6. An Escape From the Noise
With all the commotion that goes on at trade shows (live performances, music from exhibitors, and the general chatter from attendees), vendors have a hard time trying to get people to listen to them—especially if they are showcasing musical entertainment. Lou Davis Music & Entertainment avoided this problem (and made it quieter for neighboring exhibitors) by bringing in a soundproof booth typically used for karaoke or recording cubicles at events. The simple plexiglass structure had two speakers and a television monitor inside, allowing as many as seven visitors to hear bands without being interrupted.
7. Where to Store Cards
It’s so easy to collect business cards at trade shows and then lose them. Barb Salzman from event design company Hatch
Creative Studio created a cute, but simple pouch to hold the four cards from the booth she shared with event planning company AVEnts and entertainment booking agency Expressway Music. Salzman sewed strips of green-colored paper into a little wallet and attached self-adhesive circular pieces of Velcro to the insides to keep the whole thing together.
8. A Beautiful Booth
Surroundings Flowers & Events built an attractive tentlike structure for its booth to showcase the firm’s design talents. Labeled as a “Temple of the Senses,” the booth was draped with swaths of lilac and blue fabric and had a pointed archway entrance covered in strips of bark, ostrich feathers, and peacock plumes. Inside, seeds and nuts imported from the Philippines decorated the side tables, small dishes offered Green & Black’s organic Mayan gold chocolate, and a chandelier made with beads and Swarovski crystals hung from the ceiling.
9. A New Take on Trade Show Food
If you’re like us and have been to tons of trade shows, eating a trade show meal is always an iffy affair. Great Performances’ Season Café was a fresh take on trade show food: set up to showcase seven venues where the firm provides foodservice—the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Dahesh Museum of Art, and the Asia Society, to name a few—dishes with fresh, and often seasonal ingredients, like whole-wheat fettucine with.phparagus, butternut squash, and mushrooms in a light cream sauce, or lump crab meat with a vegetable terrine, were prepared on the spot. The Wave Hill Café offered protein and vegetarian sandwiches for those on special diets, and a selection of panini from Sotheby’s Café was pressed on the spot. And the café itself, which offered both table seating and a bar area decorated with a water screen backdrop, provided a nice respite from the busy show floor. It was a welcome—if a tad pricey—change from the usual plastic-wrapped sandwiches or soggy salads at trade shows.
10. Unique Theatrical Performances
India-based Disability Theatre offers unusual entertainment with balletlike performances, many based upon colorful, traditional Indian folklore. The catch here is that the shows are acted out by disabled players—in wheelchairs or on crutches—making it a unique option for fund-raisers or as a motivational performance.
3 Ideas We’ve Already Covered—But You May Have Missed
1. Talking Badges
Much has been written (by us and others) about the promise of the various interactive name tag providers that encourage attendees at events to communicate by alerting them to others with similar or complementary interests. (A badge beeps when a buyer passes a seller on a trade show floor, for example.) Although nTag hasn’t officially unveiled its next generation product, its staffers were buzzing about novel features at the show. We hear new devices will include the ability to allow users to send text messages and for event organizers to survey and interact with attendees.
2. Flexible Walls That Fold Up
One of our picks from the International Contemporary Furniture Fair earlier this year—Molo Design’s Softwall—made its way onto the floor of our show. Made of 400 layers of lightweight, honeycombed, translucent, fire-retardant paper, the curving, freestanding Softwall can create rooms inside a venue, and even improves the acoustics in hard-surface spaces. Molo debuted its new low walls made of Tyvek, which are more rigid and make great counterlike surfaces, at our show.
3. An Event Design Tool
We heard some attendees get excited about Vivien, the computer-aided design program from Cast Software we featured in the June/July 2005 issue of our magazine. Users can create and manipulate seating and table arrangements, develop staging configurations, and work with floor and wall layouts and colors. The program has drawing tools and features like shading for textural effects, and gives the user the capability to prepare detailed renderings. It also allows the user to track inventory and produce rental orders.
