MI Pro

Managing the great leaps forward that technology occasionally delivers is one of the hardest tasks that can face a manufacturer. It’s often the time when a fresh-faced upstart can sneak into the market and steal your crown. But occasionally, a company does it so seamlessly that it’s easy to overlook just what it is it’s achieved. Take Tascam, for example. In 1979, when the Portastudio was launched to an astonished MI world, analog recording wasn’t just king, it was the only way you could record. And it stayed that way, though losing ground steadily, until the new millennium, when digital finally triumphed, for all but a few die-hard analog fans. To have entered that transition as the most successful recording equipment brand in MI and to have come out of it in exactly the same position with a fully digital line-up is extremely impressive.

But perhaps even more impressive is that Tascam has fought a war on a second front, too. With the almost ubiquitous use of computers among music makers today, many had predicted that recording would follow so many other pursuits out of the realm of dedicated hardware and onto the laptop. For a lot of top-end home and professional recording that prediction might have been right – but somehow Tascam has managed to make a range of products so intuitive to use, so affordable and liked, that musicians still buy and use them, in preference to doing whatever it is their particular Tascam does on a computer.

The product that most people immediately associate with Tascam is the Portstudio, celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. While the market may not be quite what it once was when home recording began to boom in the 1980s, it is still a phenomenally popular seller and Tascam has gone on to develop other markets, too – notably the hugely popular guitar trainer sector and what has been the surprise hit of the past few years – the digital stereo recorder.

Not only has the technology changed. Tascam UK itself has changed a lot since MI Pro last spoke with it, five years ago. During that time, Tony Gravel, who has now clocked up an impressive 22 years with the company, has become responsible for Teac (the parent corporation’s) Tacsam operation in the UK, as part of a reorganisation which saw the relocation of several Teac operations to Germany, so it’s him we turn to for an overview of where Tascam UK is today.

We begin by asking about the current state of Tascam’s UK market and where Gravel sees sales opportunities for his many retail customers.

THE PRODUCT THAT KEEPS ON GOING

“The first thing to say is that the market for the Portastudio is still very buoyant. Though it’s smaller than back in the heady days of 1979, the product itself is still every bit as relevant to the end-user as it was. In terms of the bang per buck it offers and the appealing ease of use, it’s still a very relevant product and the DP-004, our entry level unit, sells in phenomenal numbers. Importantly, it is also bringing a lot of smaller stores back to Tascam.”

This aspect of Tascam today – its desire to work with and appeal to smaller stores – is something Tony Gravel returns to several times in our interview. Where once recording gear might have seemed the natural territory of high-tech stores, Tascam’s genius has been to make its products easy to use for those who still don’t feel entirely comfortable with computers, or don’t find them convenient or sufficiently portable. Happily, these are just the sort of customers who are more likely to patronise smaller shops, anyway – particularly ‘empty nesters’ returning to music making after a break and now with disposable cash and fond memories of the early days of multitracking.

“If you look at the DP-004, it doesn’t cost much more than a USB interface, it runs on SD cards, it works with either electric or acoustic guitars, having two microphones built-in – it has been a shot in the arm for us and it has helped show how relevant the concept still is today.”

Another product that is making serious waves is the stereo recorder. Gravel admits that this one caught many by surprise and that Tascam may have been late to market with its take on the concept, but it now has a full range. Though at first sight not a lot more than a very capable alternative to a field cassette or MD recorder, these are finding countless applications, not least with bands who want to record rehearsals and gigs and instantly share copies among the players. Then, of course, there are Tascam’s hugely successful guitar and voice trainers like the GT-R1 guitar trainer. Sales of these are, he says, “phenomenal”.

“That said, USB interfaces are also selling tremendously well and have been for years now – the US-122L and US-144 are in an award-winnng range, which has become a staple in a lot of music stores – both bigger shops and smaller independents. They are about to be replaced in the next few months, incidentally – three new interfaces are on the way, which will be launched at the AES in New York and will be available before Christmas.”

In fact, Tascam is currently on a launch crusade because, in addition to the new USB interfaces, a new Portastudio is on the way, too, also destined to help boost retailers’ Christmas period sales.

But even a host of well-timed new products isn’t a lot of use if retailers can’t sell them and a make a profit and this area is one where Gravel has some particularly interesting revelations – not least about ways in which he and his team have been working with eBay to counter excessive discounting.

“Because we are a subsidiary of Teac, Tokyo, as is Teac Europe, it’s in our interests and within our capabilities, to work closely with our European colleagues to make sure there’s a level playing field. Where you have different distributors in different countries, it can sometimes be a bit of a bun fight, but we have to make sure that we’re not treading on one another’s toes and we can work very closely together and help the dealers in that way.

