By Gary Kayye, CTS

Two years ago, I wrote a column for KNews where I said that if you are in the ProAV business and more than 75% of your business was in projectors, lookout.

Well, although that wasn't a statement that required a PhD to make, that has finally come to fruition. The economy has beset many of the projector-houses. In my first two installments on the economy I remarked that virtually everyone I spoke to in the ProAV business said that the economic slow-down had not, yet, affected them.

But, upon further review and feedback from readers, I realized that I might have spoken too soon. When I surveyed the dealers, I targeted systems integration companies, not projector, box resellers. So, as far as integration goes, all's well - for now.

But, as far as projector resellers who derive the majority of their sales selling boxes, business is down and down big. For some it started slow - happening over the course of four or five months. For others, it happened almost immediately in December and has not yet recovered.

This is sure to have some impact on our business as far as overall sales tracking, revenue reporting and profitability are concerned, but those dealers in the integration business are outperforming last year's numbers (not at the same growth numbers that they experienced in 2000 over 1999, but higher than 2000 in any case).

And last week, I received a truly enlightening e-mail from a KNews reader (an architect) who wrote, "Five years ago, I realized that the convergence of Bricks (physical space) and Clicks (cyber space) always occurs in a visual display of some sort. My interest in the audiovisual profession, products and system integration grew by a huge leap. I enjoy your newsletter and was struck by your recent comments about AV growth. I thought you might enjoy two observations an outsider has about AV professionals:

1. They underestimate the growth potential of their own audiovisual field.
2. They are hung up on the word 'Presentation' and consequently are sometimes missing out on the 'Interaction' side of the business, which is fueling a lot of the growth. The younger generation coming out of schools and into the workforce will demand technology everywhere, including all those conference rooms that now just have a table and chairs.

There are tremendous opportunities for AV."

Now, go out and Interact.

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Gary Kayye is Principal of Kayye Consulting a firm that specializes in providing marketing consulting, telephony integration and training development to the professional audiovisual industry. He spent 12 years at Extron and AMX as VP of Sales and Marketing before founding his own firm. He can be reached at www.kayye.com or via e-mail at gkayye@kayye.com.

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