Great topic! I'm going to have to print this thread up to give to my wife the next time she gives me the evil eye!
As someone who's managed to grow and stay afloat for 20 years in the Boston studio market, here's a few things that have helped me along the way
1. My ego is a serious liability. Whenever it shows up, I end up alienating clients and/or screwing myself. It mostly shows up as resentment when I'm feeling overworked, underpaid, and unappreciated, so I find ways in my life to do stuff ( playing gigs, family time, learning new instruments), that help keep things in perspective.
2. I can't afford a full-time, or even part-time staff. Freelance engineers that I trust hire the studio, have their own keys, and bring me work. When I can't engineer the sessions myself, I have a pool of freelancers I call to do the session and handle the project. I do the booking, schmooze the clients, handle the conflicts, kick butt when necessary, and I engineer about 50 hours a week.
3. I've had very good experiences generally with interns, partly because I set high expectations for them, and demand they perform well. It causes me some stress, but ultimately they do a lot of useful work for free, allowing me time for other things. Some of my ex-interns are now gainfully employed as free-lancers with me and other studios.
4. I've always looked for ways to lower my monthly costs; I built my two room studio facility ( 4000 sq ft) with a carpenter friend. It costs about $3200 a month for the mortgage, taxes, utilities, and a little gear maintanence, after that I can feed my family. Unlike many studios I compete with, I have no trust funds or gifts from my family to keep me going.
5. When people come to see the studio for the first time ( wellspringsound.com)I tell them- "You're not getting a studio here, you're getting 20 years of obsessive behavior". I think people respond well to the idea that some guy lost sleep for 20 years trying to figure out ways for them to sound good. This goes back to an earlier post about what we're selling in the studio biz-- service.
Thanks to all-
Eric Kilburn
Wellspring Sound