How Does Your Trade Show Partner Behave - Class & Integrity?

 Today, while I was scrolling through LinkedIn, I saw a post labeled, "learn from the oops moments at CES 2024".  This post was from a local competitor.  I will not name them here, because I do truly think it is tacky to do so. Stand on your own merits, don't put other companies down on any social media platform.  But I digress.

I took a look at the blog post for this company, and it actually contained photos and text that clearly called out the exhibiting companies!  Yeah, shaming them for their exhibits at CES. Really?

Here are a couple of phrases they used describing not only the exhibits, but the exhibiting companies.

"This year however, the streaming giant got it all wrong."

They went on to say that people waited in line to get into the exhibit and had they known what they were going to see, they "wouldn't have wasted their time"

"The fact that this was their solution would seriously make one think twice about partnering with (Insert exhibitor name here).

"The devil's in the details even when you are shelling out millions on an otherwise sensational stand. (Insert exhibitor name here) would have been better served by scraping these vinyl letters of their exhibit entirely."

There are more, but you get the gist. I was astonished and disgusted enough to make a comment saying it was tacky to post the exhibitor names and slam them like they did in this post. The language in the post was arrogant and condescending. 

Suffice it to say, my comment was removed by their social media people.

Unless you are the exhibitor, you have no idea what these exhibitor stories, maybe their freight was lost, maybe they are a start up.

Shame on this exhibit house. Really.  This, to me, was a HUGE OOPS moment on their part. Why would you do business with someone like that?

Integrity - Own Your Mistakes!

I have been wrestling with some thoughts recently.  If you have read any of my posts you know how much I value integrity.   We have turned away business if we feel a client is dishonest or lacks integrity.  To us relationships and partnerships are everything.  

We recently lost a customer.  Of course, that happens to everyone.  They had some new staff and they had fired our contact.    We worked very hard to be sure the transition for them was smooth.  We did show paperwork for them at no charge because they didn't know how to do it.  We provided many services for them that we normally charge for at no charge.    When they had a list minute show request come in and all of their inventory was out at other shows, we rushed an order to be sure they had a display for their show.  We did not charge them any rush charges.

In the end, these new employees screwed up a couple of things for their shows and they threw us under the bus to their boss.  I am a big girl.  I can take it.  

Eventually we got a call from another exhibit house saying that they wanted us to ship them all the products we were storing in our warehouse. 

  We didn't even get a call from the client.  We were their excuse.  We were their scapegoat.  It became clear that they lacked integrity.  So, in the end I am glad that they are no longer a client.  Does that sound harsh?  Sorry, not sorry.  

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Lori Hanken has been in sales and marketing for over 30 years. She is passionate about service and providing value to her vendors, prospects and clients. Lori is currently co-owner of Total Displays with her husband David. They help people look great at events, trade shows, in retail, museums and develop long partnerships with customers and suppliers. If you would like to learn more, email her at lori@totaldisplays.com. She is an open networker, connect with her on LinkedIn here.

Read other Total Displays Blog posts at http://totaldisplays.blogspot.com/

You can also check out our website at www.totaldisplays.com

Do You Stand Out At Your Trade Shows Or Events?

The end of the year is always a time of reflection.   How did the year go?   What did we do well?   Where can we improve?   In the trade show world it is often a time for budgeting.   All too frequently I hear, "we are cutting back on our trade show schedule for next year".   When you ask why, the response is we just are NOT getting the ROI we need.

Have you ever analyzed why you are not getting the ROI you need or do you just throw in the towel?   There are so many questions you should be asking.   Do not just look at number of leads and lead conversion.

Here are a couple of key questions to consider.  This is not meant to be an exhaustive list, just a couple of ideas for you.

1. Are your biggest competitors at that show?
2. Do any of your Key Accounts attend that show?
3. How many potential prospects attend the show?
4. Who is staffing your booth?   Are they trained?   Do they represent your company and brand well?
5. Do you have enough people at the show or too many?
6. Do you have the right people?   (See #4)
7. Does your exhibit and/or graphics have big impact on the show floor?
8. Are you participating in any pre-show marketing?
9. Do you have documented and measurable goals for the show?

So here is my big question to you for 2018.

WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO TO STAND OUT AT YOUR TRADE SHOWS AND EVENTS FOR 2018?

We are here to help with many ideas from experiential marketing, graphics refresh, themes and many other ideas to help you GET NOTICED.

If you would like help reviewing your trade show program and the profitability and feasibility of  the various shows, we can help you with that!

If you like what you read, please share it!

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Lori Hanken has been in sales and marketing for over 30 years. She is passionate about service and providing value to her vendors, prospects and clients. Lori is currently co-owner of Total Displays with her husband David. They help people look great at events, trade shows, in retail, museums and develop long partnerships with customers and suppliers. If you would like to learn more, email her at lori@totaldisplays.com. She is an open networker, connect with her on LinkedIn here.

Read other Total Displays Blog posts at http://totaldisplays.blogspot.com/

Do You Lose Gracefully? Or are you going to make them pay?

