Editor's note: This is one in a weekly series of profiles on locally owned and operated businesses in Southern Oregon.

What do you do and how long have you been doing it?

Jeanine: We own a mobile DJ business, filling any kind of need for a disc jockey from school dances to bars, including karaoke. We do weddings every weekend as well as birthday parties and bar mitzvahs. We also do sound systems for schools and auctions. We've been doing this since 2002, starting it in Portland and then bringing it to Medford in 2003.

How long have you lived in the Rogue Valley?

Tim was raised here and I moved here from Portland after college.

What inspired you to go into this line of work?

My husband was a DJ for Medford Skate University for 10 years and fell in love with DJ work. I did it in college and then we stopped doing it. Then, after two years we had a baby and I wanted to be a stay-at-home parent, so we decided to take our DJ skills and turn it into a business.

What decision or action would you change if you could do it again?

I probably would have waited until we moved back to Medford to start the business, because we are still getting requests in Portland. It's too difficult to travel up to Portland for a Friday afternoon gig and then get back here for Saturday. We can't book something that interferes with our regular work here.

What's the toughest business decision you've made?

Not to take out any loans and to grow the business slowly. We've had opportunities to grow business dramatically by taking out loans, but didn't want to owe any money. It took us six years to get five employees and five rigs. We had that opportunity four years ago to do that, but we didn't want to have the loans.

Who are your competitors?

Destination DJ, Hot Nights and Heat Productions. We worked for Heat Productions back when Sean Christian owned it and had 12 DJs. We're booking gigs just fine, so there is plenty of work for all of us.

What are your goals?

Spotlight's On You is my husband's full-time job and could become a full-time job for me at some point. I work full-time at a manufacturing company during the day. Right now we book from Roseburg to Klamath Falls. I think we'd like to get to eight or nine employees, including someone to work in the office to handle calls and appointments, then have eight DJs.

What training or education did you need?

Tim's been DJing for almost 20 years, but never worked for a radio station. You need a wide variety of music from big band to jazz to '80s dance to techno as well as traditional songs. We buy a lot of discs and put songs on compilation discs.

We belong to a national group called Promo Only that supplies DJs with new music. I started DJing for Heat Productions while I was a student at Southern Oregon University in 1999.

What's your advice for budding entrepreneurs?

Just go for it. One of us made enough money to allow the other one to make the business go. The best decision we made was to continue on with our normal work while preceding on with the business. We are in a good position now six years after starting because we didn't take out loans and we own all of our equipment.

To suggest an idea for this column, contact reporter Greg Stiles at 776-4463 or e-mail business@mailtribune.com