He’s Got the Magic Touch With Corporations : Ron Anderson’s firm provides its clients G-rated comedy, magic and other entertainment.
Combining a love of magic with business savvy was no trick for Ron Anderson.
Anderson, a 41-year-old magician and comedian, decided three years ago to form Entertainment Productions, a Westminster company that provides corporate clients with old-fashioned, good, clean fun.
Particularly busy during the party-filled holiday season, the company bills itself as offering wholesome entertainment designed for everyone. Translation: no offensive, off-color jokes from comedians during a show. Racist and sexist humor is forbidden, double-entendres are a no-no, male and female strippers are taboo.
“There seems to be a shift toward political correctness in the workplace, which helps my business,” Anderson said. “I always tell a client there is nothing in my show that will offend your workers. I give them a money-back guarantee.”
Anderson said several corporate executives have called him after hiring comedians with offensive jokes, some of which prompted workers to walk out during performances. His company has provided magic and entertainment for companies such as AT&T; in Los Angeles, Avco Financial Services in Irvine, Household Bank in Newport Beach and CB Commercial Real Estate Group in Cerritos.
“We’ve used him and his company for several events. It makes the difference between just a blah party and a lively one,” said George Delanoy president of Brea Travel. “I didn’t miss the off-color jokes because I don’t think you need that these days.”
Despite the large number of talented magicians and comedians in Southern California, Anderson said he is poised for success, partly because his degree in business administration from Cal State Long Beach gives him added insight into corporate culture.
“I look at this as a sales job, and I’m always selling,” said Anderson. “It’s a unique product, but it’s still a product.”
Anderson began performing magic tricks at 13, first holding shows for the neighborhood children in his parent’s garage in Rowland Heights. During summers he performed shows at area schools and charged 25 cents. By the time he attended high school, Anderson had business cards printed and was taking out classified ads.
In the mid-1970s, Anderson was with an Army entertainment division, serving as a master of ceremonies and magician for entertainment events for American troops in Europe.
“Wherever there were U.S. troops, we’d go and do shows,” Anderson said.
After the military, Anderson returned to California and settled in Long Beach, where he got married and had a son. He made money by working nightclubs in Southern California and on the cruise ships that called at the Port of Los Angeles, but his wife urged him to find work a little closer to home.
“That’s when I started looking at the corporate arena and began thinking of providing good, clean entertainment,” he said, noting it fit with his moral beliefs. Anderson said he did not want to tell jokes he couldn’t repeat in his own Westminster living room in front of his son. Bill Cosby’s brand of clean humor is his role model, Anderson said.
His company charges from $450 for a one-person comedy act to $10,000 for an elaborate show with several performers and props and draws from a pool of 20 performers, including illusionists, hypnotists and mind readers. Anderson began his company with about $20,000 from savings and expects to net $40,000 this year, up from $15,000 in the first year. He supplements his income with investments in real estate. He predicts Entertainment Productions will pull in $300,000 annually by 1995.
One reason for such optimism, Anderson said, is the potential to perform at company sales meetings and awards dinners, where a company’s philosophy can be incorporated into the performance.
For instance, if the company is focusing on boosting profits, Anderson might put a $100 bill on a table and make it rise into the air. At Nestle SA, he figuratively put candy from a competitor in a box and crushed it, a play on Nestle’s Crunch. He said it is often helpful to get a chief executive on stage in a humorous situation, because it helps employees to perceive their chief in a new light.
Anderson said he sometimes can’t believe his good fortune--calling it almost magical.
“Sometimes when I’m doing a show with performers I’ve known for years, and afterward we go out to dinner until 2 a.m. talking about magic and showing each other our newest tricks, I can’t believe I’m getting paid to do something I love so much,” he said. “I’m still doing just what I loved and wanted to do as a child. Now, how many people get to do that?”
