Trade show update

Trade show costs can be an expensive surprise. After Affiliate Summit 2010, I am back in Miami, and one lesson I bring home is a bill for 1,700 dollars to move two pallets around 100 metres. So read the small print when you book a stand.

I am pretty tired after the trade show in Las Vegas. We have gone all out, my legs hurt, and there has been far too much partying in the evenings and far too many late nights. But the big question, of course, is whether the trip was worth the money.

A trip that cost a fortune

My partner Henrik loves to party and has invited lots of our partners out. Nightclubs, restaurant visits and all sorts of other things add up. In the video, I estimate that we have spent close to 200,000 kroner a day on that sort of thing. That is my spoken estimate after the trip, not a completed set of accounts.

We have flown 13 people over, most of them from Denmark. That is a lot of money. A really large amount. Looking at the entire trip, I talk about perhaps half a million kroner or more.

I find it difficult to spend that much money on people I basically do not know. At the same time, I know it can cost money to make money. Henrik has previously benefited from bringing people together and meeting new people that way.

The right meetings can make a difference

Last time, I met some interesting people, which led to us getting SLOW-PCfighter. At the time of this video, I say that product generates two to three million kroner in revenue for us each month.

So I need to get used to the idea that those kinds of contacts can be worth something. This time, I am mainly hoping the trip has brought us good resellers. Whether it will actually pay off, I do not yet know. I share my own experiences of developing businesses in Iværksætter til jeg dør.

Trade show costs: 1,700 dollars for two pallets

The specific experience I want to pass on involves two pallets of necklaces we handed out at the trade show. We brought them in a truck and needed to get them into the exhibition area.

But we were not allowed to take them in ourselves. We had to stack them on the pallets ourselves, and we also had to unload them again ourselves. The trade show staff handled moving the pallets in.

It was about 100 metres. So far, so good. But afterwards we got a bill for 1,700 dollars. In my assessment, it was ten minutes’ work for one man.

We refused to pay. So I expect there will be a follow-up. My reaction is blunt, to put it mildly: I think 1,700 dollars for that transport is completely outrageous.

That is the experience I want to spare others. When you exhibit at a trade show, read all the small print. Even a very simple task of getting materials to your stand can have terms and a price you did not expect.

What else could the money have been spent on?

Trade shows seem a little old-fashioned to me. When you may have spent half a million kroner or more on a trip like that, you can bloody well buy a lot of Google AdWords for the same money.

That does not mean I have already concluded that the trip was a waste. We will see what we get out of it. I will come back with results if the good contacts and resellers lead to something. Right now, I have both hope for new opportunities and a very expensive reminder to read the small print.

What did we learn, and did we get anything out of the trade show?

Location:Florida 9,Fort Lauderdale,USA