Behind the screens: Golden Enterprise fills supporting roles for TV, film

ColoradoBiz, May, 2008 by Nora Caley

Because of Heidi McLean, people who work on movies can be sure they'll get paid, and people who get voted off reality television shows know there will be a camera crew waiting for them at home.

At least that's part of what McLean's two Golden-based companies, PayReel and Crew Connection, do. Although Colorado is not exactly known for filmmaking and television production, McLean's companies have thrived in related niches--supporting roles, you might say.

McLean worked for CBS News in the 1980s with her husband, Gordon--she as an audio engineer and he as a cameraman (now called a photojournalist). When she started having kids in the late 1980s, she quit her job and worked some freelance jobs in television. Then she had an idea.

"I had a friend who was working for the Fox show, 'Cops,'" she says. "They needed crews all over. We knew a lot of people, so I started to put together a network for him, helping him find crews. One thing led to another."

It led to Crew Connection, a television and film booking service. When a TV or movie production company needs audio engineers, makeup artists, directors of photography and others, Crew Connection finds someone from its database of 6,000 freelancers.

"The crews love it, because we're collecting their pay and paying them," she says. "We are sort of a buffer zone. They are all small businesses themselves, and what they hate to do more than anything is track down clients for payment."

She launched the business with $10,000 of her savings. Early in the life of the company, she paid herself in stock. At first it was difficult to explain what Crew Connection did. "People asked, 'You do what?' and I had to explain it many times," McClain says. "That is the nature of a niche business. No one has a clue what you do."

The work can be anything from capturing the tearful welcome-home when someone doesn't lose enough weight on NBC's "The Biggest Loser," to a visit with a woman's family on ABC's "The Bachelor."

"We do good, honorable stuff, too," the 57-year-old McClain says. "We do a lot of PBS and History Channel."

The crews live and work worldwide. For example, when a news program needs to tape an interview with someone in another city, or a sports show needs to put together a segment about an athlete in another country, Crew Connection finds an experienced camera crew in the area to work for a few days or weeks. It saves the production companies from having to interview, hire and even relocate people for short term, on-location work. There's also corporate work, which means shooting training videos and seminars.

"We have a real core of people that we work with over and over because we can rely on them and they have good equipment," she says.

The crews are often small businesses themselves. "We work on a lot of different shoots for Crew Connection, mostly corporate gigs," says Julie Tatlock, who with her husband, Bob, owns 1080 Studios in Denver. "People are surprised by the type of work we do. You do not think of Denver as a city that would support a lot of productions, but it does."

PAYING PEOPLE

As Crew Connection built its client list, McLean found another niche: outsourcing payroll. People who work on television shows and movies aren't like office temps or freelancers. The camera and other crews often belong to a union. They need workers' compensation insurance. Employers might misclassify employees as independent contractors and incur trouble with the IRS.

In 1995 McLean launched PayReel, which handles payroll services for the crews working on film or TV productions. PayReel handles the required tax, insurance and employment forms. On a film shoot, for example, PayReel becomes the employer of record for the cast and crew. Even if the crew was formed by the production company and didn't use Crew Connection, PayReel becomes the employer for these workers.

It's one less thing for a production company to handle, says Lorii Rabinowitz, whose company is Fruition Films. She's the producer of the movie "Suburban," filmed in Colorado last year. Rabinowtiz says that of the 100 people who worked on the film, about 90 did so for only two or three weeks. A few were there for months. So Fruition Films outsourced the payroll to PayReel.

"We sent them timesheets every week, and they sent us the paychecks," Rabinowitz says. "You are super busy, especially in an independent film. You have a hundred people waiting for their paychecks."

Rabinowitz says people who worked on the movie also appreciated the PayReel experience. "When I interviewed people I asked, 'What is the worst experience you had working on independent film?' and they would say, 'Not getting paid. The guy said he would pay us and then the company ran out of money.'"

McLean says 40 percent of PayReel's clients are movie companies, mostly independent film makers. The company handles payroll for five to 10 movies at a time, including some out of state. The other 60 percent are corporate clients. Companies hire people to develop videos of meetings, events or the CEO delivering a speech. Clients such as the Comcast Media Center and Verizon Communications are the repeat customers in an industry of one-time projects.