Founders' Forum

From Coca-Cola to Twitter: Jeffrey Studley on the Dynamics of Change

• Marc Bernstein / Jeffrey Studley • Episode 70

Share episode

Is it possible to have too much change in business and personal growth? Join us in a compelling discussion where we dissect this question through the lens of memorable examples such as Coca-Cola's notorious formula switch, Madonna's endless reinventions, and Elon Musk's aggressive ventures, including his recent acquisition of Twitter. Ang and Ryan Sullivan balance the conversation by highlighting the critical aspects of risk-taking and the speed of change, while today's guest, Jeffrey Studley, shares invaluable insights from his 30-year journey in the business world. Jeffrey's perspective on continuous technological advancements offers a nuanced view on the challenges and opportunities of constant transformation.

In another segment, we explore how companies have swiftly adapted to technological advancements for live events, especially during the pandemic. We discuss how flexible roles and familiarity with virtual technologies helped one company thrive in uncertain times, yet the return of in-person events highlights our innate need for physical interaction. We also dive into the significance of long-term strategic vision for sustained success, emphasizing goal-setting and future planning over merely reacting to daily changes. Tune in for an episode packed with essential lessons and inspiration for both entrepreneurs and business leaders.

About Jeffrey Studley:
Jeffrey Studley is the Founder of CPR MultiMedia Solutions.  He grew up in the resort region known as the Borscht Belt in upstate New York, and went to Conell School of Hotel Administration. He got a call from cousin in audio field who saw a monochrome low-res projector at a trade show and said this would be a growth industry. After thinking he could spend a few days every other week in DC area doing the admin part of the business, Jeff had to move there because he was at the tip of the spear of this quickly growing industry. He’s since stayed at the cutting edge of new developments in this industry using the technology for live events.

Connect with Jeffrey:
Website cprmms.com
LinkedIn linkedin.com/company/cpr-multimedia-solutions
Instagram instagram.com/cprmms
Facebook facebook.com/jeff.studley.94 
YouTube youtube.com/@CPRMultiMediaSolutions

This episode is brought to you by CPR MultiMedia Solutions; A Full Service AV Event Solutions Provider. Go to cprmms.com to learn more.

📅 New episodes every Wednesday—hit “Subscribe” now!

💬 Love the show? Let us know! Leave a quick rating & review here—your feedback helps us grow!

📲 Stay connected with Marc Bernstein:
➡️ Follow on Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook

🎤 Got a success story worth sharing?
We’re always looking for visionary founders to feature! Apply here to be a guest on the Founders' Forum Radio Show & Podcast.

📩 Join our email list here so you never miss an episode.

Announcer:

The following programming is sponsored by Marc J Bernstein. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of this station, its management or Beasley Media Group. Entrepreneur, author and financial consultant, Marc Bernstein helps high-performing entrepreneurial business owners create a vision for the future and follow through on their goals and intentions. Ang Onorato is a business growth strategist who blends psychology and business together to create conscious leaders and business owners who impact the world. Founders Forum is a radio show podcast sharing the real stories behind entrepreneurship as founders discover more about themselves, while providing valuable lessons and some fun and entertainment for you. Now here's Marc and Ang.

Marc Bernstein:

Good morning America. How are you? How are you?

Ang Onorato:

Ang that's a real, that's a real question.

Marc Bernstein:

That's not a rhetorical question how are you? You're great Good. We also have Ryan Sullivan, who is our last guest on Founders Forum sitting in on the panel.

Ryan Sullivan:

Good.

Marc Bernstein:

Appreciate it, how you doing, doing good. We also have Jeff with us this morning. I'll give you his full introduction in a minute. So the topic for today is we talk a lot on the show about change and in fact, a week or two ago we actually paid Ch-Ch-Changes, we paid David Bowie's song and had a little intro into all the change that's going on.

