Paulson’s AV has been serving the Detroit area’s technology needs since 1991, but the company underwent some big changes beginning three years ago, which is when brothers Dan and Kris Paulson bought ownership of the shop from their retiring dad, Ken. In addition to adding a prominent tagline of “Your Technology Partner” to their logo, showing that they provide a full suite of home enhancements beyond AV, they also built a new experience center and made some adjustments to the culture.
“God bless my dad putting forth the effort to build the foundation we have today,” says Dan Paulson, co-owner of Paulson’s AV. “We have a team of 30 people. We have two locations, and we’re in the process of opening a third experience center right now and having a lot of fun. But we’ve gone from running seven days a week from 10:00 AM to 9:00 PM, with after-hours deliveries, to scaling our hours and aligning them with our clients’ needs and availability. Our hours evolved from COVID, where we were open Monday through Saturday, 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM. We will do appointments after-hours if that’s what someone needs, but most of the time, they’re coming during those time periods, which works out wonderfully for all of us, our families included.”
One aspect that has not changed is Paulson’s devotion to providing high-end audio systems to its clientele. In fact, with the new experience centers, it’s only grown deeper.
“Our store is about 9000 square feet with seven different lifestyle vignettes,” explains Paulson, “all of which clients can come in and be immersed with the technology and experience it firsthand in the lifestyle sections. Then we have two different speaker rooms — our more ‘entry-level’ room that is $10,000 and below, and our high-end room, which is $15,000 and up. Clients can come in, and we can expose them to what real music can sound like. We also have a dedicated service team and a bench in-house. We’re an authorized McIntosh repair center. We repair Anthem. We repair all of our speakers. It works really well for us having the showroom, from the standpoint that clients come in looking for products and then realize we can not only help them there, but service and support them after the sale, which is huge for us.”
Despite the impressive arrangement of bookshelf and tower speakers in the entry-level room, the space has another, hidden demo purpose as well. “We have invisible speakers and subwoofers in there, too, in addition to small aperture speakers in the ceiling,” Paulson says. “We have tower speakers sitting with a really nice cabinet — a full end-user solution. They see it, they get it — they’re not confused by the tech. We play music, and they’re thinking, ‘Oh, that sounds great,’ but it turns out it’s the invisible system. We show them that the wires are not hooked up to the tower. Their minds are blown because we are exposing them to something they didn’t even know existed.”
Then it is a simple matter to plug the towers back in to show what they can do and have a conversation about design and aesthetics and what is important to the customer.
No such sleight of hand exists in the high-end room, which is typically next on the tour. “Our high-end room has Paradigm 9Hs with an Anthem STR system,” explains Paulson. “We have the top-of-the-line Bowers & Wilkins with a huge McIntosh amp. Most people have never seen anything like this. And we don’t want to treat it like a Ferrari dealership where, ‘Oh, it’s pretty, but don’t touch.’ We ask them to sit down, we play them a song, and they tell us they didn’t know things could sound this good.
“It’s awesome to expose clients who had little to no experience or expectations, but even with clients who are coming in and know what they want, it helps give us credibility and them the experience they’re looking for, too. So, it’s a win-win.”
Addictive Audio
It is typical that the high-end listening room is not the goal of the initial meeting and comes later in the customer relationship. Paulson says that by asking customers how and where they like to listen to music, it can lead to additional projects down the road.
As an example, he tells of a client whose home Paulson’s AV had already fitted with a dedicated home theater, but who now wanted a media room in the living room area that made music listening a priority.
“He had a two-story living room with glass windows along one side and a hardwood floor because, well, why wouldn’t he?” says Paulson with a smile. “We had put Bowers & Wilkins in his home theater but used a Paradigm 9H system in his living room because they have built-in power drivers, and I wanted to make sure we got the pressure level up so you can hit the bass and feel it for the music. We suggested adding a subwoofer and wound up doing a 5.1-channel surround sound system that was optimized for music. Well, a 5.2 system because I looked at the photo my guys took when they came back, and I noticed a void over in the corner. We needed a second sub just from an aesthetic standpoint. So, he added the second sub and was very happy with the performance enhancement. The room has a complete McIntosh stack — mono blocks, preamps, surround processor — which is proudly displayed.
