Don't Get Lost at the High Point Market

With 188 buildings, 12 million square feet of showroom and exhibit space, and more than 2,000 exhibitors, the High Point Market, a biannual furniture show in High Point, N.C., can be particularly daunting to navigate.

Next time around, things might be a little bit easier.

For the upcoming event, Oct. 1–7, attendees will have the opportunity to go to the High Point Market Authority's Web site, www.highpointmarket.org, beforehand and map out their entire route with a Market Planner.

Other tradeshows have offered online planners for attendees to manage an exhibit floor for a while now, but High Point had the unique challenge of mapping an entire downtown area and corresponding shuttle routes where the showrooms are located.

The tool lets attendees look through a list of exhibitors and events before the market and save the information, including location, to their personal Market Plan.

Brian Casey, High Point Market Authority's president, said, "Buyers can search and map their route by company name, showroom building or product category and create a pdf file that they can e-mail to associates or print out to carry along in High Point, complete with a map of shuttle routes that serve the sights they most want to see."

The Market Planner divides exhibitors into categories:

• small-retailer friendly and/or designer-friendly
• container-only supplier, or possessing a U.S. warehouse
• those with minimum-order requirements

High Point had a printed market directory in the past, but Casey said a lot of people suggested it be married with the online planner. "The result is a user-friendly, time-saving tool that will help attendees quickly identify the showrooms they most want to visit. Every marketgoer's time is precious and, as always, we want to do all that we can to help everyone make the most of their visit to High Point."