Marc Bernstein:

But I've had this thought recently about thinking about our own business and thinking about other things that are going on. Can change be too much? Can there be too much change? And one of the things that occurred to me and I've prepped our guests on this conversation, but I didn't bring this one up Anyone remember when Coca-Cola changed their formula and they came out with a new formula and it was a total disaster, right, you know. So people didn't like it because they changed the thing that made them what they were and they thought, nah, it's just marketing, we can have a new, improved flavor, and all that didn't work.

Marc Bernstein:

Two other things that occurred to me that we have talked a little bit about in our prepping for this show, which was an article I read this morning about Madonna in the Atlantic, and it basically just talked about how, you know she's always changing, but what doesn't change for her is change, you know, and that she's always putting herself out there in new ways and it can be controversial. I won't go into all that because I'll let you all comment on that, but the latest thing, of course, was her. The way she looked at the I don't remember one of the award shows and you know, and whatever she did to herself and the criticism of that. And the other person that occurs to me we talked a little bit about that I think about a lot about is Elon Musk. I think about him because I drive Teslas for the last 11 years, really, pretty much since they came out in America, and also because I'm a shareholder in the company and you know I get concerned about, you know, as an example, the acquisition of Twitter.

Marc Bernstein:

Was that a smart thing? Was that good for us Tesla people, or was it too much? Is it going over the top? Whatever that is. So I won't express my opinions, because I'm sure there will be a lot of opinions in all of this. But, ann, just give me your thoughts and we'll go around the circle on this.

Ang Onorato:

Yeah, I mean, I think it's another awesome topic. You pick one, Marc, that we could probably have three-hour shows on, but you know, I think there's two great examples right, the way I look at Madonna has always been for 40 years. What's constant with Madonna is that she's constantly reinventing herself, and I think that's what keeps people talking about her. And I think celebrities and even, you know, entrepreneurs like Elon Musk they are known for taking chances and taking risks and how they reinvent. Some things, you know, end up like a lead balloon, but others they take off in ways that nobody could conceive of. And I think sometimes, if you're not provocative and you don't take those risks, then the things that they do produce, you know, it would never happen. I think it takes a special person, a special founder, to step out on a limb the way that those kind of people do, the ones that you just marked for sure.

Marc Bernstein:

Well, thank you for that. I'll ask Ryan your thoughts on that.

Ryan Sullivan:

Yeah, I think it's the way, like when I think about change, I think about speed of change, so like it's not that like too much change is a bad thing. I just feel like when it happens too fast it's, it's typically you just can't keep up, right, because we could barely keep up when there's just the natural change that occurs without us trying to force any change. And then, once we try to force a change, it's such a paradigm shift that, uh, it makes it easier. This is kind of an esoteric way of looking at this, but like it makes it easier kind of the slower the change happens when it, when you're trying to make it happen.

Marc Bernstein:

You know there's moments when, when you just have to change, you're forced to you know, it's a great insight, but and and the thing about the speed of change is, it does seem like the speed of change has accelerated, especially when it comes to technology and how it's affecting the world the latest things, ai, but that you know, it's changing at such a rapid pace that it's almost hard for everybody to keep up with it on all sides of it. And Jeffrey Studley is our guest today and I'll fully introduce him in a minute. But, jeff, your thoughts on this?

Jeffrey Studley:

Well, change has been the cornerstone of my business for the last three decades.

Marc Bernstein:

That's why I saved you for last.

Jeffrey Studley:

We have technology that my team is just finally wrapping their arms around when it becomes yesterday's technology, and it's a new thing to learn and it's been the keystone to our growth and our success and yet a huge challenge at times. So change is interesting.

Marc Bernstein:

It's necessary and interesting at the same time, I guess. So that's a great way to introduce Jeffrey. So Jeffrey Studley is CEO of CPR Media, I believe, right.

Jeffrey Studley:

Multimedia.

Marc Bernstein:

Multimedia, I'm sorry, CPR Multimedia, because it's not written on your bio and CPR stands for Computer Projection Rentals, I believe correct.

