Here’s a look at the regional finalists in the 2016 Hometown Hero Lighting Company of the Year award.
There are many ways to judge the vitality of our industry — ticket sales, manufacturer’s bottom line, new hires. But from where we’re sitting, it seems especially telling that, for the first time in a long time, there are so many new companies being honored for their service in their region. Not that these are “new” companies per se — heck, one has been around since 1983. But it’s a dynamic, interesting bunch, and we’re pleased to present them to here. Let’s meet the regional winners!
Northeast
Starlite Productions, Moorestown, NJ
Dean Danowitz is only half joking when he says he started Starlite Productions in 1974 — after all, he was only 11 years old. “When my friends called, I would answer with ‘Starlite Productions, can I help you?’ much to their exasperation!” he laughs. But a decade later, he had followed his ambitions, first building nightclubs before focusing on the then-emerging Atlantic City casino market. As a 20-something kid, he boldly made a $400,000 sale to a casino, closing a deal for those new-fangled “moving lights” at a trade show, and from there sold into other casinos. A relationship with touring markets ensued. “Since 1983, we have continued to build a growing inventory of entertainment-technology as well as an eclectic team of professionals. We learned early on that it’s not about a particular sale or show, but rather the relationships you develop and the trust you earn.” Today, they work out of a 53,000 square foot headquarters with 54 associates plus a pool of freelance technicians.
Starlite handles audio, video, effects, staging, rigging and theatrical and architectural lighting. They serve the concert and touring, corporate, educational, gaming, government, museum and exhibit, performing arts and worship markets. Recent investments include Clay Paky Mythos, Scenius and K20 B-Eye fixtures; grandMA2, NPUs and dot2s from MA Lighting; Colour Chorus fixtures from Elation; Chauvet Professional Rogue R1 and R2 fixtures; ETC Source Four LED fixtures; and Green Hippo media servers. This year they were asked to do a one-month outdoor lighting installation for the Philadelphia Democratic delegates as well as the 50,000-plus visitors. “Starlite lit historic City Hall as well as the 30th Street Station and took control of existing LED fixtures on Broad Street to provide a synchronized, patriotic show. Key products include SGM P5 High-performance outdoor LED wash units; Clay Paky Mythos housed in Clay Paky Igloo enclosures; Color Chorus RGBA strip lights.” Additionally, they were tapped for a public art installation for Pope Francis’ visit.
“It’s a tremendous honor to earn this distinction and we are humbled to be in the company of our peers and respected competitors who have won before us,” he says. “While I am immensely proud of what my team and I have been able to accomplish over these 30-plus years I am most thankful for the people who have helped us along the way and the lasting relationships we have formed.”
Southeast
44 Designs, Nashville
“We are first and foremost a creative team,” says 44 Designs’ Jeff Lavallee. “We come up with great, cost¬-effective designs. Our clients always have a unique look that matches what their music is saying. We make their live show the perfect partner, visually, to their sound, image and to themselves.” Lavallee established a reputation for doing a lot with a little, starting out with just a couple of Intellabeams, eight LED strips and a Hog 500 lighting board. He built on that while touring with Hank Williams Jr., Arlo Guthrie, Toby Mac, Julio Iglesias, Lady Antebellum and Trace Adkins, among others.
“Today we have many new clients including Andy Grammer, Young The Giant, Jewel, Matt Maher, Lewis Del Mar, The Mavericks, 7eventh Time Down, Unspoken and The Love Elektrik,” says COO Clayton Thornton, all of which keeps their crew of 10 quite busy. “We also continue to have great cross rental relationships with companies throughout the Southeast and Midwest.” Gear-wise he adds they recently picked up some vintage, rusty Mole-Richardson 10K units that they retrofitted with color changing LEDS. “Of course we are acquiring new fixtures all the time, but we also like to have something customized like these 10Ks. It’s our nod to refurbishment and recycling an old light and making it into a new scenic element is something that you won’t see in a corporate shop’s stock.”
