Trade Show Get Away in Florida

As I mentioned and suspected in my last post, Discovery Cove is awesome! It is definitely the perfect getaway for trade show and corporate classroom attendees in Florida.

The resort is so beautiful, I can see now why they do not accommodate meetings or corporate classrooms on site – no one would be able o concentrate on business! There is simply too much to see and do.

The food was quite good, as you can see from the pic below, and included in the price of admission. The sting rays and dolphins are friendly. I fed the sting rays little fish, which was a little scary at first because sting rays have teeth but they just Hoover up the fish right out of your hand.

If you are planning to attend a trade show or corporate classroom in Orlando, Florida, I would pack a bathing suit and make the time to stop at Discovery Cove...oh, and to answer the question in my last post, definitely leave the corporate notebook rentals at the hotel!

Discovery Cove, notebook rentals

Trade Show Time Out

I am just wrapping up my Florida Vacation (sigh). I happen to be an animal lover so one of the main attractions for me, even over Disney World, was a place called Discovery Cove. It is an all-inclusive day resort located in Orlando, Florida not far from Sea World. The main goal of this trip, aside from visiting some of my favourite family members, of course, was to swim with the dolphins at Discovery Cove. After that goal can be crossed off my list, I could continue to enjoy my day at the same destination whilst snorkeling, wading with sting rays, feeding exotic birds at the aviary, and walking on the beach.

Discovery Cove only allows 1000 visitors per day so it is very necessary to book in advance, which I did. I will be honest, their site is not user friendly enough for my taste BUT guess what I did discover? Discovery Cove caters to Trade Show attendees! They do not actually house conventions, trade shows, or corporate events, unfortunately. They do, however offer Afternoon Escapes for burned out trade show attendees and their families.

In case you think you will find yourself feeling the need to sneak away from a Florida trade show, I have provided the link above and when I get back from holiday, I may post a photo or two of Discovery Cove’s highlights. I guess the only question is, do we leave the laptop rentals in the hotel or bring it with us so we can do some work on the beach? I am thinking the hotel is a good place!

Trade Show Essentials Blogroll Additions

I just wanted to point out a few great links we have recently added to our Trade Show Essentials blogroll.

The first link we added is to a great tradeshow directory called TSNN.com. They are dubbed the ultimate trade show resource and I can see why! This site has an easy to navigate event finder, trade show and corporate event news, industry news, and a free newsletter sign up. If you are in the industry, check out this great trade show resource.

The next link we added is for BestPromotions.com. After they left a comment on one of my recent posts, I followed their advice and checked out their site. I found a very cool blog featuring about a gazillion different unique promotional item ideas. If you plan to hand out promos for your next corporate event, trade show, or incentive program, check out Best Promotions.

The third link on the Trade Show Essentials blogroll is the Headset Express blog. This blog gives a ton of great office ergonomics and office organization tips, not to mention some great info about headsets!

Also on the side bar is a great computer rental resource link. This site offers everything from server rentals to laptop rentals!

Awesome Trade Show Promotional Items for the Coporate Female (me!)

If you read a couple of my recent posts, you know that Bayview Village held a very Valentine-centric shoe celebration last week. I have already expressed my thoughts on why I consider this event to be sort of a modified trade show. Now, what would a tradeshow, even a modified one, be without all of those free promotional items, courtesy of sponsors and exhibitors? :)

I have taken some pictures of a few of the great promotional items I received at The Shoe Affair. Some of them are shoe-centric and others are simply geared towards the corporate female. If this happens to be your target market, too then you might just get some great ideas from these clever companies. If you are looking for additional tips for your next corporate event, check out this corporate computer rentals site. It is amazing how cool your display can look with the help of some top of the line computer rentals.


A shoe horn from Davids and a foot emery from the Right Choice Dry Cleaners:

A 2-4-1 pass to the Bata Shoe museum and an adorable charm:

Bracelets from Nine West:

A passport and document case from the audi dealership, a makeup case from Davids, a shoe polisher for ecco, and dermaglow Deep Moisturizing Foot Treatment.

The fabulous reusable shopping bag all these goodies and more came in:

How great are all these promotional items? I hope they hold this event again next year!

BizBash Registration Ends Soon, Book Now!

So for today’s entry, I had a whole slew of photos from the last non-traditional trade show I attended BUT when I tried to upload my photos, my camera battery died. It is too bad because the event was very Valentine’s Day oriented and, of course, yesterday was Valentine’s Day.

As it is, I will simply have to let everyone know that Monday February 18th, 10am is the deadline for online registration to BizBash 2008. Make sure to use the code LCE to get you 20% discount.

