This months Spotlight is on Susan Bendinelli of Studio Slips. Located out in sunny Santa Rosa, California Studio Slips has been making covers of the highest quality available that will last virtually forever since 1992. Customer satisfaction is #1 and all products are custom made to order. In this interview Susan explains how her covers are built and elaborates on their durability.
300guitars: Hi Susan please tell us a little bit about yourself. Do you play guitar or any instrument? Do you like music/what are some favorite types and artists?
Susan Bendinelli: I was born and raised in San Francisco and was 12 years old during the Summer of Love. I have 3 older siblings who had to baby-sit me so they schlepped me with them to Mels Drive-In, the Fillmore, Avalon Ballroom and the free concerts at Golden Gate Park. Although I never learned to play an instrument, I’ve always been an appreciator of music. The first record I bought was Paul Butterfield Blues Band’s “East/West”. That was in 5th grade. I also saw the Beatles at the Cow Palace that year. I appreciate all types of music but my pet peeve is when it’s so damn loud. I like what’s left of my ears so I don’t go to many concerts these days, unless my husbands doing the sound. He does 3 festivals and several concerts a year working with www.cumuluspresents.com so I’m certainly not lacking when it comes to live music. Michael’s the best (in my opinion) and I’ve become a sound snob because of him.
300guitars: How did you become interested in manufacturing products for the music industry? What was your inspiration?
Susan Bendinelli: I worked at Mesa Boogie as their Traffic Manager from just before they moved from Lagunitas till I married Boogie’s Chief Tech, Michael Bendinelli in 1983. We lived in a big house and shared it with a couple of other Boogie employees, so it was Boogie, Boogie, Boogie! I decided that if this marriage was going to last, I’d better come up with something else to do. After trying my hand at a couple of other ideas that never gelled, I decided to go back to what I felt comfortable with; musicians! Although I didn’t really know what I was doing, I had Michael to ask and I was determined to put out a good product. I wanted to be totally available for our 3 boys when they were little, so we let the business grow very slowly and built the reputation for excellent quality and service. It’s not that we don’t make mistakes, but we stand behind everything we put out there, and if it’s wrong, and it’s our fault, we fix it – fast. People are so grateful for what we do. It’s amazing how happy a cover can make a musician.
300guitars: How many prototypes were made of the clamshell bag? How long was it in development? Or was it an idea that came to you in a flash?
Susan Bendinelli: I knew that I wanted a bag of some kind to fully protect what was going in it, and I did try a few different ways to do this over the years, but the clamshell came to me almost like a dream. It really did. Believe it or not, I’ve only made one of them. I’m not a great seamstress, but I’ve been blessed with folks walking into my life that can sew.
300guitars: What were some of the tests performed on your products for durability, the Samsonite Gorilla perhaps?
Susan Bendinelli: The best test is when we make a mistake and have to take one of those suckers apart. It’s not easy. I’ve also thrown them into the washing machine to see how they hold up (fine – just to be safe, air dry). Also, Michael does sound on the side and I’ve been making covers and bags for his gear since 1992. I can see for myself that it holds up; the stuff looks like new.
300guitars: What are some of the unique features of your products?
Susan Bendinelli: I think there are 3 main differences between our product and our competitors. First, the padding that we use is a quilted fiber fill rather than foam or felt. Felt doesn’t absorb any shock and is mainly good for dust and light scratch protection. Our covers and bags are excellent shock absorbers. Plus they fold up and stuff away nicely. The foam covers spring back open and take up a lot more space. I’ve also witnessed a foam cover as it was deteriorating; little bits of foam all over the studio floor.
Second, would be fit. I like our covers and bags to fit snug which means there is very little room for error. We’ve got a formula that works. If you can measure it, or we can find an architectural drawing for it (for pro-sound, molded plastic gear like the Mackie SRM450’s) we can pretty much make a cover or bag for it. We guarantee that your cover or bag will fit perfect because we always double check dimensions, which brings us to the 3rd difference – customer service. If it doesn’t fit, and it’s our fault, we’ll either try again or give you your money back.
I think we’re the only manufacturer out there that makes custom sized Briefcase Gig Bags that are great for protecting and transporting pedal boards, mixer boards and keyboards.
We offer handy pockets that zip closed. The pockets are generally 18″ wide and either 8″ tall for a head, or 12″ tall for larger models and 2″ deep. We’ll do custom sized pockets if needed. We’ve been asked if the pockets sag, but they’re made in a way that they really don’t. We also offer webbed closing straps that cinch the bottom of the cover. Our covers fit snug, so I don’t think they’re necessary unless you lay your gear on its back in the vehicle and the cover can ride up during transport. If your gear stands on its feet all the time, there’s no reason to get this option.
Then there’s the single vs. double padding. We’ve got pictures on the website that show the difference between the padding, but in a nutshell, the single padding is about 3/8″ thick and the double is more like ¾” thick.
