Writing that blog post the other day as a counter-point to Gary Kayye’s assertion that Apple should buy Sony led me to meditate on the power of branding. Of course Apple is famously derided for having itself and all its products surrounded by a Reality Distortion Field; so much so that “Reality Distortion Field” has […]

Gary just wrote a very persuasive post, detailing the synergies to be had if Apple were to purchase Sony. I’m not entirely sure that I can agree. The root of my disagreement is that Gary’s argument focused on why a buyout would be good for Sony, but didn’t really address why it would be good […]

I’ve never met an AV Pro who didn’t love tools and gadgets. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that of all the AV pros I’ve known all these years, their love of tools and gadgets vary only by degree. Some, like my friend and former co-worker Mike, one of the most talented […]

Everybody’s decision making hinges on specific psychological levers. An important part of sales skill is identifying what levers someone has where, if you pull on them, they’re going to say “Yes” to the deal. Those levers can vary greatly from one person to another, but they always involve someone’s need, whether they’re rational or irrational, […]

Believe it or not, the fact is that when it comes to technology I am perpetually late to the party. I’m not an early adopter – mostly because I’m not a sucker – and I’m always mindful of the words of one of my mentors: “Never buy the first generation of anything.” That’s just preamble […]

Love them or hate them, extended warranties figure prominently in retail electronics, as well as furniture and major appliances, and of course car sales. It’s a fact that, as margins on product categories decline annually, retailers need something, anything to get some actual profit margin out of. It’s also a fact that, by and large, […]

We all enjoy reading tales of disastrous installations. Call it schadenfreude: finding glee in the misfortunes of others. However not ever tale of troubled installations has a tragic ending. Indeed, I’ve had experiences on projects that I’ve likened to a roller coaster: thrills and chills along the way, peaks where everything looks great, followed by […]

The genesis of this post was when I saw this picture that was posted on a Facebook page devoted to 70s and 80s nostalgia that I follow: Do you remember growing up with console and component stereo systems? My very first stereo system when I was growing up was my dad’s KLH Model 11 portable […]

If you’ve spent any time at all in AV then you will be familiar with control interfaces that are commonplace to the CE channel: IR control, IR over RF and, if you’ve worked with automation systems, serial control — RS232 and RS485. But being a true integrator means being able to, you know, actually integrate […]

I’m on the receiving end of other people’s sales pitches on a daily basis. To be terribly honest, most of them aren’t very good. In fact most of them are appalling. Their only redeeming feature is that sometimes the ones I get in my Inbox are so awful that I can file them away to […]

Something I’ve noticed over the years reading blog posts and articles written by AV industry pros is that they very seldom admit to the on-the-job mistakes that they’ve made. More often than not, they write in a way that anoints them with a halo of expertise. And I’m probably just as guilty of that as […]

If there’s any one theme that strings together the editorials I’ve been writing for rAVe in the past few years, it’s how important it is for AV pros to both develop effective processes, both on the jobsite and off, and to differentiate themselves from their competitors. In the last ten years, I’ve witnessed the AV […]

Despite the fact that cost-is-no-object HomeAV projects occupy only the smallest top percentile of all the work done in the channel, they garner the most attention: features in magazines (both AV and architectural), awards like CEDIA’s annual systems competition, and of course the press releases of the manufacturers whose gear took center stage in the […]

By now regular readers know that I spend a lot of time in hotels. Not only that, but I also find myself frequently critiquing hotel AV installations. Last week I was in Calgary (again), and for the sake of variety stayed at a different hotel than I normally do, where I discovered the latest entry […]

We’ve all found ourselves in the situation where we know something, so much so that we take it for granted. In fact, we take it for granted to such an extent that, for all intents and purposes we forget it. I just had a moment like that. Last week, my father expressed an interest in […]

So it’s been a couple of years now, and Apple’s AirPlay has reached, while not ubiquity, certainly a presence in the marketplace. For those of you who just awoke from a spell cast upon you by a wicked witch, AirPlay is Apple’s vehicle for streaming through networked devices. Beyond just Apple TV and devices running […]