Related: Acoustics Made Easier
“We proposed a complete acoustic treatment of the room because of the high ceilings and the challenges that it posed. We worked with Vicoustic, which did a rendering of the elevations and all the different wall selections, and he made his choices. This system has been in the works for the last 12 months, and honestly, once the acoustic treatment goes in, he’s probably going to add something else because it’s just so much fun for him to play with it and tweak it.
“He loves music. He comes to every one of our Music Matters events, which feature listening sessions and meetings with vendor partners. He talks about all these concerts, and he gets this look on his face when he goes back to that memory. It’s great to see him go to this other place and to have the privilege to help set that up for him to use in his home whenever he wants it. It makes me very pleased to be able to do that for somebody.”
Selling Sound
For Paulson and his team, they have found the key to selling high-end audio is to slow things down. “A lot of my team used to think that the clientele is very busy — they’re high-end clients, they don’t have time,” says Paulson. “They will make time if they see value. So, we lean into our experience center and ask them to take five minutes, sit down, and let us play a song for them so they can understand where we’re coming from, and get a glimpse of our expertise. You play a song, and you can see it instantly — they’re intrigued.”
Slowing down and letting the client listen to music while discussing their needs and wants is key, according to Paulson, even pausing the music talk when other tech needs to be addressed. “If they mention streaming, it has forced us to pause on the music talk to find out how they’re going to consume their music, and if their home network can handle it,” he says. “Because if the network can’t handle the bandwidth or isn’t reliable, then your streaming experience is going to suffer, and they will blame the speakers. Everyone blames everything except for the root cause, which is usually the network. It’s not always about music, but we have that conversation daily.
“Power is another consideration. We have power management systems on every one of our systems, and it’s out in front for clients to see. In our high-end demo room, we will even demonstrate power cords. It’s easy to remind the client that this product’s purpose is to make your system sound as good as possible, but it’s also there to protect your system. It’s supposed to die, not your product. There’s value in that when you start investing in a really nice system. You want to take those safeguards to heart and do what you can to protect your investment. That’s where power comes into play.”
Related: Upping the Audio Ante
Eye of the Beholder
With the current focus on design and invisible audio, Paulson warns not to dismiss towers too quickly. “Sometimes we think the client just wants the ‘easy’ button, which means throw a pair of speakers in-wall or in-ceiling and make them invisible,” he says. “Sometimes that is the only option, depending on who oversees the room and the design of the space, but I’m grateful our industry has created products that allow us to get music in those rooms in a beautiful way. I’ve heard that people don’t want towers, they don’t want music, they don’t have time for it, they don’t have the ear for it — I think all of that is a huge myth. Take time, slow it down. Architectural products are probably going to go in 90% of the rooms, but people do still appreciate and want that high-end system that both looks impressive and sounds amazing.”
For more information, visit www.paulsonsav.com.
A Dance-Worthy Demo
When asked for his demo song of choice, Dan Paulson, co-owner of Paulson’s AV, offers a bold choice (although he is not the first we have heard who use it).
“One of our go-to tracks is ‘Vogue’ by Madonna,” he says. “The opening scene blows your mind, and the surround sound is amazing. Plus, everyone knows Madonna, and they start with, ‘Wait, you’re going to play a Madonna song that’s 40 years old?’ Then after they hear it on our system, it becomes, ‘Oh my god, where’s this been my whole life?’
“When you’re playing songs that people can’t associate with or have no emotional response to, it’s more of an uphill battle. Of course, if you’re trying to demonstrate a certain bass performance or mid-range, there are reasons why you play specific tracks, but that off-the-cuff, getting them hooked, playing something they’ve heard before wins every time.”
