CASHMAN PROFESSIONAL 

Before relocating from LA to Las Vegas, Marc Finkel built a career as a creative producer, director, and technical specialist in the video industry. After a decade of building a rich content portfolio, Finkel leveraged his skills to enter the professional audiovisual industry, initially as a sales engineer, and over time, he worked his way into management roles in New York and Los Angeles. Now, for the first time, he was offered an opportunity to become an owner and managing partner. Morgan Cashman, a client of Finkel’s, offered him a stake in his fledgling wedding photography and special events business; the only question left was whether Finkel had the entrepreneurial talent to make it a success.

Unlike any other business Finkel had worked for in the past, Cashman Photo was primarily a services business. The company’s reputation rested on a stable of glamorous nightclub photographers in the nightclub division, a role that relied more on personality than raw photographic skill.

However, when demand for skilled staff exceeded availability, staff normally assigned to photograph showrooms and restaurants were reassigned to shoot weddings or corporate events. This created a scheduling nightmare, and simply keeping track of the images and video content was a challenge in itself. I spent the first six months learning the existing processes and observing what worked and what needed to change. Professional. I became the Managing Director and partner at Cashman Professional. My mandate was to introduce new technology and training programs that would substantially improve quality and provide greater consistency for our institutional hotel clients and companies hosting large meetings and conventions. During that time, I developed an advanced understanding of photography and graphic composition.

The evolution of Cashman Professional from a simple idea to a company that dominated the wedding and special event photo and video services industry in Las Vegas makes for great reading. After the first six months of acclimation, I could see the company had great potential, but if we were going to make our mark, we had to evolve. It began with an early commitment to digital imaging in 2004, when film was still the professional choice for most photographers. I fought an internal rebellion within the company and an external one with institutional clients resistant to change. It meant a commitment to retraining, new investment, and new workflows. Before the decision, the prevailing fear was that transitioning to an all-digital workflow would disrupt the delicate yet highly inefficient way things had been done for years at each location. Each wedding venue had its own legacy operating requirements, practically guaranteeing inconsistencies across locations and services. I was firm in my resolve to make the transition away from film and analog videotape. I knew they would soon become relics of the past. Our future was dependent on how we managed this sea change. It was time to jump in with both feet and move to an all-digital workflow, even if it meant some disruption. I believed the insights and immediate benefits would ultimately justify the decision. Entrenched people, comfortable with entrenched processes, pushed back hard and seriously threatened my future with the company. Without Morgan Cashman’s unwavering faith in me, I wouldn’t be telling this story today.

Furthermore, had we not laid the foundation when we did, our competitors would have taken much of the market share we worked long and hard to acquire. I’m proud of the way we accomplished the digital transition. When we completed the full implementation of our plan, we grew to a size even the founders could not have foreseen. Cashman Professional and Cashman Photo were now technology leaders, advancing the state of the art in practice. No longer followers, we became a model for the entire industry and the gold standard of quality and overall customer satisfaction on a large scale.