My Biz: A/V company keeps pace with evolving industry

Name: Cindy Egger

Title: Co-owner

Company: Pratt Audio Visual and Video Corp.

Address: 1950 Boyson Road, Hiawatha

Phone: (319) 363-8144

Website: http://www.prattav.com/

Elevator speech: Media and sound systems for classrooms to boardrooms

HIAWATHA - It's not lost on Cindy Egger that Pratt Audio Visual and Video Corp. in Hiawatha, of which she's co-owner, is a family business.

Pratt Audio Visual was started by Egger's grandfather more than 70 years ago. Her mother and aunt - at the time only 17 and 19 years old respectively - kept the company going with the help of Egger's grandmother when her grandfather died at an early age.

“It's a male-oriented field even today, but I was destined,” she said. “I grew up being around it from an early age.”

She remembers helping with mailings when she was in high school and coming into the office on Saturdays with her mom.

Even though she had interest in radiology, Egger said her mother was very convincing about needing her to work for the family business. So after high school graduation, Egger officially started working for Pratt Audio Visual.

“When I started, it was scheduling the free film loan library, talking to customers and operating the rentals,” Egger said.

She later began working more closely with the sales force, vendors and customers. In 1991, when her mother died, Egger purchased 50 percent of the company - the other half is still owned by her aunt.

Pratt Audio Visual not only sells and rents audiovisual equipment and digital and sound media and equipment, but it also boasts staff for communication systems design. It works with a range of organizations, from schools to Fortune 500 companies.

Egger said the company has equipped many boardrooms and auditoriums for presentations, as well as doing bigger jobs such as installing a new sound system for the RoughRiders. It has offices in Davenport, Des Moines, and Omaha and Lincoln, Neb.

The company, given its field, works hard to keep up with technology.

“In years past, the new technology of the time would be the standard for a while. Now everything changes on a daily basis,” she said.

So her staff spends a lot of time evaluating new products, attending national conventions and meeting with various vendors.

Pratt Audio Visual has 60 employees, several of which are Egger's immediate family members, including Egger's husband, daughter and son-in-law, son, three siblings, and a cousin and that cousin's husband.

And yet, Egger noted, “We don't talk about work during family time. It's my rule. Otherwise you would be thinking about work all the time.”

Know a business owner or manager of a company in business for at least a year who should be considered for “My Biz”? Contact business editor Michael Chevy Castranova, michael.castranova@sourcemedia.net.