Maletis Beverage
Just Add Power Ultra HD Over IP video distribution system pours on video presentation scalability and flexibility for Oregon-based Maletis Beverage
Client
Maletis Beverage
Where
Portland, Oregon
Sector
Technology
Integrator
GB Manchester
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Background
Portland, Oregon, is serious about beer. With the wide variety of crafted beverages brewed in the area, the city is known as “Beervana” and the beer tourism capital of the world. Maletis Beverage — a locally owned and operated distributor of beer, cider, wine, and soft drinks since 1935 — has even crafted a beverage portfolio that echoes the city’s unique mark on the industry. Wanting its headquarters to tap into the spirit of the city and the range of brands it represents, Maletis renovated its 9-acre Swan Island distribution center that the company has occupied since 1993. Completed in September 2017, the multifunctional office and warehouse space was modernized with touches that that give a nod to the industrial area and capitalize on modern presentation capabilities.
The upstairs work space was opened up. The ground floor was redesigned with a dynamic lobby, conference rooms, retail space, as well as a brew house and tap kitchen with an adjoining outdoor garden and patio area. The company also added a sales room with capacity for up to EASY INSTALLATION UNMATCHED SCALABILITY OUTSTANDING PERFORM 100 people that can be used for group events, meetings, and presentations. Video and audio were a high priority for the overhaul. The original system consisted only of two 42-inch displays that they plugged their laptop into and presented on one screen at a time. Systems integrator GB Manchester was selected to bring the company’s vision for a more media-content driven environment to life.
Challenge
To amp up the video presence, the company wanted a video wall in the foyer that would play content from the brands within the Maletis portfolio, giving customers, clients, and employees an engaging snapshot that reflected the company’s commitment to quality. A 2×3 video wall was installed in a portrait configuration using six 55-inch NEC UN551S. In the massive 68’x50’ sales presentation room, the company opted for another video wall but in a large 3×3 matrix installed at the front of the room. The video wall has nine NEC UN551S displays, giving employees a much larger creative surface for presentations and better visualization for people in the back of the room. Two 89-inch LG 84LM96004K-capable screens augment the seating area. Video sources included four cable and satellite set top boxes; a MAC mini running an application that’s customized with Maletis’ advertising, Twitter feeds, weekly specials and more; a Google Chrome box running news feeds, weather, and time; a PC for slide shows; an Apple TV; and two wireless laptop connections.
It was critical to Maletis to be able to easily to switch between all 11 video sources, allowing its sales staff to take advantage of many different kinds of content. The company also wanted to be able to use the system when hosting special gatherings. To that end, they needed a video distribution and switching system that would allow them to send source content to whichever of the 17 displays they wanted, whether it was the foyer video wall, presentation video wall, or the two additional screens in the presentation room, and be easy enough for any employee to use and scalable to any future presentation needs.
Solution
When it came time to select an AV distribution system, Maletis did its own homework. They personally reached out to a local Just Add Power (J+P) sales representative to better understand the emerging world of IP-based video distribution solutions and how it might help modernize its branding and presentations. “It’s not often we have a client come to us saying, ‘We know exactly what we want,’ to distribute their video sources,” said Dale Williamson, project manager for GB Manchester. “The research Maletis put into this not only highlighted just how important it was for the company to get this component of their renovation and AV systems upgrade exactly right, but also opened up the door for us to learn more about J+P’s system. We weren’t expecting how easy it would be to learn and install. It gave us a new standard to recommend on future projects.”
GB Manchester installed J+P’s 3G Ultra HD over IP platform transmitter and receivers. Each display is equipped with a small VBS-HDIP-518AVP receiver on the back fed from two VBSHDIP-717WP2 wall plate PoE transmitters for laptop connections in areas of the room where plugging in is not possible, such as the six-panel video wall in the lobby and three VBS-HDIP749a triple-input rackmount transmitters. Designed with an innovative modular approach to video distribution, the platform allowed GB Manchester to scale the solution to fit the needs of the current display and sources. It also would allow Maletis to add displays, sources, and even support emerging formats in the future with ease. Any additional screens would only need another small receiver added into the system, and depending on the number of new video sources added, only another transmitter. This platform created an economical solution for any ongoing display, source, or format upgrades that Maletis would need going forward.
Currently, Maletis’ J+P setup supports the integration of video walls from 2×2 up to 16×16 in size, 4K Ultra HD resolutions, and HDMI 2.0 devices with HDCP 2.2. It enabled seamless switching between any resolution HDMI source (2160, 1080, 720,576, 480, interlaced or progressive) as well as uncompressed lossless multichannel audio formats including Dolby Atmos support. To enhance video presentations, it supports 3D format and has video wall functionality built-in for displays installed in portrait and flipped configurations as well as image push, pull, and pop features. An integrated scaler on the receiver automatically adjusts the picture to fit the screen. GB Manchester used Luxul’s AMS 4424P Gigabit managed Ethernet switch with layer 3 support to fully optimize J+P’s HD over IP distribution system.
Results
With J+P Ultra HD over IP platform installed, Maletis has a robust video distribution backbone that’s kicked the company’s content capabilities into high gear. They can use it for dynamic presentations with content filling the entire video wall or sources can be sent to individual screens within the matrix just by tapping a destination and source on an iPad equipped with RTI’s RTiPanel control app. Furthermore, they can choose how the content is displayed on each screen.
“As an integrator, I was impressed with the speed of switching of the video sources, the accuracy, and the image quality,” said Williamson. “We’ve had a lot of problems using typical extenders; the quality of the image sometimes is lacking or they outright fail. It’s so much easier with the Just Add Power platform, not only with the transportation of the video but also with control of it. The ease of installation and setup really streamlines things on the job. That it’s all built into the one package has been a game changer for us.”
In fact, after such a positive experience on the Maletis installation, GB Manchester updated its own headquarters with Just Add Power and plan to use the system as one of its lead components on future installations.
