Editor’s Note: See part 1 of this discussion here.
I’ve been in the audio industry coming on 50 years. Hard to believe. During this time, I’ve witnessed business to business communication evolve from teletype transmission and fax to email and video conferencing.
With the coming of the digital era, catalog mailings have been replaced by websites and email blasts. Where trade shows used to be a place to get to know your business associates, online training and webinars are now deemed as functional replacements. I’m not so sure…
Over the years, I’ve traveled the globe and met hundreds of individuals, and because of the time spent together, I got to know a bit about their world. Many still remain friends to this day. Relationships.
The Touring Side
The pandemic caused a tectonic shift in business. Things aren’t likely to go back to the way they were. The shift began with folks staying at home as a means to stop the spread of COVID.
So instead of going to work each day, folks began working from home. The extra space needed for the home office shifted housing demands from downtown condos to suburban homes. Gone were the staff meetings or impromptu hallway conversations where you got to know co-workers.
Company culture has become diluted, work hours have become ‘soft’ and distractions many. Do a Google search for “productivity” and you’ll discover reports that suggest productivity in the United States is at its lowest in 75 years! The domino effect is alive and well.
When concert touring shut down, bus and rig drivers took up jobs with FedEx and UPS, while many of those drivers moved to Amazon’s new legion of delivery trucks. Another domino effect.
Now that club dates and concerts have been reignited, there’s a noticeable shortage of drivers and support staff. When hiring local crew, tour managers commonly over-hire as many as five times more staff than needed as only 20 percent will show up. Maybe.
The exhaustive search begins to find new staff. It seems that young folks are living for today. Work-life balance has moved to the forefront. It’s not uncommon for them to make salary and vacation demands before even starting the interview. There is a sense of entitlement.
If you speak with audio touring company managers, they’ll tell you that many of today’s youth don’t have the same gusto or “stay-with-it” when applying for (or doing) a job as they did in the past.
The romance of touring is alluring: you get to meet rock stars, enjoy free concerts and hang out with interesting people! Then reality sets in: exhaustingly long 16-hour work days with overnight travel in a bus sleeping on a bunk with a thin foam mattress. Some estimates say that roughly 80 percent quit after two months.
Smart Practices
For the employer, increasing wages, leniency with respect to sick-time while trying to remain competitive is becoming all the more daunting. Smart employers are doing what they can to hold onto stable, “more mature” workers.
A recipe for success includes treating staff like family and to instill in them a sense of importance within the organization. Your crew is your front-line to the artist, stage techs and venue staff. They need to be constantly “selling and promoting” your services by being positive and treating everyone with respect.
When it comes to selecting an audio rental company for an upcoming tour, you can be sure that folks that are easy to work with and competent will always outweigh the allure of a low-cost competitor. It comes down to retaining solid relationships and nurturing customer loyalty.
There was a time when all you had to do was buy some gear (loudspeakers, microphones and a mixing console, etc.) and you instantly became an audio rental company. Not anymore. The competitive nature of the business has forced everyone to button down the hatches.
You actually have to run your business like a business. This means setting monthly budgets, keeping costs under control and constantly managing inventory levels. This may mean a greater dependence on cross-rentals, selling off old gear to invest in newer technology and even downsizing.
Financial Focus
At one point, there will be the need to borrow cash. This means developing a trusting relationship with your bank manager. Banks are essential to growing and managing a business. They can provide short-term cash bumps that will keep you out of the red.
This trusting relationship will only flourish if your books are in order and you are producing regular monthly financial statements. The bank manager doesn’t care if you’re a good sound engineer. Banks need to see a professionally run operation. This may mean culling customers by saying “no” to those that may not be profitable while focusing on the gigs that are most financially rewarding. There’s also the need to build up a “war chest” (a.k.a., savings).
Businesses that are running in the red may end up closing their doors. This presents opportunities for those that have a full piggy bank, whereby one may be able to buy out competitors and absorb newer technology at fire-sale prices. Being out front of the technology curve can give you a significant market advantage. You may also be lucky enough to get some good experienced staff as part of the deal!
Yup… another domino effect.