Jeffrey Studley:

Yes, it does, and we changed it to Multimedia Solutions when we went from being strictly a video company to encompassing all of the things that our clients wanted to support the need and use of the video.

Marc Bernstein:

So I'll tell you a little bit more about Jeffrey and then we'll get more into that. So he grew up in the resort region known as the Borscht Belt in upstate New York. So, by the way way, just as an aside, as a young kid I had relatives that had ran wieners cottages in the catskills. Um, so I, you know, more or less had a little bit of my childhood in the in the borscht belt as well, and he went to cornell school of hotel administration. At one point he got a call from a cousin in the audio field who saw a monochrome, low resolution projector at a trade show and said this would be a growth industry. So he had vision in multiple ways.

Marc Bernstein:

After thinking this is Jeffrey talking. I could spend a few days every other week in the DC area doing the administrative part of the business. I had to move there because we were at the tip of the spear of this quickly growing industry. He has since stayed at the cutting edge of new developments in the industry using this technology, as he alluded to before, using the technology for live events. So welcome Jeffrey, good to have you here today.

Jeffrey Studley:

My pleasure, thank you.

Marc Bernstein:

So you just told the story of how you got into it and I know there have been challenges along the way in the business and I understand it's a successful business. Today We've talked offline a little bit about what your future looks like and what your succession plan in the business might look like, et cetera. So it's obviously built into something that's substantial. So how did you get where you are today and what were the challenges that you faced along the way?

Jeffrey Studley:

Well, we stayed on the track of being the first that got us launched. At the beginning, we looked for all of the new technologies in the display industry, from the original, as you mentioned, crt projector to the LCD projector, to the DMD projector, et cetera, et cetera, and we watched as the speed of change grew ever faster and realized that the way to get in front of people in this world, in our industry, was to be the first. I was once running down the stairs at a conference in.

Jeffrey Studley:

France where a new projector was being introduced, and racing to beat a fellow from California to be the guy to hand the first purchase order from the Americas to a Barco representative, so we could claim to have the first of this technology in the. United States, and that's been one of our key success formulas since the beginning.

Marc Bernstein:

Were there difficulties you faced in becoming the first each time? I'm sure you had to kind of step over some people who sort of had to you know, position yourselves to always be the first. What were the challenges with that?

Jeffrey Studley:

Well, the challenges tended to be seeing other people who sensed what we sensed Unexpectedly. We weren't challenged by the big guys that were long established in the audiovisual or display markets because they move slower. We were challenged by other guys such as ourselves, young upstart entrepreneurs who said, hey, this is cool, what's the latest thing going on? And so that was our challenge to see what was coming and be the first in line to understand it and understand the clientele and the market that was looking for it Interesting.

Marc Bernstein:

So the big guys I was thinking about that. I was wondering if you were going to say that it's harder to turn the Titanic around than it is to be an entrepreneurial company. That's nimble.

Jeffrey Studley:

One of the things that resulted from that was that the big guys often came to us when and they call the big guy or the in-house AV company at some hotel or something and they say, do you have this? And after they scratched their head and went online to find out what their potential client was even talking about, they would then call us and we would say, yeah, we have it, we can rent it to you, we can provide that service for you, and that was a key part of our success to this very day. We're the guys who understand and have the newest thing, and we become the resource for the guys who have big swaths of the market for other reasons.

Marc Bernstein:

Nice, I know the pandemic obviously because you do live events. So the pandemic obviously brought some challenges. Do you want to talk about that a little bit?

Jeffrey Studley:

The most challenging thing we've faced in our corporate history.

