Resources and helpful links:
- Here’s the link to Kim’s most excellent checklist (Excel)
- Here’s the link to the Freeman Quick Facts for NAB Show 2019 (PDF)
- Join the Broadcast Media Marketing Group here
- Work Rules, and Regulations
- Exhibitors Manual (you will need your Exhibitor login credentials to access this manual)
- NAB Cares Programs-Details Unlimited Material Handling
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Hi. I’m Cindy Zuelsdorf with NAB Show Exhibitors Webinar and Kokoro Marketing. Today we have a special guest, Kim Hogeveen, and we are looking at going over what new exhibitors need to have a great show. Welcome, everybody. No matter where you’re located, or if your company is big or small, you’re in the right place to get the most out of your next trade show. Welcome, Kim. How’s your day going?
Kim Hogeveen: I’m good. How are you?
Cindy Zuelsdorf: So, so good. Now, Kim … Kim’s the Event Marketing Manager at Ross Video. Today we’re going to talk about, like we said, what you should know at your show, all the things that we wish we knew at our first NAB show. I want to jump right into something that you and I talked about that I thought was so fun. You kind of laid out your typical day at the show. Can you tell us about your typical day?
Kim Hogeveen: Sure. During even pre-show … A show day for me is, I start at seven. I’m out the door. I go visit all the rooms at the hotel that we have different events going in. Making sure whatever meetings that we have, they’re ready to go. Just kind of a final check there. Because everything’s done in advance, but there could be something that changes the day of, so I just kind of run around the hotel, double check things, take some pictures, send them off, tell people that their readings and rooms are ready and then I go. From there, I generally head out to the parking lot. I grab the minivan, then I pick up the team, who helps me kind of…
Cindy Zuelsdorf: -You have a team?
Kim Hogeveen: -Yep. I have a team.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: I want to hear about that. Just expand a little bit on the team thing.
Kim Hogeveen: Well, originally when I … I mean depends on the size of the show. If it’s a 10 x 10, I’m the whole team. But beyond that, I actually have a team of about 8 to 10 people, who come in, and we have like an hour to get the booth ready. Up, ready. The booth up team also manages front desk at the booth. Were the first line for greeting customers, that kind of thing. Getting them where they need to go, their demos booked, etc, etc. So, yeah. I have a booth team, but depending on the size of the booth. If it’s anything under 1000 square feet, that whole team is just me.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Got it.
Kim Hogeveen: Or whoever’s on site.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: And so you’re talking about like Monday morning, the first day of the show, you’ve got this hour to get it ready. That’s what we’re talking about right now?
Kim Hogeveen: Every morning of the show. Every morning of the show.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Okay.
Kim Hogeveen: Every morning of the show, this is Monday through Thursday. This is kind of the deal. We all meet at 7:20 and the van loads up then we head straight over and grab coffee at Starbucks. Little plug in there, for my favorite location. We grab coffees and we’re usually at the convention center, parked, and on the booth by 8:00 in the morning. So, show opens. On Monday it opens 10:00, which we need that extra hour on Monday. But the rest of the week, the show opens at 9:00. So we’ve got one hour before staff ascends and everybody kind of, you know customers start coming in, to get the booth ready. I can go through a list of what we kind of do there, from that perspective. In the meantime, yeah, so I’ve got a good check there. It’s handy for, you know, you just kind of scale it to the size of your booth. I’ve been using this checklist for about 20-ish years. This will be my 20th NAB I’m heading in to. It does work. You just kind of make it work for your various teams and your size of booth.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Okay. So who on this call, who on this call would like a copy of Kim’s amazing checklist that she uses for Ross Video. Anybody? Woo-hoo. Alright. We’re going to put the link in here. We prepared it for you and you can just grab it off our website right there. You can download it right now so you can kind of follow along with what Kim is talking about.
Thank you Kim for preparing that. It’s super detailed. I was blown away when I looked at it. I’m like, this is an awesome gift for everybody on the call. Really nice.
