Lighting Rental Company Expands into New Markets and Video, Acquiring Tools and Talent
With rapid growth more than doubling its number of facilities around the U.S. in just a two-year span, Las Vegas-based 4Wall Entertainment is clearly a company on the move — both geographically, and in terms of the expanding array of services it can offer to clients. But those in charge are saying that the growth is more a reflection of the needs of its thousands of clients rather than just growth for growth’s sake.
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“4Wall will continue to service a variety of markets, such as corporate, touring, live events and festivals — it’s just now we’re really expanding our product offering and our ability to serve multiple markets well,” says Wes Bailey, 4Wall’s VP of mergers and acquisitions and product strategy.
Since August 2015, when private equity firm Odyssey Investment Partners added 4Wall to its portfolio and infused the company with capital, 4Wall has brought under their wing Paramount On Location (New York, announced Oct. 2017), Wagner Media (Houston, Orlando, Las Vegas; June 2017), Beame/Atomic Lighting (Lititz, PA; Oct. 2016), Visions Lightings (Brea, CA; Sept. 2016), BML’s film and TV division (New York; June 2016), Shadowstone (New York; April 2016), Entertainment Lighting Services/ELS (Los Angeles; Nov. 2015) and the used equipment website, Solaris Network (solarisnetwork.com).
That leaves the company with nine total locations (see Company Snapshot, below) and more product offerings and expertise than ever before, including in the video field. “It’s all a significant investment,” Bailey says. “Adding each company brings challenges, but we take them one at a time and make sure we spend time integrating and training. In the case of Wagner, we’re cross-training sales staff and technicians from both companies on lighting and video. We don’t want to just be a lighting shop that also sends out video gear.”
Odyssey Investment Partners has taken a relatively hands-off approach to 4Wall, supporting the growth into video and new markets, but letting those running 4Wall do what they do best, according to CEO Kathy Torjman. “Michael [Cannon] and I were going through the process being mindful of who we partnered with, and we went with Odyssey because they were interested in completely supporting what we do,” she says.
All at 4Wall are sensitive that “acquisition” can be a misleading word, Torjman adds. “It’s been hard to fight the perception that our growth is based on buying companies and then cutting costs, when in reality it’s based on adding what these companies do well and expanding on that, usually by putting more capital into the business in the form of more equipment, better facilities and so on,” she says. “We want to give the talented people at these companies the platform to grow their expertise.”
Managing the Growth
After Odyssey became involved, 4Wall owner Michael Cannon assumed the role of chairman of 4Wall, with Torjman elevated to CEO. Torjman started out at 4Wall as a controller in 2004 and was promoted to CFO in 2007 and COO in 2011. “As a private owner, you get to a certain point where the personal debt responsibilities are such that you’re held back,” she says. “Odyssey made a significant financial commitment to the 4Wall brand based on our personnel, commitment to customer service and cutting edge technology, and we are excited to build on this great foundation. Odyssey has allowed us to get into video and a couple of more geographic areas. And so far, it’s been an adventure!”
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Bailey understands all aspects of 4Wall and the business, having started in the shop in 2003. “After a stint in the shop, I moved into the office handling inventory control, and since I majored in journalism in college, I ended up running the marketing department of both 4Wall and sister e-commerce site UsedLighting.com,” he says. “I also spent plenty of time in new locations helping to set them up operationally prior to the private equity investment.” In June of 2016, he was named VP of M&A and product strategy, and he has been responsible for taking care of integration of new companies and employees as well as driving the inventory direction of the company ever since.
Bailey says that, once an acquisition is announced, they first focus on re-branding, and then get to work selling off older equipment on UsedLighting.com and buying new as they deem necessary. But it’s all very much a two-way street. “We hope to take what has made them good and make it part of us, and grow stronger and better from them,” he says. “We, in turn want to improve on their process of doing business if we can by giving them the support of a national company that they may not have had previously.”
Torjman adds that “our mindset is to look for companies that are likeminded. We started two years ago with five locations, and now we have nine. We have equipment in our inventory that we didn’t have before, but it’s important to me to make sure the growth we do is focused on the customer and what they are asking for.”
A Video Company, Not Just Video Gear
A few years ago, Cannon and Torjman were having discussions of how lighting and video technologies were merging, and the appeal of a one-stop-shop. By 2015, the 4Wall management team determined that expanding beyond lights and going into video was going to be key to their future. But they concluded that just writing checks for video gear was not going to serve their customers. “We knew we didn’t have the expertise in house, which meant an acquisition was the best path to adding quality people, successful products and market knowledge,” Bailey says.
