Three west coast rep firms, Calwest, CLARITY AV, and Western Sales & Marketing, hosted more than 125 dealers during their Technology & Business Summit held earlier this month in Orange County and Los Angeles.
Western Sales & Marketing principal and sales manager Brad Crawford, CLARITY AV president Mark Cichowski, Rich Green, and Calwest president Michael McManus
The Summit, which took place on March 16 and 18, featured a presentation by experienced integrator and CEDIA board member Rich Green, who discussed emerging technologies, their impact on the AV market, and success strategies that dealers can use now and in years to come.
In the first session, titled “Can You Handle The Truth?” discussed how new technologies from the IT/IP world are flooding into the “CEDIA channel.” Discussion centered on the fact that there is more crossover from the Pro and Commercial channels, electrical contractors, and security and IT companies markets coming into the residential market.
The event was made possible with the help of 22 sponsoring manufacturers who all had displays of their most up to date products. The intimate environment created one-on-one time between dealers and manufacturers, which is more difficult at large venue trade shows. Manufacturers included (alphabetically): Bell’O, Current Audio, Dynamat, Envive, Epson, IC Realtime, Innovolt, McIntosh, MK Sound, Monster, NetStreams, Pioneer, Planet Waves, Russound, Screen Research, Sherwood Newcastle, Spatz, Terra, Totem Acoustic, TruAudio, Waterfall, and Xantech.
Rich Green leads one of his four seminars over two days
There were two seminars from Green each day to allow busy integrators to choose morning or afternoon, with breakfast and lunch served as well. Before, in between, and after the seminars, dealers had time to visit the displays.
The organizers are already planning a second Summit, which will probably have a slightly different educational format. The initial plan is to have multiple seminars on a variety of different topics, which could be anything from integrating 3D, home health technology opportunities, sales skill courses, business planning, and manufacturer trainings.
