PIX 20 Years : Michael Kirchoff

When I was asked to tell an interesting story from my PIX days I thought “ Uh, I can’t think of anything that won’t sound like some tell all book from the years of excess, with all the sex, drugs, and rock and roll.” At times it felt like you were on some sort of wild rock tour. I know, sounds weird to refer to working at a rental house like that, but then we were all young, loved working together, and were slightly crazy. But thinking about it I realize that PIX wasn’t the root of all the crazy things that happened, it was simply a venue. It was all of those insane people that came in looking for work and having their personalities explode within the confines of its doors. There has been quite the cast of characters that have been found behind the counter there. It was also the fact that from day one the people who’ve worked there have developed a camaraderie and friendship that will be a part of them for life. I don’t know that this exists at other stores of this kind, but it did also cross over to some of the folks that worked at Samy’s, Calumet, Pan Pacific (long gone), and even Freestyle. Even though there was fierce competition for business between the stores themselves, the sales and rental employees always got along great. When it came down to it, we all really cared that we were a link in the chain of a successful shoot, and it mattered to us. We may have played hard, but we worked even harder. We wanted the business to succeed and thrive because it was often like a second home to us. Seeing friends and family of the employees inside was an everyday occurrence. This of course was also in the days when we were open 24 hours, every freakin’ day! That in itself was quite extraordinary. Never being closed was most likely another reason some of the nutty things happened back then…..well, okay, it was definitely a reason.

Probably my best example of this is from an evening of working there when there was a serious blackout in the area. The power suddenly went off without warning and left us dead in the water. Everything ran on electricity, even the phones, so we were kinda screwed. The few of us in the store, including the manager, didn’t want to let it affect business, so we decided to power up the store on our own and get back to work. We fired up every generator outside in the parking lot, ran a myriad of extension cords to the phones, computers, and set up a dozen hot lights from rental to light the store back up, and continued working like nothing had ever happened. I think the power had been out for a few hours before it came back on and we put away all the gear. The manager was so happy that he took us out for drinks that night at a local bar as a thank you. That night became the first in an ongoing weekly get together of employees blowing off steam that lasted for over two years. We literally did not take a week off the entire time, and only extended the insanity to outside of PIX’s doors. Those who no longer worked at PIX, as well as many customers would also show up to party with us. We most often included billiards and sometimes bowling into the evening, and had from only a few to a couple dozen people show up at times. It all was a result of our working together at a place we loved and cared about, through (occasionally) some trying times both personally and professionally. That’s something you just don’t get at every job.

When I go into PIX now, it’s apparent that that camaraderie is still there. I know the current crew gets together at times to enjoy themselves (oh yea, I’ve seen the karaoke pictures…), and I consider them all friends even though I left working there many years ago. PIX has been around for twenty years now, but the impact makes it seem as though it’s been around far longer. They also started out with the idea of improving upon the standard photo rental house experience and have since set the standard for dedication and professionalism within that segment of the photo industry.

I’ll probably be at the PIX anniversary party on June 25th and just maybe I’ll discretely tell a better story. Who am I kidding….I won’t be discrete at all……

- Michael Kirchoff PIX employee (1992-1996)