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. No worries. That’s what the booth operations team handles. We also have various equipment teams. The equipment team, and the booth team, and then the structure team, or sorry, booth ops, and then the structure team, we’re first in last out. That’s either arriving to town early, we’re first in Vegas, we’re last out of Vegas. Or it even means the show floor, set up, show days, tear down. We’re in first, out last. Kind of the deal of being an Event Manager, I guess. We actually made t-shirts that said “first in, last out” a couple of years ago.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: I love that. And do you wear them during set up and tear down, or when do you wear those?
Kim Hogeveen: We do. We do. The Ross equipment, and booth, and booth ops teams … We actually have a name for ourselves. We call ourselves the Ross Roadies. And we have t-shirts every year. It’s one of my most fun projects is designing our t-shirt every year.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: It’s so fun. I love it. For everybody on the call, if you’re thinking, “Hey my company’s too small to do something like that.” I bet you didn’t spend that much money on those shirts, and it kind of brings that team together, and makes you feel that fun sense of comradery. Some people don’t like setting up the booth.
Kim Hogeveen: Absolutely.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: I don’t know. Talk to us about that piece of it.
Kim Hogeveen: We’re on from day one. We are there for the under carpet, we’re there for the carpet, we’re there for rigging, we’re there for the actual build structure. Then it’s putting in the equipment, then the demo artists come in. So we’re there from moment one. I guess I support the IND build. We have a team, and then I’m there on site though if anybody needs a hand. You know at IBC, I was actually part of the team who, we were 12 of us, and we physically built the booth, because we lost IND team at the last minute. At NAB we’ve got unions.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Oh my gosh.
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah, so. And of course, when you’re building the booth, or you’re helping pull stuff out for frame in, or you’re directing frame in, you’re getting caught on crates and everything else. So these Ross Roadie t-shirts, save all of your personal clothes. So we’ve been doing them since 2004.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Got it.
Kim Hogeveen: On site, I’m supporting the IND build. I’m actually the graphic designer for the booth, so any graphics you see on the booth. Any last minute graphics that need to be done, I’m there on site, ready to design them, get them ordered with Freeman. We’ve actually had to do an order pick up, the Sunday morning, well technically it was Monday morning, 1:30 in the morning we had to drive to a warehouse, pick up graphics. I’ve slept at Kinko’s, you know that kind of stuff happens during set up. So I slept for an hour at Kinko’s. I did. I did. I’ve slept in Kinko’s more than once. And the one on Paradise, used to be joined with a Starbucks, so the second they opened at 5:00, I was in there. We’ve had over nighters at Kinko’s for graphics, for whatever reasons over the years. I’m just part of that team as well. In addition to any of the last minute graphic requests on the booth, I manage various events at the hotel. Later in the week, I move into that booth ops role, that I was talking about. That is there for Team Ross and customers. We support, train, and manage front desk team and do lead capture. We’re there for any staff inquiries. Because we got … and at Ross alone has over 150 staff on the show floor.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: 150 staff?
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. We have a lot of staff. I remember back in the day, we had a 20 x 30 booth and we were six. So I’ve been with Ross for a lot of growth there. So that’s why this booth ops team, I guess, was developed, to support, not just customers, but Ross as well. Because if we are helping the Ross guys and they have what they need, then they can focus on what they’re on the show floor to do. And whether that’s at the demo artist role, at product management role, or a sales role, they’re there for their customers. So they can just knock off whatever they need, so we’re there to help them too.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Alright so who … We’re going to just pause for a moment. Who here on the call has been able to click to Kim’s sheet. In fact, maybe I’ll just share the screen for just a moment and then you can see it. If you click to the link that we put in the chat there, it’s going to take you to this page, and this has some resources for you. Here’s the checklist that she provided. And I really suggest you guys go ahead and download this and use it. You can see she’s put … Kim, thank you … you’ve put tabs at the bottom here for the booth operations, that you were talking about for the schedule. And even if you have a 10 x 10 booth, 10 x 20 booth, which to me is really the most important size in some way because that’s what’s emerging and so fabulous. These are super important because each of these pieces will make your booth great, no matter if you have a large booth or small booth.
