Center of Attention

Getting to Goal

Before you design a booth, consider your firm’s reasons for attending trade shows. In many cases, those goals will drive an exhibit’s major features. A company might attend a trade show primarily to introduce a product, or itself as a firm. “A trade show environment is a great place to test the waters,” says Dan Foley, national account director at Freeman, a Dallas, Texas–based booth manufacturer with offices in St. Paul.

Perhaps your firm wants to generate sales leads or show that a particular product is still the market leader. Companies that are at a trade show to emphasize a product need product samples and appropriate demonstration facilities. (They’ll also need a place to store stock or take orders if they intend to sell from the trade show floor.)

When you can, create the chance for a hands-on demonstration. “People like to touch stuff,” says Peter Mrozinski, president of Artec Displays, a custom, portable display maker in Vadnais Heights. If the product is a software program, let visitors try it on cutting-edge computer equipment. Artec used the hands-on concept for companies selling fishing equipment. “We’ve done some things where there’s actually fishing in the booth, and we’ve done large tanks to demonstrate electric fishing-boat motors,” Mrozinski says. “We cut the front of a boat off and mounted it to the front of a tank.”

Some products don’t easily lend themselves to a trade show demonstration. “A lot of times, a product might be too large to ship to the show,” Mrozinski says. “We have a client who makes large dust-collection units for industry, and they’re huge—the size of a truck.” In that case, he says, “we show pictures of them, or fabricate smaller, scaled models, or show a video of one in action.”

Other products can come to the show, but require a trained company representative to demonstrate them. Make those presentations big and easily visible. “You may be presenting to one person, but someone else will always want to look over their shoulder,” says Mike Mealey, national sales director at Featherlite. A large plasma screen is an ideal place to give virtual tours of a manufacturing process or show off an operating system.

Some companies exhibit at trade shows to strengthen their existing client relationships. For those companies, a hospitality suite can make sense. The best hospitality areas create an intimate, relaxed atmosphere where clients can enjoy drinks, snacks, and conversation. Some are built into a second-story deck above the main booth, Mealey says, noting that some booth rental includes the cubic footage up to 16 or 20 feet in the air. The design might be enclosed “to give a sense of oasis,” he says, but still allow those inside to watch the action on the trade show floor.