Sony's in the Show
Gerard S. Charles, the man behind Sony Electronics' massive exhibiting program, talks strategy
Rachelle Crum -- Tradeshow Week, 3/6/2006
Sony's largest non-Japanese subsidiary is U.S.-based Sony Electronics, with annual sales of about $11 billion. Each year, it exhibits or participates in 200 U.S. tradeshows and events (including big shows like Intl. CES, NAB and SEMA Show). And Gerard S. Charles, Sony Electronics' director and general manager of corporate events, has a hand in all this.
Along with traveling to many of these tradeshows, events and exhibit marketing shows, Charles keeps busy moderating the ebb and flow of his exhibition strategy, determining viable sponsorships, following exhibit trends and tracking changes to Sony Electronics' key businesses and categories.
Luckily for Charles, his career experience helps keeps him ahead of the pack. His start ¡ª in store line operations and visual merchandising at Macy's ¡ª guides him in building eye-catching booths. And, with 20 years with Sony Electronics' corporate events division under his belt, he knows what shows bring bang for his buck.
Charles spoke with Tradeshow Week Senior Assistant Editor Rachelle Crum from Sony Electronics' San Diego headquarters about all of this, plus the rationale behind the subsidiary's tradeshow strategy, the forces he sees at play in the industry today and why the exhibition industry remains a healthy marketing medium.
Question: How has Sony Electronics' overall exhibition strategy changed over the past year?
Answer: We've been trying to take a more focused view on our key businesses and categories, and the shows and events that best fit the needs for those categories.
Q: What are those key businesses and categories, specifically?
A: Key areas of recent growth are in TV and display products, as well as several of our digital imaging and VAIO computer models.
Q: In planning your exhibition strategy, how much do you take into account the strategy of your competitors?
A: I like to think of myself and Sony as the trendsetter. I haven't really noticed what our competitors may or may not be doing out on the showfloor.
Q: How many shows will Sony exhibit in during 2006?
A: Generally, we're in excess of 200 events (each year), and the breakdown is probably 50-50 between what we all know as a tradeshow or industry-based event and events other than that.
Q: Has Sony cut back on the number of tradeshows it exhibits in?
A: I would say that the overall number of events has an ebb and flow to it year in and year out, depending on different products that we launch and different product categories that we may stop doing business in for whatever reason. It certainly has been a fairly consistent number over the last few years.
Q: I noticed that Sony Electronics didn't exhibit at Digital Video Expo West at the Los Angeles Convention Center recently. Why did you take this show off your schedule?
A: It was a management decision made to spend those marketing dollars in other areas to try to best bring those products to market.
Q: What other shows have you recently dropped from your rotation?
A: We have not necessarily dropped any. A decision to participate in any given show in any given year is based on new product launches, marketing messages that need to be delivered to the industry and what the audience is.
Q: Everybody knows how important Intl. CES and SEMA Show are to Sony. What other shows are particularly important for you to be at?
A: Among other large events, Sony will participate in CEDIA (Expo), PMA (Intl. Annual Convention & Trade Show), NAB, NRB (Convention & Exposition), RSNA (Radiological Society of North America Scientific Assembly & Annual Meeting), ASIS (Intl. Annual Seminar & Exhibits) and InfoComm (Intl.).
Q: How has the average size of your booths changed over the last two years? Are you cutting back or expanding?
A: It has a lot to do with the products that we decide are applicable to a marketplace.
For Intl. CES this past January, Sony Electronics almost doubled the usable square footage on the showfloor. We're trying to deliver on our chairman's concept of Sony united, which is bringing all of the groups of Sony together, for instance with the Sony Experience at CES, which was 25,000 sq. ft. Our space in 2005 at CES was 14,000 sq. ft. So, there is a significant increase in presence and in investment.
Aside from some of the top marquee events, it's very strategic how large a space a company will maintain at any given show in any given year. You could show a lot of categories and a lot of pieces of product in a 2,000 sq. ft. exhibit. If you're not going to have that kind of product support the following year, maybe you move to a 20¡ä¡Á40¡ä.
Q: How much will Sony spend on exhibiting in tradeshows in 2006? How and why has this changed in recent years?
A: Sony Electronics has maintained in the last number of years a consistent investment in tradeshows and events. Maybe in the last 12 to 18 months, there's been an increase in that investment to a certain degree.
Q: Do you now focus on show sponsorships more at tradeshows?
A: At some events, we have identified sponsorships, specifically banners and shuttle bus sponsorships. Maybe the giveaway bag. At many events we have identified (sponsorships) as a good ROI on our expenditure.
Q: Could you give me a specific example of how sponsorships represent good ROI for Sony Electronics?
A: Most recently at CES, we decided that the shuttle bus and banner sponsorship opportunities would be good ways to promote Sony's large presence at the show.
Q: Many corporate exhibitors are following the trend toward more lightweight materials for tradeshow booths. Has Sony Electronics jumped on this bandwagon as well?
A: I would like to think that Sony was at the forefront of using those lightweight materials. I brought (lightweight booth materials) into the Sony world in 1996 and 1997. At a lot of those marquee electronics events, Sony was a trendsetter in using lightweight solutions over the old hardwall construction of the exhibits of yesterday.
Q: And why was that?
A: It gives you a lot of flexibility with design. They reflect professional theatrical lighting beautifully, so you get many different looks. And being lightweight is certainly one very significant way to drive down the ever-present drayage cost on the showfloor.
Q: Is that an exhibiting trend that is here to stay?
A: Oh, yes. Exhibit designers are always looking for new materials. Lightweight materials seem to work best. I would think that those materials are in the tradeshow inventory now for good, or at least for the foreseeable future.
Q: Have higher fuel prices affected your exhibition strategy?
A: It's certainly another line item in the budget. But, at this time, it has not altered our exhibition plan.
Q: What, in your opinion, defines the ideal show manager?
A: The ideal show manager or event producer should be creative, fastidious, resourceful and energetic.
Q: How involved are you with CEMA, the Corporate Event Marketing Assn., formerly the Computer Event Marketing Assn.?
A: I'm a member, and two or three people from my staff are members as well. I'm not as active as I would like to be, but I am a supporter of the organization.
Q: Do you attend exhibit marketing shows like EXHIBITOR and TS2?
A: I have attended both of those shows on occasion. Sometimes there's a scheduling conflict, but I support both of those events.
Q: What about this year?
A: Yes, I am planning to. It's important to stay on top of trends in the industry. It's important to interface with my peers who are out there doing the same thing on a daily basis as I am. And I think it's important to support the industry itself.
Q: What's your biggest frustration with tradeshow exhibiting?
A: I would like to see a more focused and determined effort to contain or reduce exhibiting costs from both the industry suppliers and the associations.
Q: Does the same frustration apply to corporate events?
A: To some degree, by the very nature of a corporate event, costs are much more controllable.
Q: Do corporate events offer the same payoff as trade-shows? The same ROI?
A: Trade-based events and corporate-sponsored events both afford us the opportunity to meet with our existing customers and also meet with new or potential customers. The opportunity to meet with the press is a valuable activity present at both venues as well.
Q: What trends have you noticed recently on the showfloor that are changing the way companies exhibit?
A: Companies are now quicker to bring to tradeshows some cutting-edge technologies that may not be ready for sale, but to increase the excitement and the buzz, either in their booth or at the event itself.
Q: Do you think that the exhibition industry is a healthy marketing medium at the moment?
A: Yes, absolutely.
I think giving the customer and the attendee the ability to see a number of different manufacturers and products under one roof is a concept that attendees like, and I think that is the main reason why attendees are driven to attend the show.
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