Displayit.com - Trade Show Displays, Booths & Exhibits Blog

Back From TS2 Trade Show

Hello everyone!  Sorry that I have not posted since last week. I have been at the TS2 Total Marketing Solutions trade show in Philadelphia since Monday.  Displayit.com was exhibiting and it was a great week.  Below is a picture of our display.  We used the new 10' XR Line trade show booth.  The display got great reviews, especially the wave canopy.  I think it really stood out as the best looking 10' x 10' display at the show.  I've also included a picture of the booth packed up after the show.  The display is packed in the two black cases and our modular flooring is in the grey case.  We had the flooring and display set up in about 45-50 minutes.  The show closed at 3PM and we were walking out the door at 4:15PM, much of that time was spent waiting on our cases to return from storage. We also raised money for some of our favorite charities.  We raised $1,130 ($750 for American Cancer Society, $270 Habitat for Humanity, and $110 for our local friends at Amigos for Christ).  I'm planning on posting more this week and weekend about the things I saw at the show.  I simply wanted to brag on our display and share some pics.

Like Hair, Trade Shows Take Planning & Patience

It is Friday and I feel like having a little fun today.  Some of the guys around the office have had a lot of trouble with their hair lately. If you look at the picture below moving left to right, I will go over some of the issues we have had at Displayit.  Scott rushed to trim his hair and used the wrong setting on his clippers.  Mark got his hands on his wife's hair color kit, and Andrew tried to trim his beard and ended up with a fu manchu.  What does all this have to do with trade show planning?  Each one of our Displayit team members failed to plan ahead and execute their plan with patience.  These are lessons that we can apply to our trade show marketing programs.

I've said it in this blog many times: If you want to have a successful trade show event, you need to start planning well in advance of your show. Sounds simple, but few exhibitors do it.  Proper planning will allow you the time you need to create the right display and graphics and also allow you to execute a theme and pre-show marketing campaign that will allow you to maximize your investment.  Anyway, I know this was a silly post today but hopefully it will get you thinking about the plans for your fall show schedule.  As always, the trade show display experts at displayit.com are ready to help.

New Banner Stand Style Now Available

A few weeks ago I made a blog entry about a new style of banner stand, the pronto two-layered banner stand.  The exciting news is that this new product is now available for purchase at our main website.   We offer two versions: The 23.5" Pronto two-layered banner stand and the 33.5" Pronto two-layered banner stand.  The banner stand is available in either black or silver base color for the hardware and there are 4 front graphic styles available:  Slim, trap down, trap up, or curves.  It will be very interesting to see how graphic designers use this new banner stand resource.  We would love to hear your thoughts on the product and how this can be used in both trade show display and event environments.

Check Out a Well Designed 10' x 10' Booth

Today I want to share with you a photo of a booth we recently completed for one of our clients. The company created their own trade show graphics and they did a great job.  The client began by selecting our most popular 10' trade show booth package the exhibitline ex1v and they added printed wings and a printed header. The wings and header are both printed on opaque material and they did a great job of bringing all the "water" elements together on each piece.  Much of the time the exhibitline wings are done on plex, but this design shows how you can use opaque graphic headers and wings to create a beautiful trade show display.

Highly Portable Table Top Display

Today we had a visit from our biggest supplier that is about to introduce a new table top display.  It is a smaller version of our highly popular xpressions display system.  This mini-xpressions table top display will fit in a tiny carry bag that can be packed in luggage or carried easily.  The display is about 35" high and we believe this is going to be a very popular unit.  This is only a sneak peak. The product should be available for purchase in early fall.  We also have our full size xpressions table top display that packs in a smartpak case available for purchase now.  This is another portable table top display.

