We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ross Collier a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Ross, appreciate you joining us today. Can you talk to us about growing your team – how did you recruit the first few people, what was the process like, how’d you go about training and if you were to start over today would you have done anything differently?

My business started as a passion project, a solo endeavor — an outlet for me to give back to the Nashville music community.

Thankfully, in 2020 we were ravaged by some destructive weather events followed by the deadly Coronavirus pandemic, and in the wake of these tragedies, demand for Omnichords surged to new heights. The demand was great for my business and gave me an opportunity to bring on some interns to teach them the art of Omnichord — mostly local youths. I tried hiring technicians from the music scene here in Nashville, but that created new hurdles for me as a small business owner. Suddenly, I needed to deal with payroll, keep cash records, and consider “livable wages”. Working with local youths made me feel good as it was a way for me to keep kids off the street & out of trouble. It made me feel good about myself and, importantly, saved me the headache of dealing with payment!

As our team has grown, I have started to rely heavily on my team of interns. One of the challenges for any small business owner is learning how to grow while maintaining the spirit and quality of one’s work. A lot of that begins in the hiring process— finding the right people. The hiring process was difficult for me at first; I felt like a lot of people didn’t want to work post-pandemic. Sometimes I wondered if I was doing something wrong, but thankfully I am connected to a strong community of small business owners & local state legislators who assured me that, truly, people just don’t want to work, and that I didn’t need to change my high bar for finding the right worker.

Acquaintances of mine used their local connections and PAC donations to collaborate with Rep. Dale Carr in the state legislature to create a bill that will loosen child labor laws— I’m really excited about that, as I really won’t have to deal with complaints about overworking or exploiting any of my interns — a lot of people just don’t understand or have empathy for the ways in which those regulations can really damage a small business’ ability to grow customer base & profit margin. Cha-Ching!

I want to give a huge shout out to our current 2023 Interns: Dennis M., Shayna P., and Kevin. I can’t recall his last name right now but either way, it’s best to use just their initials since they are minors. Thanks, Omnichord fam! I couldnt do it without you!

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

The core essence (or “musk”) of Nashville Omnichord Supply is that I service & supply Omnichord fetishists and fanatics across North America for their Omnichord needs. Suzuki Omnichords, first released in the 1980’s, are beloved for their unique & joyous mode of playing and sound, but due to their age, it is not uncommon for them to “need a little loving”. Enter, Nashville Omnichord Supply Co.

There are plenty of synth repair technicians across the globe, but what sets us apart is that we have absolutely no credentials (underdog, D.I.Y. Appeal), have dirt-cheap rates (not greedy, anti-capitalist), and focus solely on Omnichords. We don’t service other synths or electronics — we have a focused, immediate, and sensual appreciation for this wonderful & unique instrument from Suzuki.

I want every experience with my work or product to be a good memory for someone. Often, it feels stressful or anxious to navigate a situation where a beloved instrument is not working properly. I want folks to be able to reach out to me as a resource for any situation in which they need help or thoughts on how to fix what they have and what a good, affordable solution is.

Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?

Properly funding a small business is difficult, and it’s really an uphill battle for a lot of us who run our own businesses and are trying to make our own dreams come true. I struggled greatly when I first set out to start my business, facing so many obstacles in how to set up shop, how to get my name out there, and my absolutely vast ignorance towards the basic fundamentals of tech repair.

I solicited for funds through traditional means (my daddy’s friends & business partners, my uncle, my inheritance which I took early) but had difficulties achieving the amount of funding which I needed. As previously noted, I really struck gold when the pandemic hit, and was able to pull myself up by the bootstraps, received thousands of dollars in federal aid for my small business, and then the icing on top was that I lucked into such a great team of unpaid interns. This really balanced my budgets & allowed me to expand to my ideal situation — a brick and mortar shop in Wedgewood Houston, which we are renovating right now. Currently it’s only open to clients by appointment, but in 2026 we are hoping to have the grand opening of the store to the general public. I am just waiting for one last round of funding, which I think my daddy will be able to provide.

It really can be an uphill battle for small business owners in America to get the capital they need, but what most people don’t understand is that it doesn’t have to be out of reach — you just need to have a strong work ethic and put your mind to it. Once I put together a proper business plan, my father was willing to fund my overhead so I wouldn’t have to work any other job and could just focus on making connections, networking, and having free time to enjoy myself and learn about Omnichords.

In 2021 alone we spent almost 40,000 on Omnichords. Can you believe it? Unfortunately we bought a lot of our stock right when prices peaked. Now that they are coming down and Suzuki has announced the release of the new Omnichords, I am having to really crack the proverbial whip with the interns. Kevin has been a real asset in that he has small hands and can work very quickly at the soldering station — he alone has almost doubled the output of the repairs that we send out!

Can you share your view on NFTs? (Note: this is for education/entertainment purposes only, readers should not construe this as advice)

I think NFTs are definitely here to stay. They are a solid investment — with the leftover cash reserves after our big Omnichord purchase in 2021, I spent the rest on NFTs. I think my ROI is a little down right now but I feel confident they will come back up any day now.

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.nashvilleomnichordsupply.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nashvilleomnichordsupplyco/?hl=en
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nashvilleomnichordsupplyco/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ross-collier-2a9659bb?original_referer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F