In other news, they struck a partnership with Pennington Entertainment, a premier artist management group in Nashville. “They have chosen us as their exclusive provider for visual and creative services as well as production rentals and retail. We are excited for the future with them.” Otherwise, their work continues with Mutemath, and they got to modify the rig for the Twenty One Pilots’ popular summer tour. “Glow Motion Technologies continues to partner with us for their shows and that has allowed us to be at the Billboard Awards, the Tupperware Jubilee and the grand opening for the Disneyland Park in Shanghai, China.”
“We are honored and humbled by this award,” Thornton adds. “Thanks to all of our families, friends, clients and fans for supporting us through the years. They are our source of inspiration and our voice to the world. They are the real fuel behind this creative powerhouse.”
Midwest
TLS Productions, Ann Arbor, Michigan
TLS returns to the winners circle a second time, and they report that Brad Hayes and Bill Ross are the firm’s new co-presidents. “In the last few years, we’ve dropped a million bucks on lights,” Hayes says. “It’s important to stay current and relevant to our client needs.” Car shows and related press events have been their staple. Chevrolet, Toyota, Lexus and Scion are among their clients. They were called in for the NACE CARS expo and conference, highlighting the GM Genuine Parts area. But this year they’ve been expanding outside that niche market, moving into to support other corporate areas like healthcare. Another highlight was handling the visual elements of the ESPN Night of Champions event in Dallas, a particularly fun one for Hayes. “I’m a huge college football fan, and it was really exciting to be part of that,” he says.
“We designed and produced the lighting and rigging, along with providing the video and LED solutions for the Nickelodeon space for Tangram International at this year’s International Licensing Expo, which was held at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas,” says Carl Kedzierski, director of marketing. Also, there was the Lexus space at the 2016 North American International Auto Show. “Year in and year out, we move mountains, in regard to the rigs flown above spaces such as this one, and in some cases overnight, in order to accommodate a press event change over. It has to be perfect.” To keep up with the increase in demand, they added 50 Stagemaker half-ton chain hoists, boosting the total to 350 units. The company also purchased 72 Elation Colour Chorus 72s, 20 Colour Chorus 48s and ten Colour Chorus 12 and 24 units. “We also purchased 12 Elation Platinum FLX. Last but not least, we added four [High End Systems] HedgeHog 4 consoles to our ever-growing control inventory,” Carl adds. The Elation fixtures were purchased to accommodate their local rental market. A full line of Ben Nye theatrical makeup and special effects products was also added to their sales inventory.
“To say we are excited on winning our region again this year is an understatement. We are more than excited, we are honored to be a part of it all.”
Northwest
Stageworks, Seattle
Stageworks returns to the winner’s circle, having won for the region last year. The Seattle-based company started with Simon Clark, a touring professional for three decades. “I had worked for a lot of major companies, and I just got out of the business and came up here to Seattle for three months.” That three months turned into three years, and then four and five, and then, in 2007, he founded Stageworks. The company provides video, lighting, scenic and media design as well as production, technical and logistics management, and delivers complete packages with lighting, switching, media servers, rigging, installation and content.
Their growth has continued this year, adding Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros and Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats to their touring roster. More growth means more gear — they have added HD Lipstick and HD PTZ cameras to their inventory as well as custom fabricated rolling/folding video carts that can ground support LED video walls (up to 3.5 by 2.5 meters per cart). “Our custom video carts debuted at Coachella with Edward Sharpe and continued on through their summer tour,” says Stageworks LD Jeremy Roth. “We continued to design and produce the main stages at the Gorge for the Sasquatch and Watershed music festivals.”
“There was a need for acts that wanted to do large format touring, but didn’t want to be with a huge company where they get lost behind 20 other large acts,” Clark says. “We started pushing out tours only two or three at a time,” and they got a strong response for touring artist who wanted the extra attention. Touring acts like The Killers, Skrillex, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, the Shins, Flogging Molly, Wilco and many more. “As the artists evolve, we evolve with them.” Clark says festivals are an area that they see as a growth area. Mixed in that with that was corporate work, which now accounts for about 30 percent of their overall business. Today, they have five fulltime staff members plus two on the road with tours, all working out of an 8,000 square foot warehouse located on Vashon Island in the Seattle area.