Just wanted to be sure everyone saw that. Were you guys able to grab that sheet? Let’s see. And did I stop sharing, Fallon? Are we good? There we are. Okay. Yes. Do I see a yes? Anybody able to grab it? Just give us a yes in there. I just want to be sure that link’s working for everybody so that you can go ahead and grab the assets that we prepared for you. The kind of take away. Yay. Okay good. Good good.
So Kim. We said we were going to talk about a typical day for you at the show, kind of go over the basics, look at the exhibitor manual, and talk about the famous Ross memo. So that’s what’s on our agenda today.
Do you have more to talk about in a typical day, or do you want to more on to the basics?
Kim Hogeveen: No. I think I’m good. I mean, a typical day, the show closes at 6:00. We wrap up a few things. You can see what our end of day looks like on that tab spreadsheet. We kind of prep things up for next morning, and then we are out of there. Hopefully, the goal is between 6:20 and 7:00. The last few years, it’s been 6:20 to 6:30, so it’s been fantastic. We get back to the hotel in the minivan. We meet the buses back, the shuttles. So we make those back to the hotel, and then from there we go off to business dinners, and everybody’s got a ton of evening activities. That’s pretty much my day. During the show hours, we’re just running around with our head cut off, kind of doing whatever needs to get done. So, that’s a day.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: That’s great. One of the things you talked about is you have a list of basics that yo like to go over with all of your staff and I thought that was a great way to look at things like “Hey, here’s your trade show basics.” Can share that with us?
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. For sure. I guess the basic thing I focus on is, get to know the facility. The first thing I do when I get on show site for the first time, is I locate the booth, I check to see my freighters arrived, I kind of assess what services should have been done and aren’t, like is the carpet down, is the electrical in, has my furniture arrived, my rental furniture, that kind of thing.
From there, I familiarize myself … I go straight to exhibitor services, I figure out where they are, because you know that your going to go there at least once. And not every hall at NAB has all the services. So you may grab lead retrieval at a, you know, I think, well I think, I’ve never been actually to exhibitor services in South Lower, it’s a new hall for us. But last year I had to go over to Central Hall just for one particular service, it was my priority labels. So I didn’t realize that, so just get familiar with your exhibitor services. Because at least you’ll be going there once and that will be to hand in your MHA at the end, so your material handling agreement at the end of the show.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: So that means that each hall has some type of exhibitor services. So no matter what hall you’re in, there’s going to be an exhibitor services you can go to. And Kim, were you saying that some of the services are just in one hall or how does that work for people?
Kim Hogeveen: For priority labels, last year, I had to go over to Central Hall and to the Freeman exhibitor services down there. All the hall should have lead retrieval, A/V, Freeman, IND, freight, that kind of thing. For the priority labels, I had to go to Central. Just figure out what services are where. That way you know where you’re going and you’re not wasting time going all over.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Got it. Got it.
Kim Hogeveen: So that’s the big thing for me.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: For everybody here [crosstalk 00:13:15] on this call, post in the chat if you have questions. Because some of the terms like IND, and materials handling, and stuff like that, are super common for some people. For other people, it brand new, so if we inadvertently say something that sounds like code, just put it in the chat. We won’t call you out by name, but we’ll go ahead and be sure that we clarify what that is, so this is for you. Alright. Go ahead Kim. Thank you.
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. I did fix myself there, MHA is the material handling agreement.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: You’re good. You’re good.
Kim Hogeveen: From there I head back to the booth, and I start unpacking and setting things up. At some point though, here’s a quick tip, always have a Sharpie and some form of cutter in your back pocket, in your luggage. I mean, don’t fly with them. I’ve got this little business card thing and it’s got like a hook on it, so I use that as my cutter.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: I have that. I love that. That’s awesome.
Kim Hogeveen: I can fly with that, so I do fly with that. That way I can cut boxes. Because I know that I’ve packed the knives and I know that I’ve packed the Sharpies, but exactly where at that moment, when I get back to the booth and everything’s a bit overwhelming. At least I know that in my backpack, I’ve got some essentials.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: And duct tape. Can I just add one. Like for me. I’m always duct tape. So Sharpie, cutter-
Kim Hogeveen: -I never duct tape.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: You don’t? It always seems like I need [crosstalk 00:14:40] something needs something. But anyway.