Jeffrey Studley:

we are a live event company and I was at a conference of our event production network that DeepR was one of the founding members of, and a fellow with offices in Mexico got a call the first day and he came to the cocktail party that night and he was a little down looking and he said what's the matter? I said well, you know, but my office is in mexico where everyone has to fly to. They're getting tons of cancellations because nobody wants to get on a crowded airplane. Well, he said we lost sixty thousand dollars in bookings today and he said wow, that's a bummer, sorry, yeah. The next night he came down and he was that's a bummer, sorry, yeah. The next night he came down and he was incredibly depressed looking and he said I just had six hundred thousand dollars worth of booking cancel.

Jeffrey Studley:

All of us went back and called our offices and started to get the same information. So what had happened in a three-day period in march? Uh, we went from being happy to see each other and talk about the industry to leaving and talking about what was devastating our industry and, of course, that put us on the path to virtual and, while it's no replacement for a live event, it was the one thing that was growing in our world, and so we jumped on that.

Marc Bernstein:

So you were able to adopt and change to helping in a sense you're helping the technology production of the virtual events at that point.

Jeffrey Studley:

Exactly Putting up the back screen, doing the video for multi-camera things. A lot of virtual wasn't just, you know, one-on-one, it was. Let's try and have this same conference we had last year, but we'll do it in this new telephonic computer way.

Marc Bernstein:

Very interesting. I know Ang has some questions she'd like to ask you, and I see Ryan's curious as well, and feel free to jump in. But we have a commercial break right now and we'll be back in a minute. We'll talk about post-pandemic.

Announcer:

When it comes to live events, you only have one chance to get it right. With a commitment to superior customer service and state-of-the-art technology, CPR Multimedia Solutions has been getting it right for over 36 years. Cpr Multimedia Solutions has the expertise and the technology to wow your audience. Whether it's a conference or a concert, a grand opening or a trade show booth, we have the latest video, audio and lighting technology to get your message seen and heard. Cpr's indoor and outdoor LED screens display your message day or night in high resolution. Fitting into a parking space, our self-powered mobile LED screen trailers show your content like the big screens in a stadium, with great audio support. Whatever type event you have coming up, call us at 301-590-9400. We'll help you create an experience for your audience that they will talk about with others and always remember that's CPRMMScom.

Marc Bernstein:

Hi, we're back on Founders Forum. Anne, do you want to take it? Yeah?

Ang Onorato:

so you know, jeff, I love to kind of ask and chat with founders in terms of you know, we understand your story and kind of what led you to build the business that you have. But, compared to our topic that we talked about this morning, you shared about how nimble and how you reinvented the business and being ahead of technology. How has that helped you in terms of your staff, in terms of how have you onboarded them in the past? Talk to us a little bit about what's the tenure of folks and how are you thinking about the future the future, the future of work and the needs of employees, and how, if any way, how, has that changed for you as you're preparing for, kind of, the next iteration of the business?

Jeffrey Studley:

Well, the same thing that attracted a lot of the clients to us attracted some of our best technical employees. They wanted to be putting their hands on the stuff they read about. That was going to be the next coolest thing and we were the guys who had it. So that was a great attraction. From the very beginning, we've always been very what do you want to do with our employees as well. If they come on board and they say I don't really want to do that, we say, okay, you're going to be better doing what you want to do than what someone tells you you have to do. And that's been a pretty successful formula for us that people who came on and were lighting guys and then saw an LED wall and said, wow, can I shift into that department? Sure, you're motivated. We don't have to motivate you, you're internally motivated. That's great for us as management.

Jeffrey Studley:

So that's one of the things we did find a real challenge after COVID, when we had to put that, as everyone in the industry did, on employees. That many of them said later you know, I like being able to choose what I want to do, so I'm a freelancer. Now We'll call them sometimes and say, hey, we've got this and they go. What exactly is that job about? No, no, thank you. So that's a new challenge, but it's an opportunity to also find the right people for every application and every job. So when we're making those phone calls and relying more on freelance people, we find that we can often fill that slot more appropriately than when you have a larger full-time staff that you have to get on the job. So that's been a plus and a minus at the same time.

