True Colors
Exhibit-staff attire can be costly, uncomfortable, and sometimes downright ugly. That's why at EXHIBITORLIVE, the conference for trade show and corporate event marketing, marketers at Mirror Show Management Inc. eschewed traditional polo shirts and khakis for simple black-and-white, staffer-chosen clothing accented by bright-pink shoes, lanyards, and purses matching the company's corporate hue. The subtle strategy effectively identified staffers as company reps without forcing them to conform. Plus, by allowing them to choose their own clothes in predetermined colors, the company ensured that its reps were more comfortable than they would have been in boring branded duds. Shock and Awe
To demo the effectiveness of its mechanical shock absorbers, ITT Enidine Inc. crafted an ingenious aisle-side display at the Offshore Technology Conference. In continual operation throughout the show, the display offered a trio of 4-foot-long vertical Plexiglas tubes, each of which contained a roughly 5-pound weight and a different shock-absorbing device. While the central device was an Enidine shock absorber, the other two simulated competitors' products. Machinery mounted to the back of the tubes lifted the three weights about 12 inches before releasing one over a spring, causing it to bounce up and down violently. After lifting the remaining two loads a foot more, the machine released a second weight, which bounced a few times before settling. The final weight was then raised to the top of the tube and dropped onto Enidine's shock absorber with nary a bounce, proving the product's efficacy beyond the shadow of a doubt. A Dog's Life
Armor K-9, a provider of trained protection dogs, knew it wouldn't be easy for a straight-laced security firm to stand out on a show floor full of edgy exhibitors hawking significantly sexier offerings at the Marijuana Business Conference and Expo (MJBizCon). So the company decided to focus less on the notion of security and more on its well-behaved canines. Uniformed security guards manned the booth alongside a trusty German Shepherd. Every few minutes, a staffer cued the attentive dog, who subsequently performed a trick, such as perching himself precariously atop a fire hydrant positioned near the aisle. The pooch did his promotional duty, attracting curious attendees to the booth in droves. Simon Says
Alight Solutions LLC deployed a literal – albeit playful – strategy to reinforce its key messages at the Society for Human Resource Management Annual Conference and Expo with MemorySpark, a gamified activation combining elements of Dance Dance Revolution and the memory game Simon. Participants stood in the middle of a roughly 3-foot-diameter platform that featured four pressure-sensitive tiles marked Reimagine, Spark, Thrive, and Engage – core principles of Alight's Health and Wealth Solutions program. At the start of each game, lights under the tiles flashed in a short sequence, and attendees had to duplicate the pattern by stepping on the panels in the correct order. The sequences got longer with each round, and players did their best to remember the complex patterns. A leaderboard tracked the players' results, and each day's top two scorers received Amazon gift cards. But even the participants who left the booth empty-handed wouldn't soon forget Alight's messaging.
Listening In
Hosting a technical presentation in a noisy exhibit hall is no easy feat, and it's no treat for attendees trying to hear the presenter over the show-floor ruckus. That's why Shure Europe GmbH created a fully enclosed technical-presentation room in its exhibit at Integrated Systems Europe. But to ensure that the presentation played to as many people as possible – and captured the attention and interest of passersby – Shure positioned the soundproof room immediately adjacent to a busy aisle, placed large glass windows in the aisle-side wall of the structure, and equipped the exterior wall with five headsets. This combination allowed passing attendees to belly up to the window, don a headset, and listen to the in-depth presentation going on inside, thereby almost doubling the amount of presentation participants while maintaining a quiet, professional atmosphere in the theater space. Brief Encounter
Spartan chose a relatively unusual uniform for its team at the International Consumer Electronics Show. Promoting high-tech boxers that "protect your family jewels from cellphone and Wi-Fi radiation," staffers donned little more than branded T-shirts and the company's royal-blue boxer briefs made from antibacterial silver fibers. Roaming reps created quite a stir, while staffers inside Spartan's 10-by-10-foot booth stood behind a branded reception desk and explained exactly how the unmentionables safeguard wearers from 99 percent of wireless radiation. Little Big Town
How do you turn an 8-by-8-foot footprint into a head-turning space? Wit Design BV did it at EuroShop by incorporating bold colors, angular elements, and extraordinary restraint. Designers defined the company's booth space using neon vinyl flooring, then shifted the structural elements slightly to create visual intrigue. The same neon hue continued throughout the design, accenting structural edges and comprising a contemporary back-wall pattern. And while many exhibitors saddled with small booths attempt to turn their spaces into multifunctional Swiss army knives, Wit Design chose a singular element: an informal meeting area. Finally, rather than cluttering the exhibit with photos of the firm's past projects, Wit Design ran a slideshow on a single monitor.