The boutique mentality - Post Script - six audio professionals invest in AudioEngine facility

Post, Sept, 2002 by Marc Loftus

Six audio pros recently came together to acquire the assets of the three-year-old Manhattan audio facility Lower East Side. Originally owned by the New York Media Group, and later CCA, the three-room facility went through a period of mismanagement, and while it never closed, was down to only one functioning room.

Veteran mixers Bob Giammarco, Tom Goldblatt, Joe Vagnoni and David (Rex) Recker are joined by business manager/administrator Michael Porte and engineer Brian Wick in the venture, which opened under the new AudioEngine banner on August 22nd. The boutique will focus on the group's core expertise -- commercial sound mixing.

According to Giammarco, who was a mixer at Lower East Side when it opened three years ago and then moved on to Photomag, the group had been looking for the right situation, which would allow them to open an audio boutique with no ties to a video post house or larger corporate structure.

"It's a great, beautiful facility and that was part of the desire to do this," says Giammarco of the space formerly known as Lower East Side. "We wanted to do our own thing. Michael and I had been down this road for a few years now and could not find a situation that was right. To build from the ground up is expensive and time consuming. And we didn't think that New York City needed any more mixing rooms."

AudioEngine has two Avid AudioVision/Soundtracs DPC II rooms and already has plans to update its third room with Digidesign Pro Tools and a Pro Control mixer. A new fourth room could feature a similar configuration. But how will the studio zig where others have unsuccessfully zagged in a challenging economy? Giammarco doesn't necessarily see the economy as a hurdle.

"I don't know that it's the economy so much," he says. "I think the problem is that a lot of the facilities in New York just got way too big and tried to do too many things. You need to focus on your core business and what you do well. We have a fabulous team in place to Focus on what we do best -- commercial spot mixing. I think if you do that and have the right people, then you will be successful."

How will this boutique measure success?

"For us, success is defined by having a high-quality shop that we are proud of; that does good work; that we all get paid; and that we don't wind up in a hole."