Normally in my travels I expect to find sad, weird, poorly installed AV equipment in the hotels I stay at. Occasionally, I end up impressed by an installation where it’s clear that the installer was a consummate professional and no expense was spared to create a hotel of the future. But more often than not, […]

I believe that everything has both an upside and a downside, and that one of the keys to success is to recognize the upside, and figure out how to benefit from it. Regardless of how well I work to put that into practice on a daily basis, there’s something that I have yet to find […]

I love making a deal. Boy do I ever. Negotiating is fun. Or at least it can be. I recognize that not everybody enjoys it. Truthfully, negotiating a deal is only fun if both sides are having a good time with it. Also, regardless of what you’ve read in Old School salesmanship books deal making […]

In the prior installment, I had discussed the surprising growth of headphones in home AV, including how, for some retailers and distributors, their sales now eclipse stereos and surround sound AV equipment. I also touched on the importance of determining which price level your company should focus on: whether your customers are looking for entry […]

Last week I was talking with a rep I had just met from another channel. He mentioned that he had been employed with the manufacturer for almost four years now. These days that makes him a rarity on two counts: working directly for a manufacturer rather than a distributor or agent, and holding the same […]

Last week, the last of my original Squeezebox Classic units finally died, quietly in its sleep. I had two of the Classic units bought seven years ago, although when I bought them, they weren’t called Classic, they were still just “Squeezeboxes.” The first one died early last year, and after some initial poking around on […]

As luxuries become commodities, the trend continues wherein AV Pros place their focus on selling services and expertise, rather than just hanging their hats on the brands and technologies they work with. That’s no accident. Ten to twelve years ago, flat panel televisions were remarkable and expensive, and only high end dealers sold them, and […]

This installment of Employees Behaving Badly is a little different, in that this time the Career Limiting Decision isn’t one of mine! Here’s the thing about working on commission: You’re on commission! While being on straight salary means that you get paid the same no matter what, on commission you’ve actually got to, you know, […]

Our home color printer, an HP Photosmart 8250 will soon have its seventh birthday. In inkjet printer years, that’s positively ancient. Prior to that I’ve never had an inkjet printer last more than three years; I had a dot-matrix printer that lasted more than ten, but that was in the 1980s, when dinosaurs ruled the […]

Notwithstanding the fact that the title of this column betrays the fact that I’ve watched too many episodes of Special Agent Oso with my children, my point is that the things business owners need to do are ultimately quite simple. Best practices are called “best practices” for a reason: They’re things that you do because […]

Aside from the stuff that I’ve bought over the years, the equipment that I find in the recesses of my gear closet typically falls into two categories. The first is old sample products, many of which were given to me for reviews and where I was not required to send them back to the vendor. […]

It’s neither new, nor surprising that the face of AV retail has changed dramatically and continues to do so. However, what is surprising is the directions in which those changes can take us. The other weekend I was supporting one of my retailers at their annual sales event, representing a couple of my brands. While […]

There’s a gaming meme that makes the rounds online whose punchline is, “I went outside today for a change. The graphics were amazing but the story and gameplay were terrible.” Gameplay is King, and it’s always been that way. Some game developers get that, some don’t. My current addiction when I need mindless, almost meditative […]

They say that the reward for good work is always more work. By that same token, the reward for demonstrating that you can keep a secret is that you get entrusted with more secrets. Trust is important: People need to know that they can count on you, and when it comes to professional discretion, they […]

Its almost a cliché in the AV trade media that if you need a topic for your blog, post a picture of a dreadful installation and write a post that both mocks it and moralizes to the AV Pro readers about the importance of doing a better job than the one you’re writing about. Well, that’s one cliché. […]

Last week I tried to make the case that AV dealers in search of both margin and market share need to embrace entertainment furniture as more than just an afterthought to audio and video. Rather, it has to be treated as an equally important category, and detailed some trends in styling and design that are worth being […]