Ang Onorato:

Yeah, well, I think it's super smart. I mean, I think that's a true definition of what the market you know in my 30 years of executive recruiting and understanding the changing mindset of leaders and staff and technical people is giving them that opportunity to build their career and the work that they want to do. So it sounds like you've made it work for both them, you know and the business. So that sounds like a really smart and appropriate way to reinvent and to change, to adapt, as we talked about today.

Marc Bernstein:

I want to add Ryan is a technology guy. He's in the podcasting business. He's the CEO of Podcast Principles and works a lot with technology. I think he might have something he wants to ask Jeff.

Ryan Sullivan:

Yeah. So, jeff, I actually was one of those freelancers, not for you, but I was doing Zoom production by necessity in the pandemic, so I understand a little bit deeper what you're talking about. In terms of switching to the virtual, was it like a complete 180 flip, or did you guys already have a good idea of the kind of virtual event production? Or was it like complete night and?

Jeffrey Studley:

day. It was not complete night and day because a number of our clients were already doing certain virtual technology uses because they were a global company. They might be having a big conference where we had 3,000 people in a ballroom but they wanted to send it to Europe for the people that they weren't willing to fly over here to the in-person event. But we had a good basis of knowledge and a lot of the technology already cameras, all of the equipment required to gather the information for a virtual. We just had to become facile with the new technologies of hooking computers up and dealing with limited bandwidth issues that we started to discover and things that hadn't been on our plate before.

Ryan Sullivan:

Yeah, you need a good Internet connection at the very least. Indeed, I felt that too.

Marc Bernstein:

Jeff, I know one of the things that we had talked originally offline about your business. You know post-pandemic. You mentioned it's harder to get people to come back to work. I know that's one of your challenges. What kind of challenges do you face going forward in the business?

Jeffrey Studley:

A lot of organizations, because of the virtual turnabout uh, have made that part of their internal operation and that's been a bit of a challenge, um, the some of the things that we used to do entirely for a client, they do a chunk of it now themselves. But we've seen an awful lot of desire, despite our initial trepidation about it, for people to gather together.

Jeffrey Studley:

People like to be in the same room and like to get together and getting together on a TV screen or a computer laptop is not the same thing as getting together with people from around the world to discuss what they do with each other.

Marc Bernstein:

Gotcha, you know we were talking a little bit before. I was in Las Vegas a few days ago, got to see the Sphere, which is talking about new technologies Unbelievable. But what I noticed in Las Vegas is there's no shortage of visitors, conventions, conferences, I mean. It seems like people really do want to gather lately. So it sounds like you know back to the future a little bit maybe in terms of where your business is headed.

Jeffrey Studley:

Very much so. We were, as I say, very trepidatious about it, but we have seen that people over the years have built up this whole convention, et cetera, gathering style, because that's an innate part of human nature, apparently. People want to be next to other people and the TV screen is not the same.

Marc Bernstein:

While you were waiting not that you were waiting, you weren't sitting still, but during that time so you went to more virtual and now you're coming back to live. I imagine the technology has changed again. While all that's going on for the live events.

Jeffrey Studley:

For the live events. It changed a lot. One of the major changes, and once again one of the things we recognized before COVID, was LED screens. We have a lot of projectors in our warehouse that go out very infrequently now because LED screens have become the thing. They don't require the beam of projection light to be unobstructed from the back of the room or the space to do rear projection that eats up the square footage of a room. It's bright enough to overcome stage lighting and still look good on camera. So our world has changed in a large part from projection to LED as a display technology and of course in every area. Things have gone from analog to digital and that continues across the board Audio, you name it, even digital lighting control, which is an analog sort of technology.

Marc Bernstein:

Right, and I'll just go back to Sphere again for a second because the sound is the most incredible sound I've ever heard. The video is the most incredible video and I think let's see if I have the numbers right. So, and I think let's see if I have the numbers right, but I think that it's some like 57 million light bulbs or something, or 57,000 light bulbs.

