(Image taken at the Total Show Technology, EDPA Open House depicting various guests)
By Ray Smith, Exhibit City News
Everything’s a blessing for Rick Pollock.
He’s been blessed with the success of his business, Total Show Technology (TST), which he founded in Las Vegas in 1996. His wife, Jennifer, and two kids are a blessing. So are his 15 employees.
Appropriately, after introducing his staff and family at an Experiential Designers and Producers Association (EDPA) open house to kick off the holiday season, he tells some 50 clients, vendors and competitors in attendance, “I feel blessed to have you all here.”
That’s right, blessed even for his competitors, “for keeping us sharp.”
MURPHY’S LAW
Long in the tooth from providing audio-visual equipment, LED walls, video games, laptop computers, staging, drapery and wireless internet service to trade show booths and special events, Pollock understands Murphy’s Law all too well.
How does he ensure everything goes according to plan?
“It’s through our experience and our training of employees,” he answers during a conference room interview, before the crowd arrives. “They know where the land mines are, and they help our clients navigate that mine field when it comes to technology for the best outcome and within their budget.”
Total Show Technology clients are set up for success, Pollock says.
“We’re not your vendor. We’re your partner in success. You’re set up for the best possible position,” he asserts. “We don’t consider ourselves a technology company. We’re a solution company that specializes in technology on our clients’ side.”
PRODUCT DELIVERY
Along with equipping exhibit booths at Las Vegas Convention Center, Venetian Expo and Mandalay Bay Convention Center, TST handles meetings and conferences at restaurants, nightclubs and hotels. Some work has come through Allegiant Stadium and T-Mobile Arena, not under TST’s name, but as a third-party provider of technology services.
Station Casinos is requesting a 10-foot screen; Driver’s Edge needs a 1,000-watt speaker; Steelhead Productions is taking a number of control and calibration laptops.
Pollock is able to optimize his clients’ budget by knowing how to scale back and where to scale back. Whether it’s a group of thousands or a few hundred, he finds a solution for each to be successful. Most importantly, TST delivers its product quickly to people in a “hard spot,” he says.
RIGHT FIT
The company moved into a 14,500-square-foot warehouse, production and office space in 2012, east of Reid International Airport and the Strip, tripling in size from its previous location. Pollock wondered if he could fill such space, and now the racks are packed to the ceiling.
Pollock recently hired an entry-level audio-visual technician at $15 an hour, after interviewing 80 applicants. “The person has to be the right fit for the job, but the job has to be the right fit for the person,” he explains. “If it’s not the right fit, the employee’s not going to be happy, the client’s not going to be happy and we’re not going to be happy.”
In other words, it’s a blessing to find that person.
