Casaplex, a Washington, D.C.-area custom installation firm that recently acquired residential AV-focused Encore AV (keeping the brand) to boost its resi prowess and home theater expertise, aims to leverage its efficiency to assist other integrators with large projects.
Back in the day, Casaplex installed a number of nightclub systems, growing organically. But CEO Derek Goldstein and vice president Nelson Garcia, the two first and only employees in the very beginning, knew that in order for the company to grow rapidly and efficiently, they needed to establish best practices.
Today, that manifests itself in a holistic set of products, processes and philosophy Casaplex calls System One.
“We really want to help some of the smaller integrators out there who maybe never plan to staff up to have their own service department, strong back office, and engineering, etc. We want to take this concept of System One [S1] and share it in the market with trusted dealers we’ve worked with in the past, and those we meet in the future. The idea is to help the industry through these partnerships,” says Goldstein.
“This is an industry built on relationships with your clients. We don’t have every relationship out there with every client. We want clients who work with a smaller shop — which may not have the personnel or resources for dedicated design, programming, and service departments — to be assured that they are not getting a system that will die on the vine and not be serviceable,” Goldstein explains. “We really want to advance the market. One of our focuses this year is on the residential market and finding other integration partners that share our same philosophy and want to leverage some of the back-office work that we’ve done.”
The target CE pro is a smaller shop that occasionally takes on large projects, but lacks a dedicated programming team and service department. Goldstein believes by partnering with Casaplex, those small custom integration companies can more easily develop a plan for growth because it eliminates the stress of worrying about whether or not a client will be taken care of long term.
“We want to work with partners to help improve their processes and efficiency; we’re not going to do the onsite work, we want dealers to maintain and improve the relationship with their client base” he says.
The program is well suited for the Casaplex Encore Theaters brand of dedicated home theaters. Ian Williams, principal of recent Casaplex acquisition Encore AV, foresees the merged company helping dealers upsell into this highly specialized offering.
“There are a lot of integrators who are afraid to sell high, even though they have a qualified client who is looking for the best of the best. We’re here to help out with that, with our knowledge and expertise,” he says.
In that scenario, Casaplex Encore Theaters would help dealers bring a $20,000 theater up to a $100,000 or even $250,000 theater, explains Williams. Casaplex Encore Theaters would provide all the design, engineering and prefabrication so the project is ready to roll out the door. The partnering custom integrator would do the installation.
“The partner maintains the relationship with the client and healthy profit margins, but all the headache is taken out of their hands,” says Williams.
A dedicated team member from Casaplex would be assigned to each project and involved in the quality control process. Integrators who are interested in learning more about the S1 program can contact Casaplex at casaplex.com/s1.
Read the full profile: How Casaplex Acquired a Competitor to Own the Home Theater Market
If you enjoyed this article and want to receive more valuable industry content like this, click here to sign up for our digital newsletters!