The clamshell gig bag is the jewel of Studio Slips. The design makes it easy to put a heavy piece of equipment into a soft bag. We’ve made them for all sizes including 4×12’s*. There’s a nice picture of Ian Dicky’s hardwood Boogie 4×12 in the clamshell pictures. Ian tells a great tale about how he was moving in the dead of winter and that beautiful, brand new cabinet was in a moving truck in the clamshell. The truck somehow lost it and rolled, with all of Ian’s furniture and gear in it. That 4×12 was fine, and he thinks the fact that it was in the clamshell may have something to do with that. We also had a customer that had an amp in a clamshell during Katrina. The amp was in a foot of water for 2 weeks, but thanks to the clamshell, it was salvageable. I don’t recommend doing these things, of course, but the clamshell is the best protection you can get this side of a road case, and a 4×12 clamshell probably weighs about 5 pounds. You can get leather strips on the bottom of the clam as an option. Folks were concerned about whether there would be wear under the feet, so this was our answer to that concern. The strips are always 5″ wide and they run the full depth (front to back) of the cabinet. This way, they’re going to be under those feet wherever they’re positioned. We’ve had quite a few clams come back to have leather put on after the fact. They are a nice feature.*(We put openings on the bottom of the clamshell for the casters, which is an additional charge).
300guitars: How many products do you have in your line at this time?
Susan Bendinelli: We’ve got the non padded dust cover, the padded slipcover and the clamshell gig bag. People think that because they saw their model listed in our database, we must have it on the shelf so why does it take a couple of weeks to get it? Well, the first thing we do is double check dimensions with the customer. Even a manufacturer like Dr. Z who’s cabinets are always consistent, makes changes occasionally (and he doesn’t tell me!). Besides, we just passed 2300 different models that we have in our database, and every day we get a few more. Multiply that by 3 different types of covers or bags with 4 different options and 2 different colors (black or brown) and that makes, uhm, alot! Because I never know what’s going to be ordered, or if it will be ordered with a pocket, or double padding, or whatnot, we just make them as they get ordered.
300guitars: The covers you make are made of 1000 denier nylon canvas. What made you finally settle on that material?
Susan Bendinelli: It is light weight and very durable. I used to use a polyester canvas for the dust covers. It gave the false impression of being more durable because it was coated with vinyl so it felt heavy, but I had an experience of it coming apart at the seams with a bag I made for myself. I think a lot of musicians have seen this with the cheap stuff they get from the online stores. Sure they cost less, but how many times do you have to replace them?
300guitars: Who makes up most of your clientele?
Susan Bendinelli: We used to provide covers for a lot of manufacturers, but most of them have stopped including covers, or they get them from offshore. We had to rework our focus to stay in business and decided to keep our prices down and focus on the individual. Because of this, we can’t offer a large discount because it costs us more to make our covers. We’ve put in a lot of time to make our website easy to use for individuals. You can get an instant estimate http://www.studioslips.com/estimate.php by entering the dimension yourself and see the prices for each type of cover or bag (there’s no extra charge for custom sizes. Custom shapes may require an extra charge). All it takes is to fill our our measurement chart http://www.studioslips.com/measurement.php and we add your model into the database so you can order online. For someone that didn’t know how to save a file 5 years ago, I’ve become a very grateful geek.
300guitars: Do you have any interesting stories about dealing with clients? Celebrities perhaps?
Susan Bendinelli: I love all of my customers. In 16 years, I’ve only banished 2 people from Studio Slips (they were rude), and one of them begged forgiveness and has been a loyal and wonderful customer since. My customers come back over and over and I’ve heard tales of their kids from kindergarten to college. I’m a shameless flirt (ask Michael) and I love talking to musicians. It makes no difference to me if you’re famous or playing in your living room. Making music is a gift and I honor that gift in all of my customers.
300guitars: Is your husband, Mike Bendinelli, a big asset to answer any practical design questions that arise?
Susan Bendinelli: Oh yea. I wouldn’t be doing this without him. He’s my silent partner. He was so patient with me back in the beginning. I’d call him 6 times a day asking him questions and he always knew the answers. It took a while for guys to take me seriously back in the old days. Having Michael’s name to tag on to helped give me credibility. Thanks to the internet, and 23 years of my own experience in this industry, I do alright on my own now and leave him to pound on amplifiers over at Boogie.
300guitars: What do you have planned for the future of your company? Are there any new products or expansion into other things on the horizon?
Susan Bendinelli: I do have a couple of ideas up my sleeve, but each year we grow another 25% or more so it’s hard for me to find time to develop them. For the time being, we will continue to do what we do. Sometimes it’s best to just stick with the good thing. There’s a lot of gear out there that’s worth a lot of money. It’s a big investment. Our bags and covers keep that investment from loosing value because your gear will stay in mint condition if it’s protected by a Studio Slip. And unless our product is severely abused, there’s no reason why it shouldn’t last the life of the amp or speaker it protects. You only have to buy it once.
With the dollar so weak, we get a good deal of our business from Europe and I would love to find a way to do the European manufacturing over there to eliminate the insane amounts of fuel it takes to get from here to there. I feel strongly that we’ve got to change the way we do business in the world and get back to local rather than global ways of getting our products.
300guitars: Thank you very much Susan for the great Spotlight interview here at 300guitars. Your products are excellent and I wish you continued success in the coming years!
Susan Bendinelli: Thank you Billy. It’s been a pleasure and I appreciate you getting the word out about Studio Slips!