Enter Wagner Media, a company with a stellar reputation for serving corporate video needs, who 4Wall acquired in June of this year. In addition to an office in Las Vegas, they had operations in Orlando and Houston, which 4Wall didn’t have. Wagner had a business model that was like 4Wall’s in many ways, including selling older gear to make room for the newer products. “They turned their gear every year and are always on top of the latest technology, so they were a great fit for us,” Bailey says. “Their people are fantastic, which made my task of creating seamless integration much easier.” It’s noteworthy that Wagner’s president, Bill Morris, a veteran of both the lighting and video industries, is playing a large role in the new 4Wall by assuming the title of regional GM for the Southeast, which includes the Nashville, Houston and Orlando locations.
Wagner’s Las Vegas office has already been consolidated into 4Wall’s HQ. “In addition to making video a true department inside the Las Vegas shop, we’ve created a bullpen in the office that now includes both lighting and video sales teams working as one,” Bailey says. Databases have been combined, and it was all flipped in a single weekend, with video gear leaving the Wagner warehouse on a Friday and then coming to its new home at 4Wall on Monday. But what’s important to Bailey is that all the salespeople can serve whatever the needs of the client are. This has meant getting Wagner’s people up to speed on all the lighting 4Wall offers and getting all the 4Wall people educated on video.
“We’re having sales teams crossed-trained, because we want just one person writing the whole order,” Bailey says. “This will create better experiences for the customers long term.” He adds that they are leaning on the Wagner team’s expertise in purchasing additional video components. “Wagner already has a lot of Epson and Barco projectors, and we’ll be building our inventory further to include more laser projectors. We definitely want to support what the market dictates.” This includes adding LED tile to Wagner’s offering, which primarily consisted of projectors, cameras and screens.
Bailey has an extensive to-do list. His next step is integrating 4Wall’s Nashville office with video gear. “We just expanded our Nashville location to 135,000 square feet, and 18,000 square feet of that building will be dedicated to video.” After that, it’s the New York office, which will receive video after the New Year. That location is also moving into a new, bigger space, taking over a 225,000-square-foot warehouse around the corner from its current facility. After that, the plan is to add video to Washington DC and Southern California while adding lighting to the Wagner Orlando facility.
Investing in Talent
Bailey says the response to the Wagner acquisition has been “hugely positive…our customers are pleased with our video offerings, and Wagner’s people are hearing that their ability to serve their long-time clients with additional lighting needs is appreciated,” he says. He adds that they previously shared many clients. “Two of their biggest Las Vegas clients were also among our top five largest clients in Las Vegas, so those types of clients are thrilled to have both their providers now under one roof.”
Torjman says when they go into a market, they aren’t intent on disrupting it or oversaturating it. “We’re looking for companies with employees with established customer relationships,” she says. “We’re augmenting the abilities these companies have to serve their loyal customers even better. The other thing we’re trying to do is supply each company we acquire with more gear their customers want.”
They are not done acquiring, and Bailey says they are looking at different parts of the country they currently aren’t in. “The main thing to know is that while overall the company has grown a lot, we’re still focused on quality,” Bailey says. “We’re not trying to cut cost or focus solely on the bottom-line; we are flexible and constantly investing in talent that we can bring in and learn from.”
“I don’t have a single-minded goal of how big we need to get,” Torjman adds. “The biggest thing I’m trying to do is keep focused on better service that includes more products our clients need. I can’t tell you what the company will look like in five years, because our growth strategy is primarily focused on how to better serve the market and our customers. We don’t have a mentality to grow without a purpose just for the sake of growing.”
Company Snapshot:
4Wall Entertainment
- When Founded: 1999
- Chairman: Michael Cannon
- CEO: Kathy Torjman
- HQ: 4Wall Las Vegas (NV)
Other Locations:
- 4Wall New York (Moonachie, NJ)
- 4Wall Pennsylvania (Lititz, PA)
- 4Wall Nashville (TN)
- 4Wall DC (Columbia, MD)
- 4Wall Orlando (FL)
- 4Wall Houston (TX)
- 4Wall Orange County (Brea, CA)
- 4Wall Los Angeles (CA)
More Info: www.4wall.com
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