Viewpoint Studios is preparing to launch a New York City-based advertising agency that it hopes will bring more business to the photo studio.
John Pardy, president of Viewpoint, said Look Advertising will launch Aug. 1 in the SoHo section of New York City. The agency will initially have about 10 staffers and will be led by veteran marketing executive Ed Little, who has experience in the fashion and retail industry with companies such as Macy's Home Store and J.Crew.
The agency will not only drive business at the 85-person photo studio in High Point, but will also allow the company to capture a bigger share of clients' marketing dollars.
Now, Pardy said, it's hard to convince a corporate customer that they should hire Viewpoint to handle an entire marketing campaign, rather than just the relatively small commercial photography piece of it.
Photo studios in High Point employ hundreds of people and have well over 1 million square feet of studio space. Historically, the cluster depended on furniture makers, which needed elaborate commercial photography for marketing purposes.
But as the domestic furniture industry has shrunk, High Point studios have sought to diversify. They've opened up new lines of business and pursued clients outside the furniture industry.
Viewpoint Studios has about 50 percent of its business with the furniture industry, down from 60 percent three or four years ago, Pardy said.
"Clearly over the last several years the photography cluster has been growing," said Loren Hill, president of the High Point Economic Development Corp. "They're all diversifying or finding a niche somewhere."
Kreber, another photo studio, has added retail catalogs as a big part of its business. The company hired a New York City catalog veteran, David Christenson, to be its president. He helped Kreber land clients for which the company can provide both photography and also design and production services.
Viewpoint Studios hopes the advertising agency will enable it to expand beyond photography into creative services for all types of media, branding and other marketing services.
Ultimately, Pardy hopes the entire company will be driven by Look Advertising.
"Viewpoint Studios will really become a production arm of the agency," he said. "The agency business has just so much more potential revenuewise than the studio business."
Viewpoint Studios
President: John Pardy
Address: 4328 Federal Drive, Greensboro 27410
Phone: (336) 632-0202
No. of employees: 85
Web site: www.vpstudios.com
