Gary Bacchetti:  

Gary is from Boston, New York. Gary's schools include Potters Road (Kindergarten), Bellwood Elementary, West Seneca West Junior (Center Road), West Seneca West High School, SUNY Alfred, Media Studies University of Buffalo. I lived in Hollywood, California in 1973 right across the street from Hanna-Barbera Studios (The Flintstones cartoons were produced there). My degree is Audio/Visual and Film and Motion Picture Production. Robert Young (Marcus Welby M.D. TV show) was my "on set" mentor - not officially, but helped me immensely. He was a really nice guy - taught me everything I needed to know about tinsel town and why not to go into this business. The Brady Bunch, on the other hand, were a bunch of snobs, not to mention David Cassidy, Danny Bonaduce, and the rest over at Columbia (The Partridge Family) - although Shirley Jones was sincere. Lucille Ball at Universal had attitude up the wazoo. Hollywood was such a snobbish town, I moved back to Buffalo and entered marketing and advertising with GTE (now Verizon). And as Paul Harvey would say, "Now the rest of the story"... (It's long but people like to read details)... I worked for 20 years at GTE an "in-plant marketing facility" (now Verizon). We were responsible for many of our GTE locations around the country. When corporate headquarters in Stamford, CT decided to close our marketing branch in 1993 my co-workers panicked. All 52 employees started scrambling to update resumes and get ready to pound the pavement. I "Chose" A Different Route. I saw opportunity not knocking, but banging at my front door. I contacted many of our GTE and NON-GTE customers and told them not to worry. If they felt comfortable working with me as they had, someone who knew their account in great detail, we could continue business as usual - but they'd be sending payments to me this time, not GTE. I took a deep breath and took $$$ out of my 401K plan, rented an office suite, slapped on a shingle, and here I am 20 years later having brought in many times my original $$$. In my peak, I had 33 full-time employees, many of which were my former co-workers working in our new office(s) over two shifts. My Former Employer Was Now My Largest Customer! My company, Marketing & Advertising Services Center, (M.A.S.C.) grew into a complete fulfillment support organization serving thousands of businesses, educational institutions, and consumers nationwide. Success was built on extremely strong and consistent customer service. MASC, in addition to hosting and e-commerce, provided consulting services on marketing campaigns, accepted reserv...Expand for more