FROM THE TOP MARTY KLOSKA I KEPMA GUITARS USA
INTERVIEWED BY KIMBERLY KAPELA
figure out the second verse or a hook, and Tony would be able to come up with it or vice-versa. He sent me a message on LinkedIn after Sam Ash closed, and basically said, ‘What are you doing with yourself?’ We talked for a long time. I just wasn’t sure where I belonged. I liked the idea of Kepma. The product is top notch and huge interna- tionally, especially in Asia. Joining with Tony, I’d be able to be me and use some of these skills I have. WE FEATURED KEPMA EARLIER THIS YEAR IN MUSIC INC. HAVE THERE BEEN ANY COMPANY UPDATES THAT YOU’D LIKE TO SHARE WITH OUR READERS? Tony and I started talking in early March of this year, and he would tell me about the FC Minis and the Fenix. And that just amused me, because my job as national sales manager is to find music stores and find dealers in all the states that we don’t have a brand presence, and that is one of the common things that you have to overcome. I took that as a challenge. Now that the FC Minis and the Fenix are out and our reps have samples, I think what we’re learning is people really like solid top guitars, and that’s a nice plug for the Fenix and the AcoustiFex. NICE. ONE UPDATE WE’VE NOTICED IS YOUR GROWING SALES TEAM. Tony and Brandon had tried some rep firms, and we have a great rep firm in Florida, but it was almost back - wards thinking. I was getting all these inquiries, but I wanted to go after people who had more retail experience than rep experience. First of all, in the 1980s and 1990s, before the internet, you really needed a manufacturer rep- resentative to help you solve problems. I’ve experienced for the last 10 years now, every holiday season, when people walk into your store, they’re not looking at your Christmas tree or all your merchandising, they’re looking at the device in their hands. I wanted people who have worked with reps and worked with vendors and really understand what it’s like to have a store. It doesn’t matter if it’s a big chain or independent. Those people are constantly dealing with the real people in our industry, and that’s all the end users, whether that end user is Eric Clapton or a seven-year-old kid who just started playing guitar, they’re all the same in that context. I wanted people to work for us who could embody, un- derstand and run with the silly relationship that Tony and I have.
HOW DO YOU START YOUR DAY ? The true answer is: my day is started and determined by what my rescue puppy does when he wakes up. But, to give this a more intelligent and mature answer, I read these articles all the time, and, although I have this ti- tle with Kepma, I’ve been a retailer my whole life. I’ve worked for the big guys at Guitar Center and Sam Ash and nothing starts going on in the stores until about 11 in the morning. It’s always been a little bit of an advantage for me. I’ve always had to drive somewhere. I come from the genera- tion that couldn’t take advantage of working from home. I spent the majority of my career in Chicago. So, to an- swer the question, I would spend my drive thinking about, where am I going? What’s the issue with that store, with those managers? What do we have to do? I would have to drive to serve as my meditation and think tank, and then the same thing coming home, I could review everything and compartmentalize it. When I got home, I would spend 20 minutes every evening thinking about the events of the day and write them down, so whenever I would wake up and whenever I would get to the store, I was already pre- paring myself the night before, because all business is a continuing series of eight-to-10-hour issues. CAN YOU SHARE WITH READERS A LITTLE BIT ABOUT YOUR BACKGROUND AND THE PATH THAT LED YOU TO KEPMA GUITARS? I started in early 1985 at Guitar Center and was very fortunate for the people I met. I really grew up with Gui- tar Center, and when Guitar Center went public, that just wasn’t working for me. It just really changed. I went to work every day when they were about the musician. They used to have this big mantra that was in every store on the wall, ‘Don’t go on stage without us,’ and going public changed the dynamic and it was about selling a commod- ity, and I just didn’t want to deal with that at that time. I got to know the Sam Ash family. Sam Ash had recently come into Chicago, and I liked them because they were similar to Guitar Center. I joined up with them and spent 23 years until, unfortunately, they went out of business. As far as Kepma goes, Tony Moscal, who is our president and our fearless leader, ran Ampeg for St. Louis Music, and St. Louis Music had Ampeg and Crate in the Chicago store that I ran. When I became the regional manager, we did a lot of business and Tony and I clicked, and he and I have always said we had like a Lennon-McCartney relationship. I would come up with an idea, but I couldn’t
30 I MUSIC INC. I DECEMBER 2025
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