May 18, 2005 1:21 PM, By Mix Editors

Mike Dresse of Newbury Comics Gets an "A" for the day

Decades after earning his marketing degree at M.I.T., Newbury Comics CEO Mike Dreese enrolled at Berkleemusic.com, the online extension school of the Berklee College of Music, to study "The Future of Music."

As his class project, Dreese, whose company employs of 400 people and includes 25 retail outlets throughout the Northeast, set up an Internet company from scratch and bet the instructor that he would gross a million dollars in revenue by the end of the 12-week course. "My project was to start a business on the web," says Dreese, "using Amazon.com to sell used CDs and DVDs, and generate a million dollar a year run-rate from revenue by the end of the class. I think it took me three weeks after the end of the class to hit that run-rate per annum, or about $20,000 a week. It's quite amazing to start something like this on the web and end up with that level of activity in just 12 weeks. I think it's running at $3 million a year now. It's tripled in size since the end of the class."

Berkleemusic.com's "The Future of Music" is taught online by Dave Kusek, VP of Berklee Media and co-author of the just-published Future of Music—A Manifesto for the Digital Music Revolution. The course immerses students from around the world in new methods of music production and career development, focusing on discovering successful strategies for future success in the music industry.

The summer semester at Berkleemusic.com begins June 27. To learn more about its interactive online courses, visit www.berkleemusic.com.

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