Moving Home

Think driving in traffic for two hours is a strong impetus to creativity? Tom Seufert sure didn't. He was all set to rent the original Lucas Films building in West Los Angeles to house his company, Visual Music, when a friend suggested he take a drive down the notorious 405 freeway during rush hour. "I drove it for three days [and then] canceled all the orders," says Seufert, whose company has produced music scores for TV commercials and feature films since 1981. "And I decided I wasn't going to live my life that way, in my car for two hours a day,"

Seufert moved home instead, selling off a 7-foot-wide English console mixing board that had required him to lease commercial studio space and replacing it with a small digital mixing board, which he complemented with a G3 computer and audio editing software. He now collaborates with composers and musicians via cable modem. Even with softening advertising budgets, the move home in 1998 has proved profitable for Seufert, who had sales of $400,000 last year.