May 15, 2017

Meet Michael Reese and Mike Aljadeff of MJ Entertainment LA in Mid Wilshire

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael Reese and Mike Aljadeff.

So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I grew up in Connecticut and one day when I was 16 my mom decided it was about time I get a job, so she got me an interview with a local DJ company and basically kicked me out the door and wished me luck. I had terrible taste in music — I loved emo bands like Taking Back Sunday and Good Charlotte — and not the slightest inclination to become a DJ, but I went to the interview anyway. I was a super shy kid at the time and not popular at all. I wore band tee shirts and wanted to be a singer/songwriter like Dashboard Confessional. I was pretty much convinced that my big break was right around the corner (it wasn’t). The interview was really just me showing up to one of their company meetings to find out what they were about. One of the emcees, who went by the name of Wacko Jacko, sat down next to me and just decided that I was going to be his DJ from now on. I think he just saw a blank canvass and figured he paint me into his masterpiece. Or maybe it was nothing more than the fact that I just happened to be sitting next to him. Whatever it was, he took me under his wing and he trained me to become one of the better DJ’s in all of Connecticut. We must have worked hundreds of weddings, Bar/Bat Mitzvahs, sweet 16’s, proms, and everything in between together. Eventually, we decided to branch off and start our own company. Along with a few of his friends we launched WJ Productions. Under Jack’s leadership, we built the company from scratch until we became one of the leading mobile DJ companies in the state. After four years of growth, we ended up selling the company back to the one where we originally started.

I went off to college, then made my way out to California to pursue my next creative endeavor, screenwriting. Two weeks after moving to Los Angeles I was the victim of a home invasion. Two guys snuck in through the window of my ground floor apartment while I was asleep after a long day of PA work on set. I woke up to find my bedroom door open and my hallway light on, which was weird since I went to sleep with the door closed and light off. As soon as I came to my senses and realized what was happening, the guys came in, put a gun to my head and tied me up. They took pretty much everything of value I had, including my car! Around that time, I was applying to grad schools to study screenwriting further. Each of the applications wanted a personal statement, so I wrote a satirical story about my experience of the robbery, which got me accepted into UCLA’s Theater, Film and Television program.

After UCLA, I got repped by a management team, but it turned out I was more of a longer-term project that needed to sit on the bench for a few years until I was polished enough to become a starter. That meant I needed to find some way to support myself in the meantime. It just so happened that I had been living with a roommate I found off craigslist, Mike Aljadeff, who also had experience in the wedding industry.

Mike, born in Israel, grew up in Chicago and went to College in Boston at the Berklee School of Music. He played in various wedding bands all over the tri-state area to support himself while honing his skills as a songwriter. Eventually, he moved out west to pursue being an artist, performing under the name Michael Jade. He ended up performing on American Idol and The Voice (Israel), placing in the Top 50 of each competition. Mike quickly became known for his songwriting and worked with the likes of John Mayer, Richard Marx, Krewella, Conrad Sewell, and many others. In January, he signed a publishing deal with Warner/Chappell Music. As much as Mike loves being in the studio all day, he still loves performing just as much, which is why he was excited by the idea of starting a wedding entertainment company together. We knew that if we leveraged his network of friends that had performed on and placed in the Top 50 and above on American Idol, The Voice, X Factor and other TV-based talent competitions, we could really have something special that no one else was doing.

Thousands of dollars in start-up costs later, here we are.

Has it been a smooth road?
I think one of the biggest struggles so far has been that you never run out of ideas for ways to spend money on advertising/marketing. Especially, in the beginning, you sort of have to throw money at a bunch of different marketing channels to see which will work best for the company. You can’t make data-driven decisions without any data!

This also plays into another struggle which is patience and organic growth vs. trying to find growth hacks and just throw money at it to grow as big as possible as quickly as possible. What we’re finding is that the wedding industry is such a referral and word-of-mouth based industry that it’s something which takes years to build up and gain the trust of couples, venues, wedding coordinators and other vendors, which will eventually become the core engine of the business. It’s easy to get discouraged when your competition has been in business for over 30 years and is firmly entrenched in the market, but the best advice I’ve gotten so far is to put on blinders and adopt the Japanese philosophy of Kaizen. If we can focus on getting just 1% better each and every day, we’ll be much better off than if we try to take on too much too fast.

So, let’s switch gears a bit and go into the MJ Entertainment LA story. Tell us more about the business.
We provide wedding entertainment featuring Top 50 and above performers from American Idol, The Voice, X Factor and other TV-based talent shows. Our wedding band always comes with a DJ, so there is never a drop-in energy when the band takes a break. It also allows us to cater to wider tastes, rather than just what’s on the band’s song list.

What we’re most proud of as a company is that pay our performers what they are worth. Our standards for the musicians we use are ridiculously high, so you can always count on having world class performers when you hire us. We also love the fact that we’re able to make talent accessible that is normally inaccessible to most people. Having your first dance sung live by one of the runners-up on The Voice is a magical experience you’ll remember for the rest of your life.

Besides the unparalleled quality of our performers, what sets us apart is our excellent customer service. We try to answer emails immediately and always be just a phone call or text message away if our clients ever need us. We completely understand that planning a wedding is crazy-making and we try to ease the stress and make things easier in any way we can.

How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
Traditions and formalities are being thrown to the wayside in favor of a more laid back, fun and unique atmosphere. We’re seeing more and more couples that don’t want to do any of the special dances or ceremonies like the bouquet toss and garter removal. Many of them are even doing away with the cake cutting! Couples are breaking away from being slaves to tradition and throwing parties that reflect and celebrate their love in a way that is unique to them as a couple.

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