Kim Hogeveen: Now that said, at NAB, we do have a crate and a bin, and it’s all various tapes. I just don’t travel with it. We used to have trouble shipping duct tape actually, because it does not like to cross the Canadian-U.S. boarder because it’s considered a textile and that’s a whole logistical nightmare. So just a heads up on that on if you’re crossing boarders with some items.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Who knew?
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. That tape holds up your whole NAB shipment. I learnt that tip about 12 years ago and I will not forget that one.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Okay. Kim knows best. Yeah
Kim Hogeveen: Just if you’re crossing borders. If you’re an American company, then you’re good to go to ship as much duct tape as you want.
Then as far as planning goes, thinking ahead. Just planning of A, B, and C. Really take a look at what you’re shipping because when you get back to the booth, you got all your pieces. Whether you’re a 10 x 10 or you’re a 9000 square foot booth, you’re going to look at all your boxes, and go, “Oh my God, where’s that.”
Have a packing list on you, heads up. Thinking ahead, planning for your A, B, and C. Really take a look at what you’re shipping though. Streamline that. But here’s a tip, avoid the concept, “I’ll grab it when I land.” There are 1700 or more, other exhibitors. They’re going to be grabbing the same items at Target, Walgreens, you name it, I can plug all these stores. We’re all going to Lowe’s, or Best Buy, or Fry’s, I’m telling you that. And we’re grabbing the same items. So just-
Cindy Zuelsdorf: -IKEA.
Kim Hogeveen: -ship it when possible. Is there an IKEA in Vegas? I can not find one.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: I was thinking about IBC. But I bet there is one.
Kim Hogeveen: IBC, we hit up IKEA. No, you’re right. You’re right. We’re on the same wave length there. The closest IKEA I could find out of Vegas, was in California.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Could be true. We needed some furniture one year at IBC Show and just got somebody with a car to help us out. Went there and got some awesome lighting for the booth and it was great.
Kim Hogeveen: I do the same thing, so IKEA is an Event Manager trick. A trip to store XYZ could easily take you an hour, if they have it in stock. Or you’re trucking to a different Walmart across town to find what you need. And the bonus is if you’re … NAB’s changed the drayage, so you can ship the items but you don’t also want to ship so much though that you don’t know where to store it after. Just kind of streamline your shipment. But do avoid that, “I’ll grab it when I land” concept, because it can fail. So heads up on that.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: I just want to insert, this one thing we would do is keep a list of those and I think you have that on your spreadsheet, of those, like cutter, paper, you know, whatever those things are that we are tempted to pick up when we get there. And then, we’d actually take the time to inventory them after the show to go, you know, I only needed two rolls of duct tape, not five. Or whatever the thing is. I only needed one tub of breath mints, not … or we ran out of breath mints. Or whatever the thing is, and so that we could kind of hone that for the next show.
Kim Hogeveen: Oh for sure. And you know what? If you keep track of it then you know five shows in, how many rolls of duct tape … And always plan the back up though. So you know if you’re going to use three or four, pack five.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Static spray, stuff like that. I needed one can of static spray every day of the show, or actually just a half or something like that.
Kim Hogeveen: Exactly. We actually, one year, just because we had such a problem with static electricity with our carpet and our electrical equipment, that we ended up buying these sprayers that you use to spray your lawn with. And we filled them with Downy.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Brilliant.
Kim Hogeveen: And so, you know the fabric softener. We sprayed the carpet down every morning and it just helped keep that static electricity to a dull roar, so we weren’t shocking our products. So we did have that issue for a few years in a row. Especially when that Visqueen comes up. It’s bad.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: That is so smart. That’s, the Downy is so smart. I definitely have used the spray cans of static spray, but …
Kim Hogeveen: I’m a little bit more frugal than that. Those spray cans can get expensive when you’ve got a 9000 square foot booth.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Yes. For a small booth, works great. For a big booth. Correct.
Kim Hogeveen: And you know what? The booth smelled great all day long.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Nice. Nice. Okay. [crosstalk 00:19:19] I just wanted to put the exhibitor manual link in the chat if you don’t mind, Fallon. Because that is one of the things that you talked about in the basics, a little bit about the manual. Could you touch on that?
