There are a few marquee companies today that only need to register as an exhibitor, set up their booth and everyone will visit. The challenge for everyone else is creating that unique experience that will draw customers into their company’s booth. Here are three fresh examples from the first half of this year’s tradeshow circuit that put a spotlight on these exhibiting companies.
Personalizing the Lunch Sponsorship
Does anyone from your team cook award-winning barbecue? ValTek parlayed their award-winning barbecue from the 2022 Daniel Energy Barbecue competition into a lunch sponsorship at the 2023 Thrive Conference. This was no ordinary lunch sponsorship. ValTek’s team cooked overnight in their outdoor booth and personally served free lunch to all exhibitors and attendees at the conference.
This complimentary lunch brought more than 1,200 people to their booth. There’s no better way to show everyone your team’s work ethic and professionalism than to cook overnight and have them pick up their free lunch from you next to a product in your booth. This example of personalizing a sponsorship could be used with multiple other traditional methods such as handing out show-sponsored lanyards or brochures. Speak to your conference representative about a sponsorship that can show your company’s personality.
Customizing Can Change the Game
If you’ve been to at least one or two trade shows you’ve either seen or tried your skills at a putting contest on a regular putting green. If you are like me, after a few times the putting contest stopped drawing your attention. For IFPE this year Dura-Bar wanted to make the putting contest exciting again. They decided to customize their booth’s putting green by getting a 3-hole putting green built in the booth with a contouring green, fringe and sand traps. This really grabbed the attention of the attendees and had people lining up to test their skills. To take it further, Dura-Bar used their cast iron material to make putters that were given to the winners of the putting contest. Dura-Bar showed that customizing a staple attraction at trade shows can make your booth the talk of the show.
Using Ingredients as an Incentive
They say food is not for just eating. It should be an experience. Well, this year at the National Restaurant Association show, Tony Chachere’s whipped up some delicious culinary creations to entice visitors to experience their trade show booth. People’s interests were piqued when the Tony’s team had a corporate chef making shrimp and grits, pastalaya, and more meals for exhibitors and attendees to sample throughout the day. With a custom-built kitchen setup, this tactic produced a personal ambiance to accompany some classic home cooking.
Not only does this method allow visitors to try out the product first-hand, but it generates a memorable time that is easy to recall when thinking about the trade show. At the same time, when attendees walk around the show with their food samples, it creates a word-of-mouth movement to get more visitors to the booth. It also stood out to those who take a special interest in cooking. During the cooking demos, they can discover different ways to use the product while gaining insight from a professional chef.
What attraction can you put a fun twist to in order to draw attendees to your company’s booth? Here are a few other trade show booth draws that we have had success with over the years:
- Artists
- Chair massages
- Simulation screens
- Trivia
- Afternoon whiskey tasting
- Cookies or popcorn (it’s the smell)
- Cigar rolling
- And, a shoe-shine station!
These great ideas show that there are always opportunities to make an impact on the show floor no matter how big or small your company is. Fall and spring are the most popular times for trade shows. For more great ideas like these, call Foster Marketing.