Production Firm Took a Chance on Wider Focus

In 1985, Craig Murray got an exclusive contract with his former employer, Walt Disney Studios, to produce motion picture and television trailers. As Disney revitalized its film slate, Murray’s company grew alongside it. But when the exclusive contract expired five years ago, Murray found that the other major studios had pigeonholed his company into the narrow focus of animation and family films. Faced with the dual problems of stereotyping and restless employees, Murray, 45, took a risk and found a creative way to hang on to his trained staff and branch out beyond his niche at the same time. He was interviewed by freelance writer Karen E. Klein.

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When Disney determined that they no longer needed us to be exclusive, we got the green light to take on additional projects. We had years of experience working on television and film trailers for movies like “The Little Mermaid” and “Toy Story.” These 2.5-minute productions have budgets ranging from $80,000 to $500,000 and up.

While we still wanted to work with Disney, we also were eager to expand our client base and capture nonfamily work. But it was difficult to expand beyond our reputation as an animation, family-film house. [Craig Murray Productions] had located in Burbank to be close to Disney, but I found that many potential clients and employees lived on the Westside and they didn’t always want to fight traffic to come out to our headquarters.

At the same time, I had spent many years developing talented employees who had matured to the point where they were anxious to stretch their wings on nonfamily fare. I tend to hire young people or people from outside the industry, so I can train them in the way we like to do business. We depend on our people to be very service-driven for our clients, and we tend to promote from within.

Putting these two situations together--the need to keep our great employees on board and the desire to go after more work--we decided to open a second office on the Westside in the fall of 1996.

I took about half a dozen employees who were ready to move to another level and, instead of losing them to our competitors, we opened a subsidiary called CMP West. The second company had a new twist and a chance to be independent from the day-to-day influence of the Burbank headquarters. From a studio point of view, we wanted to capitalize on the cachet and the equity in our name, but also position this as a separate company that we hoped would be looked on as a new resource in the industry.

Despite all the technology that is a crucial part of this business, it still makes a difference to be close to our clients. By locating in West Los Angeles, we have the convenience of hosting clients in our office or making a short trip to the studio to discuss contracts and present projects in person. The creative process still demands that.

A lot of people thought I was crazy, spending the money to open a whole new division, have offices professionally designed and upgrade to the latest technology. Once we had a state-of-the-art headquarters in West L.A., we had to do the same for the Burbank office, so we moved to a new headquarters there too. We also had to duplicate some of our basic services, and our profit margins have changed temporarily because we’ve invested, but by and large it’s proved very successful. We’ve probably tripled our business since CMP West opened, and I’m sure I would have lost a number of key employees if they hadn’t been given the creative opportunities they’ve gotten there.

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AT A GLANCE

Company: Craig Murray Productions

Owner: Craig Murray

Nature of business: Motion picture advertising

Location: 2717 W. Olive Ave., Burbank, CA 91505

Founded: 1986

Employees: 50

Annual revenue: $9 million

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If your business can provide a lesson to other entrepreneurs, contact Karen E. Klein at the Los Angeles Times, 1333 S. Mayflower Ave., Suite 100, Monrovia, CA 91016 or send e-mail to kklein6349@aol.com. Include your name, address and phone number.