The music goes on at Conduit and the 449 Room.
By: Matt Smith
Owning and operating Conduit music club in Trenton for the past four-plus years could be called a "learning experience" for entrepreneur Roland Pott.
"You could say that," Mr. Pott says, laughing. "That’s a nice way to put it. It’s been a lot of trial and error, for everybody involved. It’s been interesting, but I think that we (co-general manager) Kevin (Swider) and I decided that if anyone was going to make it work, we were, so we’re sticking with it."
Mr. Pott and his Urban Word LLC opened the 500-plus-capacity venue in fall 2001 as the centerpiece of the $2.5 million, 25,000-square-foot Trenton Makes complex at 439-449 S. Broad St. in New Jersey’s capital city. However, Mr. Pott and former business partners John Hatch and David Henderson found out that Trenton wasn’t quite ready for the club, and the soft post-9/11 economy certainly wasn’t a help.
By 2003, the club and accompanying Urban Word Café restaurant were shuttered. The club reopened soon thereafter, in May 2003, under outside management, but that arrangement went south in less than a year as did the restaurant that replaced Urban Word Café, Congress Rotisserie.
Mr. Pott, who continued to own the club, once again took over management of Conduit (former partners Mr. Hatch and Mr. Henderson still act as consultants), and has been slowly rebuilding the club’s reputation and customer base. Mr. Swider, who has been booking live music at Conduit on and off since 2002, returned to the club in October to share general manager duties with Mr. Pott and to focus on making live music a regular presence at Conduit once again.
"Right now we’re focused on providing local and regional music," says Mr. Swider. "Just recently, Crucial played here. They’re a regional reggae band that’s opened for The Wailers and Burning Spear. We’re really focused on getting local and regional acts, and when a good national (act) comes up and it’s worth it to invest the money and do it it’s going to be a win for everybody we’ll definitely do that."
An independently owned and operated club such as Conduit can’t compete with the large national promoters, says Mr. Swider, so it has to take a more hands-on approach. "I think what really sets this club apart is one thing that a lot of clubs haven’t done, which is that we’re trying to develop (acts), as opposed to the House of Blues they don’t develop it, they buy it."
Mr. Pott uses the Clear Channel-owned Theatre of Living Arts on South Street in Philadelphia as a point of reference for Conduit. "Given the location in Philadelphia, there’s enough of a market there for national acts to fill that room multiple times per week. That’s a little different than here. It’s difficult for us to book acts of that size multiple times per week. We tried it and it was difficult, especially on midweek nights. We have to mix our programming to a certain extent to be successful, but we still have a commitment to doing live music."
For Conduit, the mix includes special events such as Christmas parties (Trenton-area bluesman Ernie White holds a popular one there each December), as well as dance club nights, which help "sustain the business," says Mr. Pott.
Conduit also is attempting to develop a solid stable of outside music promoters to book shows. "We’ve been reaching out to different promoters and trying to find people who are interested in promoting music," says Mr. Pott, "and as a club providing a service to them. We can provide them with great sound, we can provide them with a nice venue, a nice place to hear live music, because across the board the bands’ and the promoters’ feedback is always like, ‘Conduit’s a great place to put on a show.’ Bands say, ‘We love playing there,’ and promoters say, ‘Yeah, we love the room.’"
Mr. Pott and Mr. Swider have also launched the accompanying 449 Room in the former Urban Word/Congress Rotisserie space. "It’s kind of a smaller version of the Conduit," says Mr. Swider. "You’re really getting a more intimate atmosphere… We’re really looking for a singer-songwriter crowd over there."
"That room looks full when you have 30 people," adds Mr. Pott, "and when you have 30 people in here (Conduit), it looks empty."
"It’s a stepping stone to the club for bands," says Mr. Swider.
The club and restaurant space have had difficulty, as have the retail shops that line the Broad Street sidewalk at the front of the property, but Trenton Makes continues to survive because of the success of the smaller spaces it rents out, says Mr. Pott.
"As a complex, we have 25,000 square feet, and when you take Conduit out of the picture, when you take the retail out of the picture, it’s been close to 100 percent occupancy since we built it," he notes. "We’ve had a lot of success with small businesses, artists’ studios becoming a sort of incubator of new business for Trenton. We’ve created a lot of jobs here, created a lot of new businesses here… The office and studio space have provided us with a lot of consistency that we’ve needed, whereas retail has been a little bit up and down."
Mr. Pott has hopes that a housing and entertainment project planned to go up directly across Broad Street will improve the retail climate near the Trenton Makes complex. "The pedestrian traffic in this area is not there, and there’s still some perception problems with Trenton," he says, "so those are some of the challenges we’ve been up against."
Conduit and the 449 Room are located in the Trenton Makes complex, 439-449 S. Broad St., Trenton. Upcoming Conduit shows include: Heatsleeve, Andy Browne Trio, Feb. 3, 9 p.m., $10, $8 advance; Tender Trio, Copesetic, Luzer, Angela Stryker Band, Feb. 4, 9 p.m., $10, $8 advance. Upcoming 449 Room shows include Jason Mather (see sidebar), Feb. 3, 9 p.m., $5. For information, call (609) 656-1199. On the Web: www.conduitmusic.com