Today we’d like to introduce you to Nikki Oberle
Hi Nikki, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
I grew up just outside of Boston, MA and was a bartender for many years. In 2008, I started learning from a lot of my DJ friends that I had made in the industry and absolutely fell in love with mixing. Music was always a huge part of my life growing up, inside and outside of the home. I taught dance, I sang in a band at one point, but DJing felt like something I could truly make a future out of. After about a year, I continued spinning in bars and clubs, but branched out into the private events industry, learning from mentors with established companies. Fast forward moving to Austin and starting off on my own! 16 years later, I’m still doing what I love every single day and I have the best team of DJs I could possibly ask for working alongside me.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
I would NOT say the road to where I am was “smooth”! Back in 2008, being a female DJ was not the commodity it is today. It was almost a joke to some people seeing me in the booth. The amount of (mostly men) who approached me during sets, literally as I’m in the middle of mixing songs, interrupting me to say “so you’re not really mixing right?” was appalling. It was during a time when unfortunately there were several companies sending out “models for hire” to fake DJ big celebrity and playboy parties and the like, and it was very known they were just pretending with a pre-made mix, so it really hurt the rest of us females who were actually trying to make a living of the craft. As in many professions today, as a woman I had to prove myself double over the male DJs out there. It helped that I had so many people in my corner encouraging me when that type of thing would happen.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
I grew up watching both of my parents run their own successful businesses, so I learned a lot about the value of being extremely personal with my clients from a young age. I take so much pride in what I have built over the years, and I want every facet of my business to reflect that.
My team of DJs is small, but man, are we a force to be reckoned with! I’m about quality over quantity and the team I have now is just phenomenal. DJing isn’t a passing hobby or side-hustle for them, this is their life. So they care as much as I do about every detail of every event we do. And we know that no matter what’s happening in our personal lives, we have to bring it 100% to every gig. No matter what, The Show Must Go On!
As a brand, I love that I’ve been in business long enough that the clients who reach out know what they are getting with DJ Nixx Entertainment. They’re getting a diverse team, who know all kinds of music, who can MC and Host as well as they mix, and are absolutely professional and also absolutely cool as hell in every way. I think that’s what sets us apart from most, there’s no stuffiness or cheesiness to what we do.
Can you talk to us a bit about the role of luck?
My extremely fortunate luck in my career life is that when I decided to branch off and invest in my own business, my partner Jason (now husband) was financially independent enough to support us both while I was a “starving artist” as they say. Being in the event industry requires a lot of time investment as well as financial. Being that I didn’t know a soul in Austin when we moved here in 2013, starting from the very bottom was my only option. I did gigs for very little if not for free, went to every networking event I could, spent countless hours just trying to get meetings with people I really wanted to work with. I could not have done all of that and still kept a roof over my head and food in my dog’s bowl if it weren’t for him!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.djnixxentertainment.com
- Instagram: @djnixx
- Facebook: @djnixxentertainment
- Other: https://www.mixcloud.com/DJNixxEntertainment/
Image Credits
-Errich Peterson
-Happy Day Media
-Krystal Eve Photography
