Tour Sync Connects Musicians With All Aspects of Their Career
by Tim Wenger
‘Direct To Fan.’ The phrase has a great ring to it, and it is a phrase that transplanted Austin-based business Tour Sync has made their own since even before relocating to Denver late last year. Founder Chas Vergauwen brought his company to Denver last fall seeking to immerse itself in a market that strongly supports local businesses and that has an incredibly strong music community. It also didn’t hurt that several of his clients, who range from musicians to management companies and everywhere in between, have Colorado ties in one way or another.
If you have ever ordered merchandise from an artist’s website, joined a fan club, attended an autograph signing, or been a part of any other medium that connects artists to fans, part of your impression of that artist is likely formed by the experience you had. In many cases, and most all cases involving large-scale musicians, the artists themselves are not directly involved in organizing these mediums. An extremely long wait at a meet-and-great or a screwed up mail order makes the artist look bad despite the fact that they had little to no control over the situation and often aren’t even aware of the situation in the first place.
That is where Tour Sync comes in. By streamlining the processes and handling all aspects of their artist’s relationships with everything from promoters to fans, their mission is to see to it that everything is handled correctly, promptly, and as efficiently as possible. They understand that a successful artist’s strong point is their art, and the less they have to think about everything else, they better that art can be.
The company came to fruition based on two principles- artist to fan relations, and artist to management relations. “I played and toured for a little bit back in the day,” Vergauwen says. “Once I realized that wasn’t going to have a career path I got into management and a little bit of independent promotion. Then I found the niche in the direct to fan thing about five or six years ago in Austin. I basically utilized my experience of knowing the artist side of how they toured, and what managers did, and what booking agents had to do and understanding what it took to put on an event. That really set me up with understanding how to be a service provider for artists.”
The company has grown mostly based on Vergauwen and his team’s ability to use the relationships they already had in place through what they’ve done previously to find new contacts and keep growing through referrals and by following through on projects. Basically, by making a good name for themselves through hard work.
Their office, located at 1667 S. Acoma (about a half block west of Herman’s Hideaway), serves as home base for their operation. From here they ship artist merchandise directly to fans. A quick perusal at http://connect.toursync.com will get you up to date on everything and everyone they are currently working with, from local star Nathaniel Rateliff’s merch and music to classic rockers’ Kansas new documentary film Miracle Out Of Nowhere.
Behind the office is a storage room, where Tour Sync manages inventory and ships merchandise for artists on tour. “The cool thing about bringing this into one model is we can manage their e-commerce, their VIP fan club merch which is usually exclusive and different, and their tour merch, all under one roof.” Add in their connections with agents, Consonance Productions recording studio (conveniently located right next door to Tour Sync at 1669 S. Acoma), and management companies, and Tour Sync has the ability to handle all aspects of an artist’s back of house management and production under one umbrella. And for bands here in Denver, it’s all local.
Vergauwen wanted to move his company out of Austin into what he viewed as a rising market, which Denver most certainly qualifies in that respect, as the scene here has pushed a plethora of bands out into the national market over recent years and the music community here is undeniably very well bonded. “We do a lot of technology as well,” he says. “We’ll manage websites.
“From an industry standpoint, there is no labels or management companies that are burgeoning there,” says Vergauwen. “Over the last four or five years I’ve done a lot of business with 7S Management.” Much of that work has been with Rodrigo y Gabriela, whom Vergauwen and his team have been working with since 2011. “(The move) was kind of strategic in a way. Denver’s not LA, it’s not Nashville, it’s not New York. It’s kind of like what Seattle did in the nineties.”
Get more info on what Tour Sync can offer your group, or just check out the mega-store, at toursync.com.
Category: Buzzworthy
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