Speaker Selection

Standardizing for Profitability

One of the best strategies that we can recommend for success in contracting is to standardize your operations wherever possible. Settle on a few basic system designs that can be modified to cover a wide variety of circumstances and then educate your sales staff about them. Develop standard pricing calculations, in cost per hour, for all of the basic labor items — putting in a can, pulling a cable pair, installing a plenum run, and so on. Rather than trying out a new, whiz-bang esoteric product on each installation, stock a carefully selected complement of proven performers and use them consistently. Often you can achieve significant savings by reducing the number of suppliers whose products you use. When you use several suppliers, you encounter differing lead times, minimum order quantity requirements, freight policies and payment terms that complicate your ability to respond quickly and consistently to demands from your customers. These are “hidden” overhead costs that affect your ability to generate a profit.

Distributed loudspeaker systems for paging and background music are among the most important “bread and butter jobs in sound contracting. In most cities, new restaurants, hotels, health clubs and clinics are continually sprouting up. Each one has needs that can be met by a distributed system, and each represents a potential client for the enterprising contractor.

The overwhelming majority of paging and background systems are relatively small, however. With the margin on many installations running in the $400 to $600 range, there’s not much room for error or misunderstanding, since the cost of a single callback can eat up most of the profits. To succeed with distributed sound systems, the professional contractor needs to be able to count on his jobs going in smoothly and efficiently.

In this article, we’ll explore some of the “nuts and bolts” issues that affect profitability in the distributed sound system market, and offer suggestions for improving your chances of success in the business.

Ceiling vs. Surface Mount Systems

Several factors will determine the choice of surface mount or flush mount (ceiling) speakers for a given job. The most common criteria are:

•Audio coverage requirements

•Audio performance needs

•Building structure design

•Esthetic requirements of the environment

Evaluating the choices among these primary criteria will often determine the format which is required for a listening area. It is important to note here that any installation may employ both types of products for different areas or to meet certain performance needs. For example to gain more control over sound coverage surface mount speakers may be employed but ceiling mount subwoofers may be utilized to keep the esthetic “footprint” or design impact of the speakers on the space relatively small.

Selecting & Positioning Ceiling Loudspeakers

In the traditional approach to overhead-distributed systems, loudspeakers are located in a grid arrangement whose dimensions are dictated by the room height and the directivity of the speaker elements. Two basic placement patterns prevail: square spacing, and hexagonal (or crisscross) spacing.

In addition to the spacing pattern, the designer must choose between three density types, designated respectively as edge-to-edge, minimum overlap and center-to-center (see Figure 1). The greater the overlap, the more uniform the coverage — and the higher the cost. Budgetary

ElectroVoice/Dynacord BGM Guide

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