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. For sure. Basically, the manual is my best friend. Especially if you’re a new exhibitor, take a read through the manual, take a read through the rules and regulations. You can’t assume that every convention center is going to be the same as every hotel event. NAB is not the same as Infocom or any other shows. There’s different rules and regulations. So especially if you’re a new exhibitor, I would definitely take a read through over a few weeks, because there’s a lot of web pages and a lot of links and whatnot. Just like, union rules by state are vastly different. For example, Vegas is a 10 x 10 with company staff, no tools, 30 minutes and up to four lights. Colorado is one hour, New York is no electrical, so there are some various rules. So for NAB for example though, Vegas is a … You can build a 10 x 10 booth using your own company staff with not tool, and that means no power tools, and you can have up to four lights that you can plug in before you need electrical labor.
I’ve kind of pulled out a few things that might be handy.
For example, can I hang a monitor from the floor? Yes, if you are standing on the floor, with your own company staff, you can hang a monitor. The second you need a ladder, never stand on a chair, but anyway, if you need a ladder, you need to order Freeman, electrical or Freeman … electrical labor, I should say.
Can I hang my own lights? With this years regulations, yes. If booth is 10 x 10 or less, falls within the regulations, then absolutely. There’s actually two spots in the manual. One says you can hang up to four lights, the other one says you can hang up to seven. So I would definitely, if you’ve got four lights, go ahead, plug them in, you won’t have to order electrical labor, so you’ll save yourself some money there.
Can I plug in power? Absolutely. As long as you are within the regulations, so that’s 20 amps, 120 volts, and it’s your own equipment, it’s not rental equipment, company staff member can go ahead and plug in your power, as long as it’s on top of the booth carpet. The second you are going to run cables under booth carpet or anything else, you do need to get Freeman electrical labor in.
So those are a few things that I was able to find … What was the page here? I was able to find it in the NAB rules and regulations. On the website, the link … I guess I can send you guys that link. I don’t know if we had that one before.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: We just put the manual link into the chat here, and that may be the one you’re holding up, Kim. I’m not sure.
Kim Hogeveen: I’m not sure. It’s under rules and regulations, I believe. So I may have missed that one. I apologize.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: It’s all good. We have a resources page and we’ll put the links and the show notes. So there’ll be a replay to this webinar and you can watch it and everything will be in the show notes.
Kim Hogeveen: Awesome. There is a few fine lines when it comes to hanging monitors, hanging lights, and then plugging in power. For the most part, things are going to be easier. Especially if you’ve got a smaller booth, for sure. If you’re over 10 x 10, then you are going to need electrical labor.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: So if you’re over a 10 x 10, you do need electrical labor for sure, is that as far as we understand it?
Kim Hogeveen: Yes. Well it depends. That’s for lights. For hanging your own monitors, it doesn’t matter what size booth you are, if you are standing on the floor and want to hang a monitor, you can go ahead.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: So if I’m feeling tall, I’m good.
Kim Hogeveen: Yep.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Awesome.
Kim Hogeveen: The Second you need a chair, a ladder, a table, anything, you need to order electrical labor.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Okay. Good good. Any other thoughts about the exhibitor manual, or do you feel like those are the high points, Kim?
Kim Hogeveen: Those are definitely the high points, I guess. One thing though, is NAB has introduced electrical pricing changes, for this year. Some of the electrical labor is built in to what you’re paying for when you buy like a 20 amp power source. That was one of the things the NAB Show Cares has done this year. They announced a special low rate. If you need 120 volt, 500 watt, 5 amp outlet, for booth spaces 10 x 40 and less, there is special discounted rates. That was one thing that I am very excited for to see this year.
