A seemingly magical portal, a door framed with blue LED strips located on the second floor of the Augusta Marriott at the Convention Center on 10th Street leads behind the scenes to a global business that also has a branch in Augusta.
That business is encore, yes, with a lower cased “e,” a company that, according to its tagline, creates “events that transform.”
encore handles tech support for events – anything technology-related.
“encore is global. Look at any large hotel, and we are most likely in it,” said Blake Chambers, director of Event Technologies at encore. “We take care of the reader boards and Internet and handle all of the audio and video aspects of meetings (and events).”
Reader boards are computer-based boards which give maps, scheduling information, and information about what is going on in certain rooms. These have replaced the computer print-outs stuck in plastic door-sleeves of yesteryear.
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encore handles all of the audio, video, and tech aspects of corporate, some government and other events at the Marriott. Regionally, the company also handles sound, video and tech for the Augusta Convention Center and the Crowne Plaza North Augusta.
Its events transform meeting spaces into figurative other worlds. In 2019, the company’s imaging department created the image of a giant dragon for the Premier Martial Arts Tournament at the Augusta Convention Center.
Chambers said that had been one of his favorites.
“Not only did we work at the event, but we were able to watch the tournament,” he said.
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Chambers said he also enjoyed meeting visiting NBA star Kevin Durant when encore handled the technology for the Nike Peach Jam, a basketball tournament featuring some of the best high school players from across the U.S. and Canada.
He found out one of the next celebrities he met while working for encore, Alice Cooper, was actually a nice guy (as evidenced by his bio and his well-documented charity work) – contrary to perhaps his most famous song “No More Mr. Nice Guy.”
In fact, Chambers said he was proud to see rock star Alice Cooper speak at another event, for which encore did the event tech.
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Chambers has his own “West Side of the Savannah story.” He met a famous woman most people know as Maria, only she was more from the West Side of Sesame Street than the West Side of New York.
That was Sonia Manzano, who played Maria in the educational children’s show. He heard her speaking at an early childhood education conference.
“My personal favorite was Maria. She was as sweet as she could be,” he said.
As Maria, Manzano was one of the main humans who would give advice to the Muppets and children on “Sesame Street.” According to NPR.org, Manzano performed on “Sesame Street” as Maria for almost 50 years.
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Having a job where one can meet famous people may seem perk-filled and fun to other techies. However, the job does have many challenges. Even for Peach Jam, Chambers and his staff staff were responsible for handling all of the livestreaming and other technical chores. They also had to keep up with the logistical and technological aspects of the martial arts tournament along with watching the tournament.
They provide event tech for hundreds of events in the CSRA area, most of them at the Marriott facility. They also do the holiday party for the Augusta National each year. At the Crowne Plaza, encore handled the annual North Augusta Chamber meeting and awards gala earlier this month. They did the same for the Augusta Metro Chamber of Commerce.
Some events are more challenging than others. Chambers said his biggest learning experience, and challenge, has been the cyber security conference for which encore does event technology.
“The prep time for the cyber-security event is eight months,” he said, adding that the average event prep time is usually only a few weeks for other events.
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Chambers said it is one of the biggest conferences encore handles. It’s called AFCEA TechNet Augusta Conference and Expo. It is a bi-annual event for cyber-security at the Marriott.
“We work closely with the military cybersecurity center in Augusta,” Chambers said. “There was supposed to be a small conference for it in January, but it was postponed to May.”
Given the nature of the conference and its sensitive content, Chambers could not give details about it.
encore locally has hundreds of events that it provides tech for at its different locations. The company is looking to expand with more regional locations that need tech work.
Chambers said beyond the three places with which encore is contracted, “We would love to be contracted with more hotels, more venues.”
Chambers said he would also love to provide services to a science fiction or comic con and thought there would be some demand for that in the CSRA.
“We already host the Augusta Toy and Comic Show here,” he said.
encore is not a franchise but locally is the smaller version of a bigger corporate empire. Most of encore is based out of hotel office spaces as parts of contracts with the companies that own said hotels.
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On the morning of Thursday, March 17, members of the Augusta encore staff were making preparations in a large conference room (with space for 3,000) for a Mary Kay convention at the Marriott. They were putting up a giant screen, testing a gigantic LCD projector, putting in speakers, and, using a scissor-lift, hanging lighting via metal trusses.
Chambers said the projector was able to project with 20,000 lumens. According to the Integral-led.com site, “Lumens (denoted by lm) are a measure of the total amount of visible light (to the human eye) from a lamp or light source.”
This projector was set up to project on a large screen that could be seen well from the back of the humongous room.
Chambers pointed to the person on the scissor-lift and said, “His responsibility is to get all the equipment way up in the air.”
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Chambers said encore has warehouses everywhere, so just about any type of technological equipment can be obtained for a conference or meeting. For example, he said, they can provide smartboards for an educational conference.
He said he would have a full staff for the Mary Kay conference. Staff would work on video, audio and lighting respectively.
Chambers said, “Adjustments to all of these aspects can be made on demand.”
encore has been in the area at least a decade.
encore’s focus had been on live meetings before the pandemic. Since 2020, the company has moved toward doing more hybrid formats of live meetings and video streaming meetings.
“During 2022, we started the hybrid format during the pandemic. We did hybrid ten years previously, though,” Chambers said.
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Chambers said that encore is back in full swing and is hiring right now.
“We are still understaffed, but we are hiring an event technician,” he said.
He said that it helps to have a background in computer and other tech knowledge but that the company can provide training.
Chambers said, “We all come from some sort of production background.”
He has two full time employees and one part-time employee at his office. He said the two full-time employees oversee day-to-day operations and have separate skill sets. One full-timer is a rigger with lighting. The other full timer handles live audio. The part-timer has worked for encore for 15 years and recently came to the Augusta area with an audio engineering background.
Chambers worked a filmmaker before getting the director position with encore.
“I was tired of traveling in my last job,” Chambers said. He said he was getting engaged at the time and is now married. “I applied for a lower level position with encore then and was eventually promoted to this position.”
He has been with the company for five years and in his current position for three years.
Chambers said there is a regional director over him and his boss’s region is North Carolina, South Carolina and all of Georgia except Atlanta.
Ron Baxley Jr. is a correspondent for The Augusta Press.
