30 years after he founded ENTECH, now a national touring roadshow for the audio visual industry, Julius Grafton has branched out offering PCO services along with roadshow management for others. Entering the industry in 1973 offering psychedelic lightshows, Grafton forged a career on the road working with iconic rock bands in the 70’s and 80’s, before establishing a series of businesses servicing technical production supply and events.
Grafton is Sydney based but works internationally with an offshoot in NZ that produces a roadshow across Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch and a previous tilt at the USA where a fledgling ENTECH USA failed to ignite prior to the pandemic. He is on record that had it hit targets and launched, it would have been bankrupted by Covid disruptions.
In 2022 he suffered a significant setback when he lost his half of SECTECH Roadshow, a partnered venture with a publishing house that serves the ‘very boring’ (his words) security technology industry. Grafton had founded SECTECH in 2014 and the partnership ran national roadshows until 2022 when the relationship broke down. According to Grafton, his partners then engaged in ‘law fare’ which outgunned him, leading to the business being placed in voluntary liquidation with Deloitte.
“There was zero money owed to anyone and all tax was paid”, he told ASE. “We had just distributed half a million dollars in profits from the 2022 tour and my ex partners clearly had a cunning strategy that had been cooked up over time to wrestle complete control. Which they did. I was left holding a toxic legal bill and they incorporated a new company – and got away with what I would describe as an ‘immoral victory’. It was so brazen and well executed I prevaricated between sending them a congratulatory card or a cruise missile. Of course I did neither, as life is too short to cry over stuff like this. Plus I had a gut-full dealing with them, as I’m sure they did with me! We had two completely different styles – short term nickel and dime verses long term value, and fighting over the cost of catering every year wore me out.”
That cleared his calendar which leads to the gun for hire approach, where he promises to ‘get things done’, drawing on the experiences garnered from fifty years of front line events work. A side hustle has emerged with carpet tile rental after he realised the major suppliers charge almost the replacement cost for rental of 1m square carpet tiles. He just invested $50,000 and has six tonnes of carpet in his garage, displacing his Leyland P76 which is now under a tarp outside. “The car is probably worth the same money as the carpet. I’m torn”, he concluded.
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