Profession:
Director, STS Touring Productions &
Managing Director, Tour Supply

Date & place of birth:
April 12 1973; Wythenshawe, Manchester, UK

What was your first job after full-time education?
I have only ever worked in the music business. Crewing for bands whilst doing my ‘A’ Levels is where it all began. I was 16 at a show and I watched the tech during change over doing his work, and I thought that’s what I want to do.

And how has your career path steered you towards setting up a technical and logistical solutions company for the touring/event sector?
Working with Pete Dutton in the early ’90s as local crew at a nightclub, he led me into work experience with Phantom Power. I’d been working there for some time and got to know Pete well. He and I purchased some of the PA stock from Phantom and went into business together as STS Touring Productions. In August 1997, STS became a Limited company. It wasn’t necessarily the intention at the time to set up a multifaceted supply company but that’s how it’s developed.
   
What’s the secret to becoming the largest backline operation outside of London?
Well, the biggest key to it is not being in London! We have effectively created our own market for backline with lots of hard work, enabling event organisers and promoters to put on shows that require backline knowing there is a supply company on their doorstep. Nationally, we are a cost-effective alternative to the London suppliers and with a vast inventory are a major supplier in general.

Are there any particular projects that you look back on and think ‘Wow, how did we achieve that?’
There aren’t any particular projects that are special to me as it’s the people pulling them off that are special, and they are doing it all the time. There are some incredibly skilled people in this business and we are lucky to have several at STS. I do sometimes think about what we have achieved as a whole overall with STS so far and wonder how we did that!

What is one main challenge that faces STS Touring?
Second guessing where the industry is going and always being one step ahead all the time, because if you get that wrong you can be left behind very quickly. Doing this for one discipline is hard enough, STS does it for four — backline, lighting, PA and staging.

Have you ever been challenged to supply bizarre pieces of kit?
Sofas, standard lamps, pigs’ heads, broken TVs, Holy Grail style goblets, Victorian street lamps with DMX control, fake guns and mannequins.
  
How did Tour Supply come on to the scene?
Larry Martin and Lance Wascom started the company in 1998 in Minnesota. I first came across Tour Supply in 2003 and used them in the USA for all my touring supplies. I compared it to how I sourced all the items I needed in the UK, realising pretty quickly that it was actually a much harder process using several suppliers and music shops. Pete and I discussed the idea of opening a Tour Supply at length and began talks with the guys in the USA. In 2007, the final deals were done and in March 2008 Tour Supply Ltd finally opened. We haven’t looked back, thanks to all our customers.

What is unique about this company?
In all the Tour Supply shops it is the unparalleled customer service and product range that makes it unique. We supply what the customer needs, where they need it, simple as that. Tour Supply also has the mobile Portakabin shop that goes to many of the festivals in the UK, the touring crews love us being there. No one else does the mobile shop and no one else sells the product range we sell.

What occupies your free time?
Free time is a bit thin on the ground, ask my fiancée! Movie nights, curry, spending time with the family, and attempting to play drums again..

Your Desert Island Disc? 
‘Cat’s In The Cradle’. It reminds me of my dad, I can relate to it a lot having spent so much time away from home over the years and when I was younger my Dad always spent a lot of time at work. I have such a lot to thank my parents for. They made a lot of things possible for me, and I blame them for giving me that work ethic I have and the way I turned out!

Finally, what would be your advice to a teenage Paul Collis? 
I would tell him to say ‘yes’ to the monitors job with a little-known (at the time) US act called Slipknot for their first European tour, and to stop walking backwards a couple of inches before falling off the back of the truck in Poland (that hurt).
    Seriously, I would say be prepared to be involved in the best industry in the world with the best people. Love it, because if you don’t love it and love the job you do, then this business isn’t for you.