— San Diego-area winery now has a state-of-the-art distributed audio system, with the entire project – from equipment to design and installation – sourced through GC Pro and its Affiliate Program —
WESTLAKE VILLAGE, CA, September 24, 2013 — There’s always been something musical about the Salerno Winery. Located in the historic Ramona Valley American Viticultural Area, the small family boutique winery was opened in 1998 by former opera singer Herman Salerno and his wife Rose. And today, thanks to the resources of Guitar Center Professional (GC Pro), the outside sales division of Guitar Center that focuses on the needs of professional users, Salerno Winery now has music everywhere, in the form of a multi-zone distributed audio system. The system was designed and installed by The Stopper Group, a member of GC Pro’s Affiliate Program, and consists of 18 JBL Control 25 speakers, a QSC power amp, QSC powered speakers, a Mackie mixer, and Radio Design Labs preamps and switchers, as well as all mounting hardware, brackets, connectors and cables.
The system can provide background music, and also can connect with live music sources. The system is divided into four discrete zones: the upper dining area (three speakers); the lower dining area (three speakers); the winery’s Artwalk around the perimeter of the upper vineyard space, with speakers next to each of 10 bronze sculptures approximately placed every 30 feet; and the parking area (three speakers).
“This was a first for us – putting speakers in a vineyard,” recalls Steve Stopper, Owner of The Stopper Group. He says GC Pro Account Manager Javier Willis had brought him into the project as an Affiliate Program member. “There were a lot of things that had to be taken into account, including an enormous amount of cabling, including running the cables out into the vineyards for the Artwalk and using 0.75-inch PVC conduit to get them underground, and putting in a way to switch the system between prerecorded and live music on demand,” Stopper explains.
GC Pro Sales Associate Javier Willis says GC Pro’s Affiliate Program offers clients a huge advantage on complex projects like this one. “This was a very unique project requiring a lot of speakers with careful placement and a lot of cabling — it needed someone with an experienced eye to look over the landscape and see where the challenges would be,” he says. “The Stopper Group was able to be on site and help us fine-tune the equipment list for this, as well as do the actual installation. You can’t just sell products – you need to provide full service for clients, which is what GC Pro’s Affiliate Program excels at.”
Steve Stopper agrees, adding, “I think the synergy between GC Pro and our company gave this client a real advantage: GC Pro’s resources combined with our knowledge about how different pieces of this would best fit together. The client’s always the winner with that caliber of partnership.”
For more information, please visit
.