help cover expenses as the program’s popularity picks up, Clark said.

Ryan Wedel, Lawrence, left, member of the Young Professionals Chamber, and Lindsay Ferrel, Overland Park, pick out a song on the jukebox during a mixer sponsored by the Young Professionals Chamber. The event was Nov. 12 at the The Sandbar in downtown Lawrence. Ferrel is a prospective member of the group and is planning to move to Lawrence next month.

The program’s next event is Monday, with a mixer and tour of the Dole Institute of Politics at Kansas University. The event carries a $10 admission price and is being billed as a chance to “mingle amongst other young movers and shakers” in the community, all while opening up a dialogue for shaping future network-organized programs and events.

While the upcoming event is on campus — KU’s west campus — the network’s overall push is to draw a clear line between college life and the professional world.

Jennifer Turpin, a network leader, said college students already had plenty of networking vehicles, including campus organizations, fraternities and sororities. The network is reserved for people who have moved on to become attorneys, dentists, accountants, salespeople, marketers, nurses, insurance agents, physicians or employees in other professions who could use a little communication outside the office.

And that means everyone.

“Anytime you’re networking, it always pays off in business,” said Turpin, a 36-year-old who works in Lawrence as a group consultant for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas. “But personally, I don’t go to these events because I want to sell insurance — I mean, when you’re in sales, you’re always talking business, so it doesn’t hurt — but this is just another avenue to meet people.”

Basketball, business

Encouraging professionals to get to know one another also is an investment in the community, Clark said, by bolstering the chamber’s efforts to convince people to keep Lawrence dollars in town.

“The more people you know in town,” Clark said, “the easier is it to do that.”

Wedel spent a little of his money during a recent network gathering at The Sandbar, working the jukebox and calling upon Buffet and Frank Sinatra to serenade the crowd with tunes celebrating the end of another work week.

He figures that he’ll see plenty of the same faces well into the next decade, as they become better friends and colleagues, so they may as well have a good time.

“When you think of a business gathering, you think of a real stuffy atmosphere,” Wedel said. “This is a really great way to let go of that and speak freely about a lot of issues. And it’s not always just business. It’s just as much about business as the KU football or basketball teams.”

“Everyone wants to try to build relationships — whether that’s business or friendship — and this group’s conducive for that.”