The custom installation industry is nothing if not ambitious. Looking back at the industry 20 years ago — filled with audio and video experts — it would be hard to conceive the shape of business today, with lighting, shades, automation, security, power, outdoor environments, and more added to what seems to be an ever-growing list of responsibilities.
And while we don’t stray too far from our home theater roots, I always enjoy working on the September issue, which is our traditional private cinema issue. This year, however, I heard a sentiment echoed by several of the people I was speaking with: Don’t ignore home theater.
That seems like a crazy phrase to type here, but I can see what they were getting at. There are so many ways custom installers can impact a home through convenience, sustainability, and personal security, that sometimes AV’s impact gets buried. Pushing it down even further is the fact that areas like lighting and shades can get integrators in with architects, designers, and builders earlier than home theater ever could.
I think Michael Storch of Storch Entertainment Systems in Winter Park, Fla., put it best in this month’s feature story. “High-performance lighting, lighting control, and window treatments are a large part of our business, along with whole-house music, TVs, Wi-Fi, surveillance, and so on,” he says. “Seeing that Amazon left a package on your front porch…that’s information and it’s useful and it’s valuable, but it’s not the same as the home theater experience…Home theater is the ultimate expression of what we can do for our clients.”
We can’t blame a lack of interest for putting home theaters low on the proposal. We are told through surveys and predictions that the next generation watches everything on smaller screens, and yet television manufacturers introduce bigger and bigger models. Video walls were everywhere at last year’s CEDIA Expo, and were back in full force this year.
Out in commercial theaters, despite predicted doom and gloom, Deadpool & Wolverine is on its way to the Billion Dollar Club, while Twisters continues to have a strong showing. Everything is supposed to have killed movie theaters — first, it was TV, then home video, and now streaming and the pandemic have teamed up to push it down. But it survives because there is nothing like sitting in the dark while a completely crazy story unfurls in front of you and sound swirls around you — all from the comfort of a cozy chair.
The only thing better is having such an experience in your house whenever you want it.
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People have been dealing with lights, blinds, and security most of their lives — just not to the level that we can provide it for them, which is an eye-opener. But they only think they know how a luxury home theater can serve them.
As Storch says, “To be able to provide a ‘willing suspension of disbelief’ in a way that words can’t describe is an amazing thing, whether it’s a three-minute music video or a Lord of the Rings marathon, losing yourself in the moment is the real goal.”
Where else can you have fun and make money helping your customers get lost?