And you know what, it’ll make your invoice a heck of a lot less complicated. I don’t know about other exhibitors, but Ross gets a 30 page invoice from Freeman, and we have to weed through it and understand the jargon. And 20 years into this and some of that jargon still is like “What the you know, blank?” I had to google some things, even last year, when it came to rigging. So NAB Show Cares has actually came up with a few programs to help exhibitors with that regard. That’s affecting rigging this year, electrical, drayage I think most people have noticed already. Those programs are fantastic, and I’m pretty excited to see them implemented for this year.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: We have a question that came up on chat about material handling. We’ll circle back to that at the end a little bit. I do want to tell you guys that on our next webinar, which is this same time, two weeks from now, we have BJ Enright on, and she’s going to really dig into material handling, the changes in the invoice, and a lot of logistics specifics. So be sure to come back and join us two weeks from today, if you have some questions in those areas.
So all the things Kim is talking about, we’re going to have a deep dive on those. Alright.
Hey. So Kim. Is now a good time to talk about the famous Ross memo?
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. Sure. Alright. So the Ross memo. It is a staff document that goes out to all attendees, well in advance of the show. It’s something we hope that most people read on the plane or they read at some point before they get to show site. The memo provides everything they need for the week. It’s all in there. The basics are in there. Convention center address, the booth number, hours of the show, 10-6, 9-6, 9-6, 9-2, because, as the Event Manager, you are going to be asked that question until you’re blue. That is the number one question, I think, that I get is, “How late’s the show going tonight?” So anyway, everything they need. Hotel address is in there, shuttle info is in there. So how they get to and from the hotel and convention center. What times.
Staff mobile numbers. We put everybody’s staff mobile number in the memo. Put the memo on your phone, print out a copy, your choice, but then you have everybody’s number just in case you’re not friends with Sue and you want to talk to her, then you know you’ve got her number somewhere. We have a list of Ross sponsored events going on in Vegas. So people need to know, you know, there’s a Canadian Suite, there’s this event, there’s this event, Ross is sponsoring it. So yeah. For sure. Partake and set up your networking. We’ve got when and where to collect badges. Even our social accounts and hashtags are in the Ross memo.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Oh, that’s smart. So put your social accounts and hashtags. That way everybody consistent. So smart. I love that.
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So #RossNAB, is one of our favorite hashtags. That way if anybody, if they’re posting anywhere, they’ve got that info, so tag us and we can see what everybody’s doing.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Oh that’s. That’s brilliant. Now when I even work with smaller companies with just have maybe two, three, or four people going to the show going. Do we have anybody on the call with just maybe a couple people going to the show? Just chat in and let me know. We would do the same thing. It doesn’t take very long to put that together for a small company and yet it’s so helpful because everybody is looking for that same info and may need the, how to get to the booth, are there blow dryers in the hotel, is a question I think I’ve answered 8000 times in my life.
Questions about equipment, passwords on computers, I mean the list just goes on. When you put that together once, it actually helps the staff going to the show to feel like they are part of the team, and really comfortable and it kind of, even though Kim and I and a lot of us on this call have been to literally hundreds of trade shows, for the people who are going their first or second or even tenth time, they might feel nervous, right. So this helps everyone to have a better show.
Are you taking a walk, Kim?
Kim Hogeveen: You know what? I thought I had the meeting room booked for an hour and don’t, so I’m going to be walking and looking for the next room. That’s all.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: That’s all good.
Kim Hogeveen: That’s how it is when a company is a certain size.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Tour of Ross Video. It’s all good. I love that red background. Looking good. Looking good.
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah. For sure. Alright.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: -Do you have any other thoughts about the memo that you want to share with us? Or does anybody have questions, cause I think that’s brilliant? Maybe that covered it. Maybe that covered it. Good good.
We did have a couple questions and we’ll come back to that at the end. Just to wrap up here, Kim, as you know many of the people on our call are new exhibitors. If they were going to get one takeaway from our call today, what would you give them, what would you say that they should do as result of our call?
Kim Hogeveen: I toiled over this, because there’s so many little things. And I wanted to say, hydrate, smile, plan for A, B, and C. But you know what, in all seriousness, just know your deadlines. Set reminders in Outlook, whatever your project management tool is. Know your target dates. Know your service deadlines. I’ve got March 11th circled on my calendar, so that is the Freeman service order deadline date. Today is the lead retrieval date, so that’s how I knew that one earlier today. I’ve actually made Freeman quick facts, my most important and my most opened files. I think that’s in the package that you have.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Yes. If you guys go to that webpage we put together for resources, the same one where Kim’s sheet was, her amazing checklist, there’s also the Freeman quick facts downloadable there as well, and then we’re going to add these other show links to that page shortly as well. Nice. Alright.