Posted 10.31.05
Related Story
The Editors’ Favorite Ideas From Our Show (Part 1)
With all the commotion that goes on at trade shows (live performances, music from exhibitors, and the general chatter from attendees), vendors have a hard time trying to get people to listen to them—especially if they are showcasing musical entertainment. Lou Davis Music & Entertainment avoided this problem (and made it quieter for neighboring exhibitors) by bringing in a soundproof booth typically used for karaoke or recording cubicles at events. The simple plexiglass structure had two speakers and a television monitor inside, allowing as many as seven visitors to hear bands without being interrupted.
7. Where to Store Cards
It’s so easy to collect business cards at trade shows and then lose them. Barb Salzman from event design company Hatch
Creative Studio created a cute, but simple pouch to hold the four cards from the booth she shared with event planning company AVEnts and entertainment booking agency Expressway Music. Salzman sewed strips of green-colored paper into a little wallet and attached self-adhesive circular pieces of Velcro to the insides to keep the whole thing together.
8. A Beautiful Booth
Surroundings Flowers & Events built an attractive tentlike structure for its booth to showcase the firm’s design talents. Labeled as a “Temple of the Senses,” the booth was draped with swaths of lilac and blue fabric and had a pointed archway entrance covered in strips of bark, ostrich feathers, and peacock plumes. Inside, seeds and nuts imported from the Philippines decorated the side tables, small dishes offered Green & Black’s organic Mayan gold chocolate, and a chandelier made with beads and Swarovski crystals hung from the ceiling.
9. A New Take on Trade Show Food
If you’re like us and have been to tons of trade shows, eating a trade show meal is always an iffy affair. Great Performances’ Season Café was a fresh take on trade show food: set up to showcase seven venues where the firm provides foodservice—the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Dahesh Museum of Art, and the Asia Society, to name a few—dishes with fresh, and often seasonal ingredients, like whole-wheat fettucine with.phparagus, butternut squash, and mushrooms in a light cream sauce, or lump crab meat with a vegetable terrine, were prepared on the spot. The Wave Hill Café offered protein and vegetarian sandwiches for those on special diets, and a selection of panini from Sotheby’s Café was pressed on the spot. And the café itself, which offered both table seating and a bar area decorated with a water screen backdrop, provided a nice respite from the busy show floor. It was a welcome—if a tad pricey—change from the usual plastic-wrapped sandwiches or soggy salads at trade shows.
10. Unique Theatrical Performances
India-based Disability Theatre offers unusual entertainment with balletlike performances, many based upon colorful, traditional Indian folklore. The catch here is that the shows are acted out by disabled players—in wheelchairs or on crutches—making it a unique option for fund-raisers or as a motivational performance.
3 Ideas We’ve Already Covered—But You May Have Missed
1. Talking Badges
Much has been written (by us and others) about the promise of the various interactive name tag providers that encourage attendees at events to communicate by alerting them to others with similar or complementary interests. (A badge beeps when a buyer passes a seller on a trade show floor, for example.) Although nTag hasn’t officially unveiled its next generation product, its staffers were buzzing about novel features at the show. We hear new devices will include the ability to allow users to send text messages and for event organizers to survey and interact with attendees.
2. Flexible Walls That Fold Up
One of our picks from the International Contemporary Furniture Fair earlier this year—Molo Design’s Softwall—made its way onto the floor of our show. Made of 400 layers of lightweight, honeycombed, translucent, fire-retardant paper, the curving, freestanding Softwall can create rooms inside a venue, and even improves the acoustics in hard-surface spaces. Molo debuted its new low walls made of Tyvek, which are more rigid and make great counterlike surfaces, at our show.
3. An Event Design Tool
We heard some attendees get excited about Vivien, the computer-aided design program from Cast Software we featured in the June/July 2005 issue of our magazine. Users can create and manipulate seating and table arrangements, develop staging configurations, and work with floor and wall layouts and colors. The program has drawing tools and features like shading for textural effects, and gives the user the capability to prepare detailed renderings. It also allows the user to track inventory and produce rental orders.
Posted 10.31.05
Related Story
The Editors’ Favorite Ideas From Our Show (Part 1)
Booth from Lou Davis Music & Entertainment
Hatch Creative Studio's pockets
Surroundings Flowers & Events' booth
Great Performances' Season Caf?
