April 2012

ammunition

It's no secret that enticing editors to visit your booth can be challenging. That's why Chicago-based PRMconnect Inc. turned to something with universal appeal - pizza. Hoping to attract a targeted list of EXHIBITOR2011 press representatives to its booth for five- to 10-minute demonstrations of its Leadature lead-management and e-literature solution, PRM zeroed in on editors' taste buds. Together with public-relations agency Momentum Communications, PRM extended a mouth-watering offer via its press kits, which were distributed in the press room: A free pizza from Chicago's legendary Lou Malnati's sent to media reps' homes or offices - so long as they stopped by the booth for a demo. The promotion yielded a 100-percent return from represented media outlets, and 80 percent of journalists who viewed the demo ultimately published stories featuring Leadature. The way to a man's heart may be through his stomach, but the path to a press rep's post-show write-up might take a similar route. How do you breathe life into quartz, and build booth traffic in the process? If you're Hanwha Surfaces, you create an optical illusion. In its booth at the 2011 Kitchen and Bath Industry Show, the maker of natural-quartz surfaces displayed three of its newest patterns via 5-by-10-foot slabs. Words across the top of each quartz panel introduced the patterns to the public. Meanwhile, a model posed in front of each slab wearing a combination of body paint and a leotard, allowing him or her to blend into the quartz pattern. When attendees noticed the living statues, they stopped to snap photos and send tweets. Most exhibitors want their booths to communicate a little something about their brands, but DMC Worldwide took that idea one step further with its booth for Copia. An application that merges the functionality of an e-reader with the convenience and interconnectivity of social media, Copia allows users to read and discuss e-books with friends on tablet PCs and sync their library to multiple electronic devices, including laptops and even smart phones. So to make sure attendees at the International Consumer Electronics Show received Copia's message loud and clear, DMC sprinkled tongue-in-cheek phrases all over its exhibit. For example, a bathtub-size crate held hundreds of hard-bound books and bore the phrase, "Filled to the top with great discussions." The whimsical messages infused the booth with personality while simultaneously communicating what the company is all about. There's something about a man in a kilt that stops most Americans in their tracks. And that's exactly why Edinburgh, U.K.-based Magnetic Advertising Ltd. dressed its two male booth staffers in traditional Scottish kilts for the Interna- tional Hotel, Motel + Restaurant Show at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York. Making its debut at the show, the provider of promotional items such as pens and pencils wanted to set itself apart from the hundreds of other exhibitors, despite its tiny 10-by-10-foot space. While the company's ex- hibit featured little more than a fabric back-wall graphic and a table full of product sam- ples, the men in kilts made attendees stop and gawk. Granted, aside from the company's headquarters, the kilts had nothing to do with Magnetic Advertising. But a quick awkward glance from attendees was all these two gentlemen needed to break the ice and launch into a pitch about their promotional products.		It seems like everybody is trying to tighten their budgets and lighten their spending. At the World Shoe Association show in Las Vegas, Summer Rio Corp. literally lightened up by trading traditional hard-surface exhibitry for lightweight, inexpensive curtains. Creating its very own shoe store amid the trade show floor, Summer Rio enclosed its 30-by-30-foot space with lacy curtains in the company's signature purple color. Suspended from a truss system by shower-curtain rings, the drapery kept shipping, drayage, and installation costs low, enclosed the company's merchandise in its calming corporate hue, and gave Summer Rio a flashy dash of panache for its exterior walls. Assembling a press kit can be an expensive endeavor. So to keep costs down at the National Stationery Show, Basalt, CO-based stationery and gifting company Iota used its own office supplies. Iota packaged a series of press releases and a product catalog inside a simple interdepartment-delivery envelope. But to keep the press kit from looking like a lost piece of inter-office communiqué, Iota affixed a sticker to the front that read, "Hello! My name is Iota Press Kit," along with its booth number and the text, "Chock full of the latest and greatest news: what's fresh and exciting in the world of Iota." The envelope was also covered in ink-stamped phrases like "Be the first to know Iota news" and "What's fresh in the world of Iota." The crafty little kit was as alluring as it was inexpensive, proving that forgettable folders aren't the only option when it comes to packaging your press kits. Hoping to get curious attendees to visit its booth at EuroShop 2011, Floor Promotion by S-Print NV gave them a veritable trail of breadcrumbs to follow. The Deinze, Belgium, provider of custom-printed carpet created various-colored circular carpet swatches, each of which featured the image of a single footprint. Adhesive on the back of the colorful swatches allowed Floor Promotion to attach them to the convention-center floor in a "walking" pattern leading from a main aisle to its exhibit. Not all trade shows will allow this type of atypical in-aisle promotion. But at those shows that do, this nifty tactic can effectively catch the attention of passersby and direct them, step by step, right into your booth space.
		What's The Big Idea? Do you have a clever exhibit-related tip? Did your last exhibit have an über-cool traffic builder? Contact Kelli Billstein at kbillstein@exhibitormagazine.com.