Nervous Breakdown

Breaking down an exhibit booth after SEMA is no fun. I've been to the Las Vegas automotive aftermarket trade show for the past three years, but 2007 was the first time I had the "pleasure" of folding up shop. We shipped our display aids to the show in a crate. Once we arrived, they put our crate in an outdoor storage yard with thousands of others. So we had to wait over five hours before our crate got dug out. Seeing it again was like seeing a long lost relative who was stuck on an atoll in the Pacfic since World War II.

While we were sitting there waiting for the crate to come, I realized that all the PR flaks at SEMA had missed their golden opportunity. Instead of giving out mag wheel yo-yos and hard-to-get passes to the Hot Wheels party, they could have done a low-cost high-impact promotion by buying all the exhibitors a hot dog and Coke during the long tear down period after the show.

I'll betch not one of the exhibitors would ever forget who brought those "mouth watering" refreshments! A Coke during teardown would taste like ice water in a desert.