An Industry To-do List

Staff -- Tradeshow Week, 4/3/2006

1. Take attendance. What if you held a show and nobody came? That's always the fear, and according to recent Tradeshow Week research, it's a fear that can be justified. In the fourth quarter of 2005, tradeshow attendance dropped for the first time since the third quarter of 2003.
   There's also a perception taking hold that attendees now have more power than exhibitors or show organizers. So if you aren't doing anything to make sure your exhibitors are surrounded by swarms of qualified buyers, don't be surprised if those exhibitors turn up their noses and go elsewhere.
2. Gang up. Exhibitors are playing the consolidation game in many industries, so why haven't organizers joined in? Competing shows are so common that attendees and exhibitors are forced to make difficult choices and pick one show over another. Why not adopt an if-you-can't-beat-'em-join-'em attitude, particularly in the case of shows whose associations are closely aligned? There are even partnership opportunities for for-profits, as Reed Exhibitions and George Little Management have demonstrated with the collocation of their Natl. Hardware Show and Gourmet Housewares Show.
3. Gang up some more. While we're on the subject of consolidation, why not take another look at streamlining the exhibition industry itself? OK, OK ... last year's merger of the Society of Independent Show Organizers and the Intl. Assn. for Exhibition Management failed. Don't mistake that for a message that your members and sponsors don't care about efficiency — they do, particularly when it comes to getting more for their money. Dues are going up almost as fast as the cost of F&B at your fancy parties; it's only a matter of time until the cash cow kicks over the bucket. Why not do yourselves a favor and at least entertain the idea of consolidating some similar projects and programs?
4. Clean up your act. You might think it's funny to joke about kickbacks — sorry, "commissions" — at industry cocktail receptions, but take heed: A new generation of show managers and service contractors with post-Enron ethics is headed your way. They probably won't get it. They will, however, get your business, when customers see them doing things above board.
   And while you're at it, just pay for the carpet, reg' counters and flowers in your show office, for crying out loud. Read our lips: services rendered, fees paid. You really wanna control exhibitors' costs? It's as simple as that.
5. Build it yourself. Week in and week out, we run accounts of business-to-business Company X buying a package of shows from B-to-B Company Y. Meanwhile, we know that executives from companies A to Z are looking everywhere they can think of for the hottest, newest, fastest-growing show to buy. After all, it's a proven no-fuss, no-mess way to boost the bottom line.
   But there are CEOs at the SISO meeting this week who will, for the second or third straight year, go home without even a decent nibble at a viable acquisition target. The good ones are hard to find.
   So, stop relying on the wily entrepreneurs and do it yourself. Diversified Business Communications is one example of a company with an incubator unit designed to build new shows from scratch. It's slow work, but at least at the end of the day it's all theirs.
   Get your hands dirty. Start small again. Take a chance.
6. Get some new friends. Face it, if you're at the SISO CEO Summit this week, you're already part of the "in" crowd; you and your longtime friends have already had your share of success — and you want to believe it will never end. So you keep telling each other it won't.
   In the meantime, there are hundreds of SISO wanna-bes not in Charlotte, who spend as many days and weeks and months as you used to either on a tradeshow floor, on the way to one, or on the phone trying to get somebody to buy space in one.
   They likely have a pretty good idea of some of the changes to the industry that might be ahead, the changes that sound so uncomfortable that you don't want to even think about them. Maybe they're who you should be talking to next week.
7. Shut up already about COMDEX. Everybody knows the story. You laughed, you cried, you laughed again. You've all shared your favorite chestnuts about Sheldon Adelson and the inimitable Fred Rosen. You've all got your own theories about what happened and why, and some of them even make sense.
   But what are the chances of the same thing happening again? Think of what you know about the shows that are at the top of the TSW 200 year in and year out. You know who and what are involved, and that the odds of any of them coming to such an inglorious demise are slim. You also know that, given today's economic landscape, the idea that one show could experience such a meteoric rise to fame again is unrealistic.
   You do, however, know what you're good at, and that what you do best is somewhere in between the two COMDEX extremes. So go do it.
8. Go someplace uncomfortable. Leery of Beijing? Queasy about New Delhi? All the more reason to take a trip and check it out. You're not leaders in your industry because you're afraid of taking risks. If you haven't figured out yet that the world is flat, don't worry: That just means more of the global pie for Adelson and Gary Loveman.
9. Express yourself. Remember the post-Sept. 11 hoopla about creating an industry campaign to show the world that tradeshows are a good value, especially when times are bad? Remember that? What happened?
   IAEM President Steven Hacker wrote us a letter explaining that a Got Milk?-style campaign would never work for this industry because it's comprised of a bunch of different industries with specific needs. Everybody agreed it would be expensive, but nobody would pony up the dough; and the idea died.
   Well, while you were sleeping, somebody else did it. With less than $300,000, the U.K. industry launched an effective PR and advocacy campaign demonstrating, in language C-level and Capitol-Hill types appreciate, why exhibitions and events are good for the bottom line and the economy. It wasn't easy, said those involved, but they didn't want to be caught in a recession with their pants down.
   Suspenders, anyone?
10. Finally, just from us ... You're the newsmakers, we're the news gatherers. We'll count on you to tell us the truth and the straight story; you can count on us to get it right. And don't tiptoe around the bad news; it only makes us suspicious.