Jeffrey Studley:

I'm not. I mean some crazy number 57 million sounds right.

Marc Bernstein:

And it's not light bulbs it's LEDs, leds, right, that's right and it's the individual light generating component.

Marc Bernstein:

Because each panel has a whole bunch of leds in it. Right, right, right. It's amazing and you know when you're up, when you're, when you're, when you're up close to it, like from the outside, you can almost see that. But you move back a few feet and it just looks like this smooth globe that has all this, these amazing images, moving images, built into them. I mean, the technology really blows my mind.

Marc Bernstein:

And the sound. You know, there's the thing about everybody sitting in there has different sound, hears it differently, and it's purposely set up that way so they have a different experience. Um, it's much, much different sitting downstairs, sitting in front of the band and having that experience than it is. I was up in the upper deck and a lot of people said that's the best because you could see like the whole sphere and you could get all the sound. And the sound was perfect. And the way I judge perfect sound anymore at concerts is if you can have perfect sound and have all the power of rock and roll band or a hip hop band, hip hop group or you know, act and and and still talk and have a conversation at the same time. That's unbelievable and and that's exactly the way it is in there and it's so it's. It's amazing that rapid technology advances, that we're having Jeff. We like to find out a little bit about the person behind the company, so I know you like to read. What are your favorite books?

Jeffrey Studley:

Wow, I tend to have lifelong been a science fiction fan, because it's so, I guess, indicated where I ended up being at the cutting edge of our industry in science. But I like the idea of discovering new things and reinventing my understanding of what's going on around me.

Jeffrey Studley:

I went back, I would say Bradbury and Heinlein were great authors. I haven't read much science fiction recently. I'm getting more into and maybe this is because I'm aging. I'm reading biographical books Me too, following what other people have done over the course of a lifetime. As I look back at what I've done over the course of a lifetime, by the way, you and I are similar ages.

Marc Bernstein:

I'm not really a science geek or anything, but as a kid I love science fiction as well, so mine were. Did you read tom swift when you were a kid? When a young kid I did not oh, you didn't, tom.

Marc Bernstein:

Swift is all about these futuristic space race type things and all that. So that was it would have been at an earlier age, before bradbury, and that kind of thing. But yeah, I love that stuff as a kid and you know we grew up in the space age. You know it was like all about sending. You know the mission to send rocket ships into space and to the moon and all that.

Jeffrey Studley:

We do a lot of work and have done some installations at the Air and Space Museums here in Washington DC, the Smithsonian and I'll go and work as a hand if we get to spend a day amongst all of that cool technology.

Marc Bernstein:

Interesting. We were talking offline about Cornell Tech. I should take you there sometime. You should check it out. You would love that because there's so much technology and space-related stuff going on there. One last question for you If you could speak to your younger self, what advice would you give you looking back?

Jeffrey Studley:

I would say think farther out. When I was really young, I was about what was going on around me at that time and it was not negative. I love to travel, I love to experience new things, but I didn't have a long-term game plan. Getting out of college, let's go to the coolest restaurant city in the world, new York and I'll figure it out from there. So I sort of got into the long-range planning when I landed in this industry and started to see how quickly things changed, that you had to plan ahead. You couldn't just wake up in the morning and say, oh, what's going on. You had to be thinking what's going to be going on when I wake up a year from now? And that's been a key to our continuous success.

Marc Bernstein:

So you would be more of a planner early on.

Jeffrey Studley:

Yes, have a vision early on. Yes, have a vision, have a goal. Yep, I love experiencing life and travel and all of that, but knowing where you want to end up is part of that, should be part of that Excellent.

Marc Bernstein:

Well, thank you for those words of wisdom to yourself and to everybody else listening, and thank you all for being here at Founders Forum today with us, and we look forward again to seeing you next week. Thank you, Ang, thank you Ryan Sullivan, and thanks to our guest, jeffrey Studley.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Marc Bernstein

Host