Scams: Part II

(This is the second article in a series on fraudulent schemes involving nonexistent shows.)

Anyone who read our Jan. 16 report about a company selling exhibit space for shows that never took place might have a hard time believing this, but you haven't heard anything yet.

As previously reported, Natl. Expo Group advertised four expos: Natl. College Day, Natl. Home Real Estate and Finance Expo, Natl. Computer Expo and Natl. Home Expo USA. The nonexistent events were purportedly set to run concurrently at 12 different venues across the United States from the end of 2006 through this year.

What's more, Tradeshow Week discovered that Natl. Expo Group isn't running the only scam affecting the tradeshow industry. Exhibition organizer Agile Events fell victim to a con artist who used its show, Expo Tu Casa, to rip off at least one unsuspecting exhibitor.

Web sites for Natl. Expo Group's events said they would take place at San Francisco's Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, the San Jose Convention Center, Dallas Convention Center, Los Angeles Convention Center, Orange County Convention Center and Atlanta's Georgia World Congress Center, but none of the venues had signed contracts with the company.

Convention centers weren't the only ones caught up in the ensuing mess. Unsuspecting salespeople hired by Natl. Expo Group to sell exhibit space for the events were barely, if ever, paid for their work, and high-profile speakers such as Donald Trump were falsely touted as appearing at several events.

Rebekah Dubina, a recruiter for Southwestern College in Phoenix, Ariz., showed up Nov. 18, 2006, at the Sands Expo & Convention Center/Venetian Resort Hotel in Las Vegas to set up her school's booth in a space she'd bought from salesperson Bill Gluth for National College Day. The venue was completely empty.

When TSW contacted the owner of Natl. Expo Group, Kristen Martin, she said, "We planned to have all those expos," but that she was forced to cancel them due to financial difficulties. Martin also claimed she had filed bankruptcy, although TSW found no record of a filing under her company's name in the bankruptcy court for Oakland, where the business is located.

Gluth never received payment for his work, and Dubina did not want to draw more negative attention to her school by discussing whether her expenses for the nonexistent expo had been refunded. Martin said she reimbursed fees paid by Dubina and another exhibitor who had shown up at the Sands.

Operators of Bill Graham Civic Auditorium became suspicious that something was wrong when an exhibit salesperson working for Natl. Expo Group called to find out whether four expos were actually on the facility's schedule. The center's sales coordinator, Jennifer Marris, said there were no signed contracts on the advertised dates, Jan. 27¨C28, for any of the shows.

"Our facilities manager made a claim to the San Francisco Police Dept. of fraudulent activity," Marris said.

Lt. Ken Lee, who works in the property crimes unit's fraud section, checked out the Natl. Expo Group's Web sites and saw the other convention centers listed as hosting events.

"I called other centers and asked if they had any of the expos there, and of course none were happening," he said.

One of his calls was to Diana Pontan, vice president of sales for the San Jose CC. Her facility was advertised as hosting all four expos on Feb. 3.

"We sent Natl. Expo Group an e-mail on Dec. 4, 2006, saying (the events) were not booked here, and Kristen Martin (the company's president) sent us an e-mail back saying she signed a contract with one of our representatives," Pontan said. "They didn't have a signed contract with us."

Pontan sent by overnight mail a cease-and-desist letter to Natl. Expo Group stating that the company had no signed contracts at the San Jose CC and demanded the facility be removed from all of the expos' Web sites.

"At that point, we didn't know if there was exhibit space being sold for any of the expos, and we had to be able to cover ourselves if it was," Pontan added. She took another precautionary step and reported everything to the San Jose Police Dept.

Nearly identical situations were unfolding at other convention centers around the country.

Wayne Furry, contract management administrator for Orlando's Orange County CC, said the facility had no bookings for any of the expos on the advertised date, Feb. 17. There were no Natl. Expo Group contracts for March 10 at the Dallas CC, according to Director Frank Poe; no contracts for April 21¨C22 at the Los Angeles CC, according to Public Relations Manager Felix Hernandez; and no contracts for June 23¨C24 at the Georgia World Congress Center, according to a spokesperson there.

Even after venues sent cease-and-desist letters to Natl. Expo Group, Web sites for the expos remained up until Jan. 3. Martin said she had filed for bankruptcy Dec. 1.

