Swell, a Chicago-based postproduction facility, has added Deborah Zwayer Caffray as executive producer, a new title at the company. In that capacity, her primary focus will be in sales and marketing.
Caffray comes over to Swell after a brief stint as Chicago-based account executive for Los Angeles-headquartered Sourcemine.com. That business-to-business Web-based technology solutions provider is targeted to the marketing/advertising industries.
However, Caffray is best known for her previous 10-year run as an independent sales rep in the Chicago community. Her own former company, Zwayer Represents, handled Midwest representation for such commercial clients as New York-based The Sussan Group, Taxi Films and DC 3 Films; Santa Monica-based POP Film (now R!OT); Minneapolis-based Lamb & Company and Chicago-based Superior Street. In 1994, she also spent a year as executive producer at Chicago-based Northwest Teleproductions.
At Swell, Caffray will concentrate on developing new business in the commercial and long format markets, as well as coordinating between clients and staff. Although Swell retained an independent rep at one point, it hadn’t had someone serving in a sales and marketing role full-time since former producer Renee Schroeder left the company three years ago to move to the West Coast, said Swell’s VP/ director of client services Dave Mueller. (Swell continues to retain producer Juli Hudgins, who serves in a traditional producer’s capacity).
After looking for someone for the past six months, Mueller contacted Caffray. "We made a deal right away," reported Mueller, who met Caffray in the early ’90s when she was repping still photographers. "She’s got a good background—[for instance] she repped POP. She’s got a lot of good energy. We were lucky; I think the timing was very good." He added that Caffray will handle sales and marketing efforts primarily in Chicago and in such Midwest markets as Minneapolis, Detroit and St. Louis.
Caffray said that she had been talking to several other dot-com companies when she received a call from Mueller. After several subsequent discussions and a visit to Swell, Caffray concluded that the job would be a good fit for her. "I got a really comfortable feeling here," she said, "plus the fact that it’s everything I’ve been learning since my career started. Post is my favorite end of the business. For some time now, I’ve had so many ideas that I’ve been wanting to develop and have been searching for the right company to share them with. Swell is that company…There’s a lot of talent here."
One of Caffray’s responsibilities will be to market Swell’s artisans to agencies. Commenting that people seem to know the facility itself better than the talent, Caffray said she intends to increase exposure for Swell’s editors as well as the artists at the company’s design/ animation and effects division, Bazooka, and the mixers at Swell’s audio division, Boom.
"People don’t understand that we’ve got some really excellent, experienced people," observed Caffray, citing Swell’s Tom Rovak, who earned best colorist honors at the 1999 and 2000 Monitor Awards, "and some young, hip people who are adding an edgier element to the work."
Swell also comprises senior VP/editor Brian Clark and editors Gregory David, Ed Maroney, Billy Sheahan, Mark Jepsen, Dave Ryan, Hanneh Rudkilde, Jill Bzibziak and Joe Otting. Bazooka consists of graphics designer Andy Montag, designers/animators Rick Thompson and Tom Mackey, designer Melissa Von Dornburg, and online editors/compositors Frank Carioti and Mark Dolnick. Boom’s roster consists of engineers Jim Hoffman, Bill Kovach and Steve Wilke.
