Profits & Passions Mark Braunstein A techie CEO with a gift for giving By LYNN WOODS

Profits & Passions
Mark Braunstein
A techie CEO with a gift for giving
By LYNN WOODS

Mark Braunstein in the Markertek call center.

Markertek is one of the world’s top suppliers of electronic equipment and accessories for the audio, video and multimedia industries. Launched by Mark Braunstein, a self-taught engineer and inventor, in his Woodstock garage in 1987, the company, which is located on Saugerties’ King’s Highway, currently has more than 100 employees and serves an international clientele of TV broadcasters, film studios and educational and governmental organizations. Its catalog, which lists every kind of cable connector, interface, power outlet, scaler, switcher, monitor, mixer, headphone, speaker mount and mic you can imagine, has achieved cult status among audio-videophiles.

The Markertek name is also familiar to the local arts community and numerous charities. The company is the primary sponsor of the Woodstock Film Festival, a four-day event held in October. Several years ago Markertek bought a building for the Boys and Girls Club of Saugerties, and it provided funds to The Children’s Annex, a nonprofit organization focused on kids with special needs, for a new passageway.

One of its first philanthropic initiatives was starting a soup kitchen in the Lutheran Church in Woodstock, which is still going strong. The company also supports the Hudson Valley Food Bank. It contributes to the Artists’ Soapbox Derby, a popular event held annually in Kingston, and has supported the Arts Society of Kingston (ASK), which was co-founded by Braunstein’s wife, Katherine McKenna, an artist and gallery owner.

Markertek also helps out in ways you’d never hear about the winter coat that was given to someone in need, the sound system donated for a charity event, the equipment set up for free in the home of a person with disabilities. Employees regularly donate their time for these types of services as well as volunteer in the soup kitchen.

“We do very big projects and extremely small projects,” said Braunstein. “We’ve always felt from day one that philanthropy should be an important part of our operations. We’ve integrated into our thinking this desire to support hunger and the arts.” While a staff person has been appointed to oversee the company’s philanthropic activities, such initiatives often are an outgrowth of a personal interest or connection, Braunstein said.

Braunstein standing by his wife's landscape painting which hangs in his office.

Indeed, the CEO is a bit of a maverick, an individualist who has built his company on the shifting tides of the marketplace and who doesn’t see the workplace as separate from the enjoyment of life. “We create systems that thrive on change,” Braunstein explained, sitting in his roomy office. A large, Southwestern-style landscape painting by his wife hangs on one wall. Other noteworthy embellishments are a photo of a bumper car Braunstein used to own one from Coney Island a signed photo by Robbie Robertson, formerly of The Band, thanking him for some studio electronics, and a 4-foot-high neon sculpture of a flower. The sculpture was a gift from his staff, inspired by a trip to Las Vegas: “We were at a trade show in Vegas and there were these giant neon tulips in front of the hotel,” Braunstein explained. “I said to the guys, wow, that’s just what I need, a giant neon tulip as a joke.” They subsequently had a smaller version fabricated for him in Poughkeepsie and presented it to him as a surprise.

Braunstein is also the owner of various types of wheels. On his desk is a postcard featuring a photo of himself and McKenna cruising on the Hudson River in his 1964 red Amphicar. The card was produced by the Ulster County Development Corp. as a pitch to prospective businesses about the desirability of the area, and the eccentric, freewheeling image certainly is a powerful sell. The car is one of 400 of the specialty autos, which can be driven on land or sea, that have survived. When Braunstein launches the car into the river from Saugerties or Tivoli, he gets a lot of stares.

He is also a motorcyclist, who supported the fabrication of a customized streamliner bike in Kingston by a couple of biker friends, after the group watched “The World’s Fastest Indian” at the Rosendale movie theater and were inspired. The machine was entered into the world motorcycle speed trials at the Bonneville Salt Flats, in Utah, last September and broke a national land speed record, reaching a speed of 119.368 miles per hour. “Team Markertek” is moving from a shop in Kingston to the Markertek building in preparation for future triumphs.

The CEO’s tastes and personality aren’t limited to the confines of his office: a tour Braunstein conducts of the facilities reveals colorful paintings by accomplished local artists on the walls of the call center. A small conference room has a Western theme, with a mural-sized photo of the Grand Tetons covering the back wall, a silhouette of a bucking cowboy decorating another and a stuffed coyote on a table in the corner. The Planet Hollywood-style room reflects Braunstein’s connection with the West: his wife is from the region, and the couple owns a ranch in Colorado.

Braunstein in the Western-style conference room.

“We’re hard-charging and we get the job done, but we always have fun,” Braunstein concluded.

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