Southwest
Visions Lighting, Brea, CA
Todd Roberts has been fascinated by lighting ever since attending an Easter service in junior high. He became a DJ for local weddings and parties and started buying DJ lighting equipment for his shows working out of his parent’s garage. From there he worked in nightclubs installing lighting equipment and started to do lighting for raves in the late 1990’s. He somehow parlayed that into a tour for Prince and eventually diversified into corporate and social events and music festivals. “Since starting Visions Lighting in 1992, I am fortunate to say that we have grown each year we’ve been in business,” he says. “Any company in the industry can get leases and loans and buy a bunch of gear and advertise that they have it, but if it’s not working all the time, we don’t see that as smart choice. We trade bragging rights regarding gear to buying gear we know will be working for us all the time.” It’s resulted in nearly doubling their warehouse space recently, and they’ve gone from 21 full time employees to 2012 to over 40 today. Clients include festival promoters, concert production managers, corporate event planners, and special/social event planners. They work with Insomniac Events, Golden Voice, AEG Live, Product Partner/Beachbody and Live Nation. They have been involved with the Coachella Festival and the Electric Daisy Carnival.
“Another goal for us is to never take on projects that we cannot handle and deliver 100 percent,” he says. “We hate to turn down business, but if we can’t deliver our best to the client because we are tapped of gear or skilled labor, we pass and hopefully earn the respect by doing so.” To make it all happen requires gear, and Vision recently invested in 48 Robe BMFL Blades, 460 Absen C7 7mm LED Tiles, 60 Elation Platinum FLX and 100 Elation ACL 360 Bars.
“Seeing Visions grow over the years and receiving praise and press in the industry magazines has been awesome,” he says. “We have to say though that being nominated and winning the Southwest Region of Hometown Heroes Lighting Company from PLSN far surpasses any accolade or award we have received to date.”
Canada
SoundBox Productions, Stoney Creek (Hamilton Area), Ontario
“This is an honor,” says SoundBox CEO Jamie Altena. “We’ve been reading PLSN since we’ve started production. It’s been a source of inspiration over the years.” Since 2001, the company has been serving clients in the picturesque Hamilton and Niagara region, with the goal of providing world-class production values to the local community. Altena and partner Tran Langford (COO) set out to provide for those bigger, more complicated events so well that there would be no need to turn to “bigger” companies in cities with a lot of mileage in between. “From full tour and event production, product sales and repair, installation and meeting support, their customers return to us time and again. We are fortunate to have the dedicated staff and reputable clients to have grown from a small proprietary company into a competitive corporation.” They recently moved into a new facility providing 10,000 square feet of space for their 10 full time staff members and the growing number of contract production managers and installers.
“Like many people who have gone into production, we started by playing in bands and touring,” Altena says, smiling. “Eventually, we started handling the technical side of shows and tours for people we knew. Then it naturally grew into larger events. Eventually, we added product sales, installation and training.” He says growth from the beginning has been organic, and is happy they have needed to increase staff, inventory and capacity every year. “We have had a few key milestones along the way, including a circus and some key venue installations. Three years ago, we opened up a satellite office in Hamilton to service corporate clients in a venue in which we provide ongoing event support.”
SoundBox provides lighting, staging, video and audio for events and show productions. “Our main client base are professional events at the business oriented venues in southern Ontario, and many of our regional festivals and tours. Installation clients are manly performance venues and churches. We’ve recently started growing our corporate integrations division. We currently gearing up to go out with the Family Channel Big Ticket Summer Concert Tour.”
All six Hometown Hero finalists appear on the 2016 Parnelli Awards ballot (www.parnelliawards.com/vote). Voting continues through the month of September. The top vote-getters will be honored at the Oct. 22 ceremony at the Rio in Las Vegas. For more information (and reservations) go to www.parnelliawards.com.
