Boulevard Pro, a leading New York City metro area audio systems and backline provider, recently added an L-Acoustics KARA package to its inventory.
According to co-owner Anthony Cioffi, 80 percent of what goes out the door for rentals are sound system components from L-Acoustics, whose products have literally changed his company’s arc. “When we first got into L-Acoustics with dV-DOSC back in 2004 and 2005, it changed everything,” he recalls. “It propelled our business forward. The powered 112P wedge monitor is still our biggest single rental item—we have 24 and they are out all the time.
“I read riders,” Cioffi continues, “and L-Acoustics is on everyone’s contract riders. I don’t buy a product because I think it’s sexy—I buy it because it’s what everyone wants, it’s what makes the best business sense. And that’s been the case with every L-Acoustics product we’ve had.”
Thus in addition to the dV-DOSC, dV-SUB and 112P enclosures already on hand, Boulevard Pro recently expanded it’s inventory with 36 KARA enclosures (two 18-box main arrays), eight ARCS Wide constant curvature systems for in-fill applications, five coaxial 8XT as front fills, 16 SB18 subs, and a dozen LA8 amplified controllers housed in four LA-RAK touring racks.
The new system was purchased to meet the sound reinforcement needs of client venues seating upwards of 3,000 patrons. “With KARA we’re now able to more than adequately fill the region’s largest theater spaces for any kind of music performance,” Cioffi notes. “Since taking delivery of the system, we’ve already used it at NJPAC, Tarrytown Music Hall, bergenPAC and other venues in the NYC metro area for artists like Heart, Pat Benatar, Feist, The Beach Boys, Kenny Rogers, Huey Lewis and the News, Lou Gramm with Marty Balin, Los Lonely Boys and more.”
He adds that each new acquisition steps up the company’s technology bar. “The KARA was the next logical step for us—it takes us to the next level,” he says.
But as it does for every independent business, it always comes back to an economic decision, and Cioffi says that L-Acoustics wins those arguments every time. “As a regional sound company of about 15 employees, we have to make smart choices, exploit niches and get the most bang out of each buck. And L-Acoustics systems have helped us by, for instance, increasing our corporate work and our sub-contracting work, where we provide extra reach for existing sound systems when they need it. L-Acoustics has always made a positive difference for our business, and it will keep doing that.”
Boulevard Pro was established in 1986 when owners Anthony and James Cioffi came off the road as musicians, backing up artists like Gary U.S. Bonds and Mink Deville. It’s where they learned the value of having the right technology products for the markets they were working in, from renting out classic Fender Twin amps that clients of their rehearsal studio business in the 1980s knew to come to them for, to more recently having the in-demand products and systems that their live event and touring customers require.
