Following its acquisition earlier this year by a Canadian company, KMC Music said this week that it will keep its corporate headquarters in Bloomfield, but in a new location within town.
Effective immediately, KMC — formerly owned by guitar and equipment maker Fender Musical Instruments and now owned by Montreal-based JAM Industries — said its new corporate headquarters is located at 310 West Newberry Road. That’s mere steps from its former headquarters at 55 Griffin Road South.
JAM has 45 Connecticut employees, a spokesman said.
“When it was time to select a new corporate headquarters we knew we didn’t want to stray far from our roots,” KMC President Mark Terry said in a statement. “We’re thrilled to remain in Bloomfield, where our company was founded and where so much of our history resides.”
KMC also announced that it will move its warehousing and distribution operation from Tennessee to JAM’s facility in Mississippi.
Terry, a former executive at Stamford audio manufacturer Harman, was hired by Fender in late 2013 to lead KMC.
In January, Fender sold KMC for an undisclosed amount to JAM, a group of companies that distributes consumer electronics, audio equipment and instruments. JAM appointed Terry as CEO of its U.S. musical instruments group, which includes KMC and three other companies.
Also in January, in a separate deal, Fender sold KMC’s owned and licensed percussion brands, including Gretsch Drums, to California’s Drum Workshop Inc. DW also bought the Ovation guitar brand from Fender in that deal.
Fender closed its Ovation manufacturing facility in New Hartford last summer, prior to the announcement of the sale of the brand to Drum Workshop.
Fender acquired KMC in 2007 from Kaman Music Corp., which was originally founded in the mid-1960s by Charles Kaman, founder of Bloomfield aerospace manufacturer-distributor Kaman Corp. and inventor of the Ovation guitar.