What questions do you guys have? Bring them on and we have Nick from NAB Show with us and Kim, Exhibitor Advisory Committee and obvious trade show expert and I’ve done a couple shows myself. So bring it on. What questions do you have?
One of the questions around lead retrieval was, where to pick that up? Does anybody have a little info about where to pick up lead retrieval?
Kim Hogeveen: Lead retrieval is an easy one, thankfully. They’re going to be located, I’m not sure what hall this person is located in, but they are going to be with the exhibitor services in whatever hall. So if you’re in North Hall, follow exhibitor services. There’s going to be arrows on the floor. It’ll be Freeman, it’ll be Experience, so that’s the lead retrieval folks is Experience. You’ll see all the different banners and it should be within each hall.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Good.
Nick Gadino: And just to piggyback off of Kim, all those locations, they are going to be in each hall and they are still being finalized as we speak on our floor plan. But yes, as Kim said, there will be directional signage. There will be posted 22 x 28 little lollipop stands, like we call them, and it’ll be quite easy to find.
Kim Hogeveen: Yeah.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Oh. That’s good to know. And now we’ve got a question regarding the SWAP app that’s used to collect leads NAB Show. Is there an extra wi-fi connection that’s required to use that or is that free in the convention center? And if it is free, is reliable so that somebody could count on it for their lead retrieval?
Kim Hogeveen: I don’t know if Nick wants to take this, but I do know that the last EAC meeting I was in, NAB’s wi-fi for exhibitors and attendees this year. So there will be better wi-fi than previous years. But no, to use the app, any apps that I’ve had before, I haven’t had to purchase any extra internet for that.
Nick Gadino: No, those are all gonna be … those activations will be downloadable by the exhibitor onto their device. You can also run the device from Experian, if you like. It’s not gonna require any kind of external connection. As Kim said, yes, there will be internet. We’re finalizing all our discussions right now with Cox and we are going to be communicating to the entire exhibitor community once everything is finalized.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Okay. For the person that has the question about that, feel free to email Nick and just double check, if you want to do that. I mean, that’s what I would do. So just hit him up and you can see his contact info in the chat here, just to confirm. Because I see what you’re saying, is as an exhibitor, you got the app and when you purchased it, it tells you that wi-fi connection is required. So I know NAB Show is going to help you with that for sure.
Question here about ordering things from Freeman and when things are pre-ordered from Freeman, wondering where to go and pick those things up and are sometimes, I guess you’re finding them missing. Is that what you’re saying as well? On your question, I’m not sure about the things … Are you thinking about chairs, and tables, and trash cans, and stuff? Or maybe you could give us a little bit more info about that. And then we can definitely help you with that as well.
Nick Gadino: One thing I will say on that, Kim I don’t know what Ross has experienced in … Well I do know what Ross has experienced in the past. I will say that in addition to, as Kim said near the beginning of our call, to seek out your exhibit service desk, and seek out a Freeman representative, you can do that. They’re also are, what we call, Freeman concierge in the hall. So each hall has a designated Freeman representative that is on a Freeman designated cart, going around each hall and checking in with those folks that have questions. If something does happen, and we hope that it doesn’t happen, where you have something pre-ordered and it should be delivered to your booth, if it is ordered by Freeman. If that doesn’t happen for whatever case, that’s where you would contact a Freeman rep or a Freeman concierge on the floor and they’re going to alleviate that issue as soon as possible.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: And now there’s a Freeman concierge, which is great, I didn’t know that. Is there still a floor manager in each hall as well?
Nick Gadino: Yes. There are.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Oh gosh. So can I just say to everybody on the call, one of the best things you can do is, when you get there, whether it’s Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, whatever day you get there, is find your floor manager and introduce yourself. And then now I’d say, find your Freeman concierge person and introduce yourself. Just so you’ve got the connection. Then if you do need something, you know who to go to.