The company offered turn-key packages for exhibit space. For instance, at the Natl. Real Estate and Finance Expo, a company could pay $5,995 for a fully draped, piped and carpeted 20¡ä ¡Á 40¡ä booth, advertising, and a front row seat for the keynote speech by Donald Trump; $895 for a 10¡ä ¡Á 10¡ä booth and four VIP passes.

It all sounded good to Evangeline Allen, a single mother in Louisville, Ky., who was looking for a stay-at-home job. She answered an Internet ad on Monster.com to sell booth space for Natl. Home Expo USA and was offered an annual salary of $40,000 plus commission.

"I was excited about it," she said. "It sounded like a wonderful opportunity."

On Nov. 6, Allen started making phone calls in the Indianapolis area (another one of the targeted cities) to businesses associated with the home market, such as lighting companies. Allen was close to making a few sales, when one of the interested parties called the Indiana CC and discovered the event didn't exist.

"I called Natl. Expo Group and told Kristen clients were suspicious, and she said she was taking care of it," Allen said. "She told me to send her the info I had of interested buyers. I called my sales manager and said, 'Something's going on here.'"

Allen didn't give Martin the sales information. Instead, she called the full list of convention centers on the show's calendar, and found out the same thing as Lt. Lee: It was all a sham.

What made it even worse was that she, like Gluth, was never paid the more than $3,000 she was owed by Natl. Expo Group.

"I felt like a fool," Allen said. "Usually I love Christmas, and this year I couldn't wait for it to be over with. I had $38.00 that someone gave me to go shopping for my daughter, and I had my mother's tree."

Allen and Gluth weren't the only dupes. Allen said there were six people on her team, and only one was partially paid; Gluth said no one on his team of eight was paid.

Meanwhile, a company called First Choice Media was running its own scam.

In early November, Nancy Gold from First Choice Media contacted Donna Berg, director of marketing for Nicholson Homes, a homebuilder based outside Orlando, and told Berg about an opportunity to exhibit at Casa Latino, a Hispanic home show in Puerto Rico, on Feb. 3. Gold told Berg she had to make a decision fast because there were only two spots left.

"Her timing was good," said Mona Reaves, marketing assistant to Nicholson Homes' president. "The housing market was slow, and we just had done a successful show. It piqued our interest to capture the Latino market."

The company paid $2,000 for booth space and another $2,000 for a full-page color ad in the expo program.

"Some time went by, and Donna kept calling and asking questions about where to stay and where the venue was, but Nancy just kept putting her off and still dangled the carrot," Reaves said.

In the first week of January, Berg e-mailed Gold and told her Nicholson Homes was pulling out of the show and wanted a full refund. Gold said she would refund the money within 30 days, but by now, Reaves said, Nicholson had figured out they were being scammed.

"When there was no response from Nancy Gold ... we called terra (a media company), one of the sponsors on the Web site," Reaves said. "They said they were concerned this show was using their name fraudulently and sent them a cease-and-desist letter."

It's not that terra didn't sponsor a Hispanic home show; it did ¡ª Expo Tu Casa, owned by Agile Events. Terra's Michele Azan e-mailed Agile CEO Jim Forlenza and told him about Nicholson Homes buying space for the fraudulent event.

Agile COO Bill Herman said he looked at First Choice Media's Web site for Casa Latino and couldn't believe his eyes.

"It is 100 percent our material," he said. "Every word, every statistic, every photograph and every sponsor logo is ours. This company completely stole our content and simply inserted their name. They even included a photo with Jim Forlenza."

First Choice Media (First choice media.info) apparently copied Agile Events' site (Expotucasausa.com) and bilked unwitting exhibitors.

"They used us a platform to pull this off," Forlenza said.

Herman called the police department in Sunny Isles Beach, where First Choice Media's business address was listed. A detective called him back and told him there was no office at that address, but there was a Mailboxes Etc. The phone number listed on the First Choice Web site is a land line located northeast of Orlando in Oviedo, Fla.

Calls by TSW to Nancy Gold were not returned.

Nicholson Homes never heard from Gold again and was not refunded its $4,000 in payments. All of the sponsors lifted from the Expo Tu Casa Web site for Casa Latino have also sent cease-and-desist letters to First Choice Media.

"Some people have balls," Herman said.

(The third installment of the series will appear in Jan. 29 issue of TSW.)