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Mackie is an American manufacturer of professional audio equipment. LOUD Technologies’ major product line is Mackie, which was founded in Seattle in 1988 by Greg Mackie as a manufacturer of inexpensive and adaptable compact pro audio mixers.
Greg Mackie, an ex-Boeing employee who began building pro audio gear and guitar amps in his leisure time, created Mackie Designs, Inc. in Woodinville, Washington. After founding the small-line mixer manufacturer TAPCO and, later, the home audio processor manufacturer AudioControl, Mackie founded Mackie Designs, Inc.
In his three-bedroom condominium in Edmonds, Washington, designing and manufacturing affordable and versatile compact pro audio mixers under the Mackie brand. Mackie’s first product was the $399 LM-1602 line mixer.
Following the LM-1602’s moderate sales success, the company relocated to a proper factory in 1991 to develop and sell its follow-up model, the CR-1604. The CR-1604 was purchased for use in a wide range of markets and applications due to its ability to be utilized as a desktop or rackmount mixer (a unique concept at the time), strong performance, and low price. The CR-1604 was a huge success, selling hundreds of thousands of units by 1996 and accounting for more than 48% of Mackie’s total sales at the time.
Mackie remained firmly in the mixer market during this period, producing 8-Bus mixing consoles for multitrack recording and live sound production in 1993. Mackie took advantage of the abundance of electronic and engineering subcontractors in the Seattle area, as well as automated assembly machines, to achieve high productivity and quality while lowering overall manufacturing costs.
At the time, the company was growing at a rate of more than 100% each year, forcing Mackie to relocate and increase operations every year. By 1994, Mackie had developed into a 30,000-square-foot plant with over 250 employees and yearly revenues of $35.5 million.
In 1995, Mackie celebrated the sale of its 100,000th mixer and relocated to a 90,000-square-foot plant. Later that year, the company conducted an initial public stock offering and debuted the Ultra-mix Universal Automation System for 8-bus consoles at the AES Convention.
By 1996, Mackie had begun to diversify, hiring senior industry designer Cal Perkins and expanding into power amps, powered mixers, and active studio monitors. Mackie introduced the SRM450-powered loudspeaker in 1999, as a result of Mackie Designs’ acquisition of Radio Cine Forniture S.p.A., and by 2001, speakers accounted for 55% of Mackie sales.
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