Kim Hogeveen: Oh for sure. And they’re so reliable. Whenever I’ve had issues, everything gets resolved within an hour or two, which is fantastic. And it does save you a few trips to that exhibitor services desk.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Alright. What other questions do you have? We’re here for you. We want to make the show great and easy. Throw your questions in Q A here, if you’ve got more.
Nick Gadino: One thing I want to add about on site service, myself, I’m, as Kim said, before during the show days and even during show prep, me and my team we get there the week prior as well on Monday the 1st. And then we proceed to run around for 11 days, screaming and you know … but one thing I will say is that I personally handle North and Central Hall queries for exhibitors and my other colleagues handle South, Upper and Lower Hall. If you are in North and Central, I will be your NAB contact. We are there, we do our best to divide and conquer and make sure that all issues are alleviated as quickly as possible.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Hey Nick. Somebody chatted in asking, can we bring our own materials, such as TVs, etc.? Can you just give us an answer on that?
Nick Gadino: Yes. You certainly can. A lot of people are question with the new material handling policy this year. Are we still allowed to hand carry our things in? The answer is absolutely yes. I will say, I’ve talked to a lot of exhibitors about this, and in our own advisory committee meetings with Kim and our colleagues there is that you can totally do that. But for a lot of folks, even if you are in a 10 x 10 or 10 x 20 booth, it can take up to four, five hours to bring those things in and sometimes maybe even more depending on what your doing with your setup. If you can ship it ahead of time, to Freeman to the warehouse or even to the show site and have the material handling already taken care of, which is already included in your booth space purchase, I think that’s a great way to go. But some folks still want to bring in their own materials, hand carried. You can certainly do that.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Got it. I think we’re at the end of our questions. Ah, another one popped up. Alright. Let me just look at this. When equipment is shipped from our home location is it delivered to the booth or is it housed in some central location? Great question.
Nick Gadino: Nancy, you can do either or. You can ship to Freeman advance warehouse and then it will be shipped to Freeman Vegas warehouse and then they will then bring it in themselves during move in and bring it to your booth and it will be at your booth by your assigned move in date. For booths that are linear, that’s usually the 5th, for the larger booths it can be from the 1st to the 2nd or the 3rd. If you do ship it direct to show site, it will still be brought in by Freeman to your booth, however there’s no guarantee that it will be there by your move in date.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: And so we are having, two weeks from today, having an entire session on the unlimited materials handling and everything all about that. Nick can you give us a preview on that? We have several people who’ve chatted in asking about it and it would be great if you could touch on how that works.
Nick Gadino: For the unlimited material handling policy?
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Correct.
Nick Gadino: This is something that I know Kim is also aware of because we had spoken about it in our meetings, and a lot of exhibitors have come and spoken to us about this. Is it really, is it really unlimited material handling? That doesn’t sound quite right. And we say, yes, it truly, truly is. You can ship to your hearts desire. Obviously, the shipping costs are at your expense, but the actual drayage, or the new term, the material handling, that is all already included in your booth space. You paid that $3.85 per square foot for your space and that includes everything that gets shipped will be brought in by Freeman personnel to your booth. There are no limits on weight or anything of that nature. It really is, it is that simple.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: That’s wonderful. Where can people find their move in date and time?
Nick Gadino: That is another thing we did this year there was a lot of queries about how do I find that out. All you have to do now, login to your exhibitor dashboard and it’s going to be on the upper right hand corner of your main screen. It will give you the date, it will give you the time. Yeah. It is that simple. For some reason, if you can’t find it, as Cindy mentioned, you can shoot me a message on LinkedIn, you can email us at exhibitservices@NAB.org. Trying to streamline the process, make things as easy as possible.
Cindy Zuelsdorf: Alright. We are going to wrap it up here. Join us again in two weeks, when we dig deep dive into material handling and all kinds of other logistics. In the meantime, if you have any questions at all the Kim can answer, hit her up. If I can do anything for you, let me know. And then if it very specific logistics or just really any NAB Show anything, Nick is at your service as well. And thank you all and we’ll see you in Las Vegas. Actually see you in two-