New SOLO Counter Images

We have recently finished adding a number of new images to our SOLO counter display section at displayit.com.  These new images really spotlight how attractive this counter system can be.  The SOLO counter system is a very cost effective lightweight system. It is not as meaty as many other counters, but it can support up to 200 lbs. and it sets up very quickly. Take a look at one of our most popular packages.  The SOLO Counter Kit #1 is a very attractive trade show or event counter.  The package starts at $1419 without graphics or cases.  The basic SOLO counter with Curvo Graphics is also a great option.  The SOLO counter is an ideal, cost effective solution for a variety of portable counter needs.  Just a reminder, if you are looking for a higher-end custom looking counter you may want to consider our Exhibitline Counters which I blogged about earlier this summer.

Back from our Exhibitline Factory Tour

Our staff designer and our web product manager just got back from a visit to one of our best suppliers: Pascale Engineering, makers of the Exhibit line display system.  The guys had a great visit and discovered a number of new options that will help us to provide more options to our clients with the Exhibitline and XRLine displays.  You will see us launch a number of new innovations for these products, but today I just want to share a couple of them with you. First, they discovered a new accessory for the v-leg counters on the basic exhibitline kits such as the ex1v.  You can add a translucent plex, blank sintra, or printed graphic panel to the front space of your counter.  Take a look at the picture to the left.  We also got to get a close look at the new Exhibitline NLC1 tapered counter.  This is a very attractive locking counter that can be added to standard Exhibitline and XRLine displays.

Providing Capital for the Third World

I'm going to be way off topic today and share with you a cool discovery we made yesterday.  Our mission at displayit.com is to be a blessing to all those we come in contact with: Clients, Vendors, Each Other, & Community.  Each morning we have a meeting to review our mission and discuss ways that we can be a blessing to all those groups.  One of our Account Managers suggested we provide some money to help people in the third world to start a business, etc., so we went to kiva.org to provide funds for micro loans.  We helped provide capital for a home to be built in Mozambique and for a group of entrepreneurs in Uganda.  It was just a lot of fun.  The whole process was just very exciting. In some ways, providing a loan and giving a talented person the chance to pay it off is more fun and rewarding than making a donation.  I hope you will visit kiva.org and check it out. 

Lower Your Trade Show Handling Costs

We are preparing to attend the TS2 Show in Philadelphia, PA.  The show is TS2 or TS squared, which is the trade show about trade shows.  As I made my final show preparations I got to thinking about managing show costs such as drayage.  As many of you know, drayage is the cost of moving your trade show materials from the dock door/advance warehouse to your booth space and back onto the truck after the show.  Your drayage costs are based on the weight and size of your shipment, but one mistake that many exhibitors make is when they ship multiple pieces on different days to the advance warehouse or show site, each shipment received at the advance warehouse carries a minimum charge.  If you ship a variety of small pieces into the advance warehouse from multiple vendors, you could be looking at hundreds of dollars in extra costs.  Just something to think about for future events.

How Do You Choose a Table Top Display

I want to put down some basic thoughts on what you need to know to select the right table top display for your trade shows or presentations.  Here are some questions to ask yourself and some products that might fit some various needs.

1. How are you going to transport it? - If you are planning on attending local events and you are going to be transporting your table top display in a car or other vehicle, you have almost limitless options.  The most cost effective style of table top display is the tri-fold table top display.  This is a display that is covered with fabric that you can Velcro items to.  If you are doing local events, you could obviously select any style of display, but this is the niche where the tri-fold works. If you are shipping or going to out of town events, the tri-fold will not be a good option because it is more costly to ship.
2. What are you displaying? - If you are planning on displaying a single, large graphic message, you might want to consider a Blast Fabric Pop-up Display or traditional pop-up display.  These create a very large high-impact message.  However, if you need to change graphics out frequently, you would probably want a standard fabric covered pop-up display or a traditional tri-fold display.
3. What type of image do I need to project? - If you are attending a higher-end table top display event, you may need a little more sophisticated display.  If your neighbors will have a fancy display, you will need to do your best to keep up.  You might want to consider the Exhibitline Table Top Display.