This is an incredibly exciting time to be in our industry. We have transitioned from the traditional television and broadcast era into a truly-digital age, where developing platforms are creating an enormous opportunity for content. With the increasing demand for content across a wide range of platforms comes the ever-expanding need for high-quality audio.
2010 was a very successful year for Sound Lounge. As we saw this trend emerge of our clients needing to expand their offerings to accommodate cross-platform projects, our role changed from being a service provider to entering into truly “creative partnerships” with our clients.
For example, we had many clients come to us with cross-platform projects that required the traditional :60 and :30 broadcast spots, but they also needed to repurpose that material for use on the Web, for a series of Webisodes or a Web film, or a corporate/marketing video, theatrical release, environmental display, or distribution via mobile devices.
We were able to address this new trend in a powerful way, because we designed Sound Lounge from our inception 12 years ago to accommodate any project our clients brought to us, and to serve as “solution providers.” Following this core philosophy, we have conservatively grown over the past decade from just five mixing studios to 12 studios with divisions in Radio, Casting, Long-Form, and Sound Design, building a very solid infrastructure that can meet the needs of our clients’ projects.
Our goal as a company and a team over this past year was to pursue and nurture “long-term relationships” with our clients, working in all areas of the industry. We altered our business model a bit and added the important role of executive producer, a first in our history.
With the addition of Gloria Pitagorsky to our team, the partners at Sound Lounge gave Gloria carte blanche to collaborate with clients across the board: at ad agencies, editorial companies, visual effects studios, etc. She was able to leverage on her existing contact base, as well as ours, and engage in an ongoing dialogue every day with clients about the projects they are working on. We collaborate very closely with them over time in order to understand clearly their goals and initiatives. We provide them with an extremely high-quality experience, enabling them to promote their clients’ brands and marketing initiatives to the best possible creative results.
Looking forward, 2011 will be a continued year of expansion. While others are contracting, we are expanding. We are ending 2010 in fact by unveiling a major expansion of our long-form division, the addition of 5,000 square feet including an ADR Stage, 10 edit suites, and production space. We are now better positioned to go after even more film and television projects.
We believe the key to staying in business as we all move forward in this ever-changing environment is to provide the best quality, talent and service: be the best, and the most diverse.
Marshall Grupp is a Partner/Sound Designer at Sound Lounge (www.soundlounge.com) in New York City.