This is a long post.  Sorry.  If you have read our other blog posts, you know how passionate I am about partnerships and about integrity.  A lack of integrity exists in all industries.  I refuse to be a person or a company without integrity.

Every line of business out there has them.  The liars, the cheats, the dishonest business person.  You hope you do not run into them much.  That is one of the reasons that we believe so much in partnerships and why we value the great partnerships we have.

Seriously I can't say it enough.  If you have great partners, do not lose them.  Value and take care of the relationships.


Last year we lost a client that stored their booth here at our facility.  The client never had the decency to call us and tell us.  They simply had another display house email us saying they wanted us to ship them all of the client's booth materials.  The client had a new VP that had a relationship with another display house.  That happens to everyone regardless of how well you care for and service your clients.

We reached out to the client multiple times, not to try to save the business but to make sure that it was ok to ship their materials to another display house.  The client would not return our calls.  Eventually we connected with the client.  We packaged up all their materials and shipped them out.  We did not charge them for even close to the time that it took us to package it all up.

So why do I tell you this?

A few months after that, the tables were turned.  We had a client acquire another company.  That company had a booth that was built by a custom house out of Atlanta.  The parent company wanted to move those materials over to use to store and manage their show schedule.  Our client had a very different experience.  The client reached out to the custom exhibit house to find out what materials were there and how to get the materials shipped to our location.

What transpired leaves me shaking my head and wondering how this company possibly has any clients.

The exhibit house treated us and the client with nothing but disdain and contempt.  We reached out to them as the client had a show coming up.  Even though the client asked us to get the booth ready for the show the exhibit house would not answer any questions about the booth property that they were storing.  They held the booth hostage and tried to throw us under the bus with our client.  They acted desperate and childish.  They continually tried to undermine our efforts.  Here are some excerpts of some of the emails they sent us and the client.

"I told you I am on VACATION, I will deal with this when I get back."

"I have been in the industry for over 30 years...."

We were trying to get a list with weights and sizes so that we could coordinate shipping of the materials.  They would not provide that.  They told us,

"Just schedule a full 53' air ride trailer."

Now anyone that has been in the exhibit industry for 30 years knows you don't just schedule a full trailer without dimensions and weights of things being shipped.  Here was our response to him.

Mr 'I've Been In The Industry For Over 30 Years':

I appreciate your response yesterday advising us to schedule a 53’ air ride trailer for the 'Client' materials however our logistics partner is in need of greater detail. We respectfully request again on behalf of the client, the # of pieces, the types of pieces i.e. crates, pallets, tubs, the dimensions of such and their  estimated weights.

We cannot just send in a 53’ trailer without more detail.  It also would be excessive in equipment and money if we were to bring in a 53’ trailer when a straight dock truck would be sufficient.  This freight will not be first shipping to our Minneapolis warehouse but rather to our warehouse in Atlanta for prep prior to 'Show Name'

I hope you can understand my position.  I have to be mindful of my money and expenses as well as the client’s.

After trying to convince the client that they were better than Total Displays, trying to find our client's boss to go over her head, and stalling for as long as possible, they finally agreed to ship us the product.  They charged the client over $3,000 to pull it all and ship it and never did provide us with a list of what they were shipping.  We did get the dimensions and weights.  Here is the internal email the owner sent to his warehouse manager.  He forgot and copied our client on the message.  Whoops.

To:  'Warehouse Manager'

Why would you spend all the time to do a detailed list. Not needed. Ship it.

You seen how much we got for this move out. This is not a product that needs all the attention. Your done ship it

'Mr I Have Been In The Industry For Over 30 Years'

All the exhibit materials eventually arrived.  The crates were a disaster, they were poorly packed, pallets of junk were sent to us.  Broken things, non-working things.  It was a mess.

The icing on the cake?  We are in the process of installing this booth at the show.  The exhibit house provided the client no set up instructions, no pictures of the booth, no inventory list even though all those things were requested.

The exhibit house had a booth right across the aisle from our installation.  Our clients booth was truly custom and complete over kill (more on that in another post later).  We know nothing about the booth or how it sets up.   As our crew was trying to figure it out, the crew from the exhibit house setting up the booth across the aisle.  What do you suppose they did?  Sit and laugh at our crew.

This is the epitome of a poor loser and why would you want to do business with a company like this?

Here are our suggestions to you in case you have an exhibit partner that may have this type of behavior lurking under the surface.

Make sure you have current photos of any booth.

Make sure you have current set up instructions for your booth.

Make sure you have graphic templates so you can replace graphics when needed.

You should not have to protect yourself from your exhibit partner.  But we learned the hard way that not everyone is a gracious loser and not every exhibit house is a great partner.


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Lori Hanken has been in sales and marketing for over 30 years. She is passionate about service and providing value to her vendors, prospects and clients. Lori is currently co-owner of Total Displays with her husband David. They help people look great at events, trade shows, in retail, museums and develop long partnerships with customers and suppliers. If you would like to learn more, email her at lori@totaldisplays.com. She is an open networker, connect with her on LinkedIn here.

Read other Total Displays Blog posts at http://totaldisplays.blogspot.com/