“This has real benefits when, for example, Gary Maguire and Alex Farrell, our UK ASMs, go into shops, because they can show retail prices advertised, they can show the price we are selling to them and they can show that the retailer can make a margin. Slowly and surely that is a battle we are winning and it’s a result of the amount of time that we have spent on this.

VERIFIED BY TASCAM

“As for other areas where we have been trying to help, eBay runs something called the VERO programme, which stands for the Verified Rights Owner programme, and we have signed up to that. As to how it works, if an eBay seller has used the Tascam name, Tascam is our name and the rights belong to Teac Tokyo. So if someone is selling Tascam products and they are using our images from the web, or if they are using copy from our website and selling products too cheaply, or even if they aren’t a registered dealer, we can take action.

“I was made aware of the VERO programme a while ago and it takes a lot of very time-consuming leg-work. Basically, it allows you to log an offending item, following which eBay will look into it and if it agrees it conflicts with your rights, it will be removed. Some months ago, we came across a seller who was offering virtually every product we had. He said he was selling bankrupt stock, but he wasn’t and in the end I managed to get the whole account closed down. It turned out he was bringing it in from a store in America.

“It’s a very effective programme and it does seem to work, but it is time consuming to operate. I do think the majority of retailers are appreciative of the efforts we’ve taken to help them in this way. That said, you do still get the odd one. Just recently one said to me ‘Right – what is your company going to invest in us this year?’ I thought, well, apart from spending thousands on product R&D, manufacturing, shipping that product to you, spending money on making the consumer aware of it, providing service and backup, so you can put it on your website, discount it and wait for the cash to roll in? Well, not a lot really!”

THE INDEPENDENT APPROACH

Gravel is keen to stress how much importance Tascam UK places on smaller independent retailers and he feels the company has a lot to offer them.

“We are being approached by more and more independents these days – and the buying groups, too – and we make it very easy for them. It’s almost on a ‘one to go, one to show basis’, with very generous discounts, so that retailers can have one out on demonstration. And we don’t hold dealers to stocking one of everything – it’s down to what is relevant to the catchment area of that individual shop.”

One problem Tascam does experience among smaller dealers is that some don’t realise they are being courted by what they perceive as a giant concern.

“I had a case of that recently, in Cornwall,” Gravel says. “I went to see a retailer and he had just assumed he couldn’t get the line. It’s not until you talk to them about the products they can easily sell, like the  DP-004 or the DR-07, that they see there’s real potential there. We try to make it easy for them to get a representation of Tascam in their stores.”

In as much as some retailers need leading to the realisation of  Tascam products’ potential, so do the end-users. It’s when you actually play around with a GTR-1 that the metaphorical light bulb starts to shine your head and all the things you could do with one become apparent.

“Yes, for products like the guitar trainers, you’ve got to have them in the guitar area of a shop, not in a glass cabinet. If you put those in the guitar section so people can try them, they’ll sell and we’ll do all we can to help: our reps will help you secure them; we know they will get soiled, so we do a rotation system; we offer discounts on the demo models – this is something I’ve done since day one. You’ve got to have the kit out so people can play with them and the dealers that have taken us up on this have done really well with them.

“A lot of the people who’ll be drawn to the gear are oblivious to the recession. They see a new bit of kit that’s going to help them get to their goal as a player that bit quicker and they will find the money for it somehow.”

Beyond solely MI stores, Tascam UK has recently launched a dedicated sales and support service for the professional AV sector in the UK, headed by Gary Maguire, and it’s worth remembering that for all its success in the MI field, the company still has a huge amount of business in the professional arena – in some areas of which the transition to digital is only now taking place.

“As far as Tascam is concerned, we are embracing solid state, using SD and Compact Flash with products from rack-mounted install products to handheld Portastudios, right up to networkable hard drives and all sorts of alternatives to MDs and CDs. We see this continuing. Teac Corporation has built a whole lot more resources into Tascam this year and we’re seeing the benefits of that now in the new products that are coming along.

“In the next half fiscal year we’ve got 28 new products on our road map - which means before the end of March. That shows you how much emphasis Teac is putting on this market – from pro audio through to MI.”

And if even that isn’t quite sufficient to get the sales juices flowing, Tascam has yet another appetiser on the horizon. To celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Portastudio, the fourth quarter of this year will see a promotion to celebrate the birth of this iconic product and point of sale material is on the way for retailers, which they will be able to get from their Tascam ASMs.

“I keep coming back to how encouraging it is to see the number of small retailers coming on board,” says Tony Gravel. “We have a tremendous amount to offer them and I’d hate them to miss out because they imagine they were too small to interest us. Call the office, let us come out and talk with you about what might work for you and your particular business in your area. We are doing everything we can to work with and support retailers and we are certainly not prejudiced against the smaller independents and specialists.”

TASCAM: 08451 302511