On Target
Trade Show Reality: ‘This is This’
Putting on a trade show for the first time this year I have a newfound respect for anyone who attempts to mount a successful show year after year. I think it must have been easier to do years ago. I remember a time when any trade show I attended had full aisles, happy exhibitors and late night parties that were hard to recover from. But I think those days have come and gone, and we’re left with certain new realities regarding trade shows and access to content.
Back in the day (my kids cringe every time I use that term), we used to love to go the trade shows. We were born of generation that truly liked to go face-to-face with our suppliers and customers all day and then party with them all night long. We had the time and the budgets to do so and we were anxious to use them. The trade show was the main source of getting up-to-date content on the products and services from all of the suppliers in a particular community. It was also the main source of continuing education and an invaluable method of relationship building. Buyers and sellers alike from my generation still love the trade show environment, and we urge management to let us go every chance we get. In fact, I suspect if there’s a decline in attendees at a show it’s not among attendees in the 35-to-55-year-old age group. That’s just a guess, but I think it’s a good guess.
There are major differences in the new generation of trade show goers and the management that sends them:
- Today’s younger generation is far more comfortable building relationships through e-mail, instant messaging, text messaging, face books, etc, etc, etc. Anyone with teenagers sees this phenomenon first hand every day. Well, I have news for you: it has been going on for a decade and it affects trade shows
- There are also far more outlets to get the immediate and comprehensive access to content that was once the sole domain of the trade show
- Attendees are busier than ever and don’t have the time to spend as many – or any – days at a trade show.
- Budgets have been cut, preventing as many people from traveling to show as they did in the past.
Is this all bad news? I’m not so sure. As Robert De Niro said in The Deer Hunter (for you younger readers, The Deer Hunter was a movie from the 80s – you can find excerpts on YouTube), “This is this,” meaning it is what it is and we all need to deal with the realities of our time. Leading trade shows offer more than just the three-day event. They offer a virtual trade show year-round, they offer ongoing content year-round delivered on multiple platforms, they offer web-based education and they offer tools that allow for a buyer and seller to communicate any time and any day year-round.
Is that better than having more people at a trade show? Who knows, arguments can be made on both sides of the aisle. What I do know is that the objective of a trade show has been (and will continue to be) a way to bring buyers and sellers together. It might not happen in the traditional ways we remember, but as long as it continues to happen, the trade show remains a vital cog in an industry that should be supported.
And to all my young friends who prefer to get their information in a virtual world as opposed to a real world: You’re missing a great party and a wonderful way to really get to know the people you work with.
Jim Kilmetis