If previous years are any indication, this event should have some quality exhibitors, excellent samples from caterers, including Opulence Catering, which does this sweet potato shrimp thing that is to die for, and of course some great speakers and corporate classroom sessions. I have noticed that the size of this trade show seems to have declined quite a bit since I first attended the 2005 show but, if you are serious about the corporate event industry, non-corporate event industry for that matter, I would say this is an important event to attend or exhibit.

The Keynote speaker at this event will be Preston Bailey and Natalie Brown will be the MC. The event will also feature DJ Piers, Carmellina Proshootoe, Bollywood Grooves, The George Kash Experience, Aerial Angels, and Freestyle Soccer.

Of course, I will not be in Toronto for the event this year, I am very disappointed. I am hoping someone I know will attend or exhibit so I can get the full scoop on how it went down! Oh, and if you are exhibiting, you will want to keep up with your trade show booth neighbors, these guys know what they are doing. Take advantage of corporate computer rentals, notebook rentals, and whatever else you can imagine to get a leg up on the competition!

A Shoe Affair: A Non Traditional Tradeshow

Not long ago I wrote about a nontraditional trade show, eCom Xpo. It is a virtual tradeshow held entirely online. Well yesterday evening I attended an event that I believe was another type of nontraditional trade show. This event was not online, I drove all the way to Bayview Village, Toronto to attend. This show was a “Shoe event” geared toward the corporate female.

The event, called The Shoe Affair is going on from February 11th-17th. The main attraction of the event is a shoe fashion show. It does not really sound like a trade show yet, does it? Except that we had to walk through a sea of retail booths strategically placed outside of stores before reaching our main destination in the mall. My personal favourite was the ecco display, which sidetracked me from the main event with a shoe-centric scavenger hunt. I did not get to keep the red patent pumps with the soft silver lining but I did earn a contest entry when I found them.

I made it out of ecco in time for the shoe fashion show. The models wore all of the hottest spring fashions on a runway, built high enough for their feet to be at eye level. The runway was set against an awesome LCD projector rental featuring each of the event sponsors names and logos as the model was wearing their shoe. The LCD projector was such a great tool. I made several mental notes during the course of the fashion show to visit Capezio and Davids before leaving the mall.

I thoroughly enjoyed myself at this “non-traditional trade show” and I will let you know if my scavenger hunt efforts pay off!

Photos of Cool Trade Show Promos

As I have been talking extensively about trade show and corporate event promotional items the last couple of weeks, I thought it might be a good idea to post some of the cool promos I have received lately (or in the case of the mouse pad, not so lately).

The first item is the stain removing pen. This is the item that Brent from Viper Marketing mentioned in a previous post to be one of the hot trade show items of 2007/8.

This next one I thought was cool for two reasons. The first is that I had really thought stress balls were so overdone but this one looks so unique. I usually give stress balls to my little brother or puppy but this one is still on my desk months after that corporate event took place.

The second reason I like this tradeshow promo is because it actually kind of resembles a coworker in my office; he is always “stressing out” over the small stuff, just like this little guy!

The final item I am showing is a mouse pad that is also a notepad. I received this at a trade show years ago, 2005 to be exact, but I still keep it in my cool promo ideas drawer, should the perfect occasion ever arise that I should order them for.

So these are some promos that I think represent pretty innovative trade show strategies. If you are looking for more advice on trade show strategies, consider taking advantage of corporate computer rentals, such as notebook rentals.

Nontraditional Trade Show Promotions

With the exception of my last post, I have been talking a lot lately about trade show promotional items. But what do you do if handing out traditional promos is not a practical option? As an example of when this might be the case, the eCom Xpo is coming up soon. It is a virtual tradeshow that takes place entirely online. These exhibitors definitely cannot hand out key chains, stress balls, of coffee mugs to get attention. So they need to think VERY outside the box.

The last time I attended the eCom Xpo, this is how they dealt with exhibitors’ inability to hand out promo items. Each booth had the option of holding their own independent contests, of course, and also each attendee accumulates points based on how many booths he or she visits, how many VCards he or she hands out, and even how many live chats the attendee participates in. An up to the second running total is kept so the attendee can click on a link at any point during the course of the tradeshow to see how many points he or she has accumulated. Prizes are given away after the tradeshow “floor” has closed to the attendees who have collected the most points.

I thought that this was an innovative and fun strategy to encourage booth attendance and interaction.

You may not be exhibiting at a virtual tradeshow any time soon, but remember, preparation is key to any tradeshow, online or otherwise. Pick promos that go along with the theme of your booth, and utilize inexpensive attention grabbing tactics, such as computer projector rentals.