Don Jalbert knows trade shows, and he’s ready to share that wisdom with you. This podcast is loaded with tips and tricks for trade shows and brand activations, with expertise and advice from Exhibit Associates where Don is a Partner. How can we get the best bang for the buck in terms of ROI? Listen in to Don’s 4 hacks and find out.
TRANSCRIPT:
Welcome to the Small Business Miracles podcast.
I’m Jeff Randolph. This small business podcast
is brought to you by EAG Advertising and Marketing.
We’re going to talk about marketing, and we’re
also here to celebrate entrepreneurs by diving
into their story and learn a little more about
what makes them tick. Today, we’re talking about
trade shows with no end of tricks and tips and
accumulated wisdom from Don Jalbert. He’s a partner
at Exhibit Associates. So let’s get right into
it. Hi there. Jumping right into the featured
section of our show, I am here with Don Jalbert.
Don is a partner at Exhibit Associates. Don,
welcome to the show. Thanks, man. Glad to be
here. We’re happy to have you. So first, tell
us about Exhibit Associates because we’re going
to get deeply nerdy on all of the trade show
things today. And I’m excited about it. We do
a lot of trade show tips and we talk about trade
shows quite a bit because it’s a whole world
and it’s kind of important. There’s an investment
there. So tell me about Exhibit Associates and
what do you do? Well, what do I do? What is it
you’d say you do here? Well, yeah, what do I
do here? That’s a great question. I wear many
hats. Partner is a great title for the co -owner
who works with his wife. Oh, gotcha. Okay. So
she’s president. So we’re a woman -owned business.
She is actively involved in the business. But
what we do is we design and build trade show
booths, corporate displays, and museum exhibits.
So once we get a client, and it depends on what
they want, we go through a whole design process.
Then we fabricate. Then we get it ready for the
trade show. Well, I’ll focus on trade shows here.
We’ll ship it to the trade show, oversee the
entire setup. Everything from taking care of
the trash at night to hanging your sign to –
I look at it this way. Full service. We get to
perfection, and perfection is at .of a
o ‘clock opening. At .everybody’s shirt
is pressed. All the brochures are in the right
spot. The carpet is spotless. At .that’s
when we shoot for perfection. Samples are lined
up, ready to go. All the giveaways. Now, at
.– It’s a different story. Chaos. Chaos. But
the buzz, that excitement, the electricity in
the trade show, especially a big trade show where
a lot has gone into it, maybe one that goes every
two years, which is – they’re getting rarer and
rarer now. A lot of organizations like to have
them every year, have annual events. But that
buzz at that perfection is what we shoot
for. Now, we also store. We maintain. We do the
graphics. We do everything. When it comes to
trade shows – We’ll do as much or as little as
the client wants. We’ve done major booths and
we ship them and we never see them again. Here
you go and hands off and it’s somebody else’s
deal. It’s someone else’s deal and that’s fine.
Whatever the client wants. We don’t have pre
-canned solutions. We focus on what the client
wants. We ask the thousand questions that every
good business does at their clients to figure
out what they want. And then we execute on that,
and that’s the key thing. And we’ve been asked
to execute on plans that go – we’ve got a trade
show in months we’ve got a plan for. Oh, yeah,
yeah. As a matter of fact, we have one, and we’re
talking to a client. It’s in months is the
trade show. Now sometimes they come in and we
have a show in days. Right, right. There’s
the right way to do it, and it’s better to have
a little more time. So the time to start is probably
now. Yes, and we’re focused on a show in February
with a client, and it’s a Winback client. So
they were with us in We don’t know
why they left us. We always like to find out
why. And it’s usually lack of service or not
agreeing with the individual on the team. Because
people do business with people. Right, right.
And they like to do people with people they like.
So lo and behold, they call us up. They actually
got a referral into us to come back to, you know,
it’s been eight years since we did business with
them. They’re coming back to us and I look at
LinkedIn, I look at the customer, and everybody
who we did business with eight years ago, none
of them are there. Yeah, yeah. So it went through
a whole cycle and now they’re with another provider
and they’re like, you know, We’re not happy with
that provider. Who else is out there? So the
first question we asked, you know you were with
us before. That’s right, we know you. We don’t
know any of the people who are here right now.
But we want to make sure because we’ve had clients
reach out to us and say, hey, we’ve done business
with you before and it went sideways for various
reasons. Tell us why. Make sure you understand
why because we want to be up front because there’s
not many companies who do what we do, what Exhibit
Associates does. So eventually a company is going
to come back to us and we want them as a client.
Every client is important to us. So it’s very
important that we do what we say we’re going
to do. We follow through. And one great thing
about trade shows, and I know EAG has a great
experience with trade shows. you’re going to
have to solve a problem that day you did not
know was a problem when you showed up that day.
%. And as an outsourced marketing agency,
if we’re the ones on site, if we’re the ones
in the booth, I feel so confident that we can
solve that problem, whatever that problem is.
But when you’re sending the client with the booth
and all of the materials and everything there,
you just kind of have that, I don’t know if it’s
a parent kind of moment, but we care deeply and
we’re like, oh man, whatever that problem is,
problem is. And we don’t know what that problem
is yet, but whatever that is, I hope they’re
prepared for it. We had a client go to a trade
show in Orlando and the advanced warehouse, we
always try and ship to advanced warehouse that
helps the client save money. We’re all about
spending the money like it’s ours. And advanced
warehouse lost the floor. No, that’s the whole
job of the advanced warehouse is to make sure
it’s there. Well, they shipped it to another
trade show. And there was no way it was coming
back. And so we had to solve that problem within
hours because we had the setup crew ready to
go. It was a by booth. It was a big investment
by the client. They needed flooring. And we couldn’t
get the exact color we wanted, but at least we
had flooring and padding. And if you’re doing
trade shows, if you have a trade show booth,
get padding. Your team will love you. Double
pad, if you want. Hey, that and some hokas. You
know you’ve been to a trade show. Tell me about
the beginning of a client relationship. When
you first have that conversation with somebody,
what kind of questions are you asking them about
their trade show experience? How do you start
that conversation? Well, the first question I
like to ask is, when is the trade show? I mean,
that’s basic. Good first question. And again,
sometimes it’s months away. Sometimes it’s
days away. Then we go into what their expectation
is at the end of the trade show. So is it brand
awareness? Is it purchase orders? What are they
doing? And the simple thing is if they want to
sign purchase orders and get orders at the trade
show, they’ve got to have a place that’s flat
to sit down and sign the POs. The physical environment
needs to match the thing you’re trying to do.
Yes, and so we always try that. And we mention
things like a client will come in to you. into
your booth, which is great, but if they feel
like they can’t get out of your trade show booth,
they’re not going to come in. You’ve got like
steps of that person. He’s going to evaluate
you. He’s going to look at the team, look at
everybody, look at the booth, and say, can I
get out of there? Not can I get in. The giveaways
are important. It’s fine, but it’s never going
to get somebody in. It’s going to make someone
remember you if it’s an appropriate I mean, prior
to acquiring Exhibit Associates, I did trade
shows with a software company I was involved
with. And we gave away golf balls. Oh, yeah.
We might as well just dump them at the airport
and let people would have been more appreciative.
And, you know, we never saw the golf balls again.
They never led the business. And we should have
done something a little bit different. But it
was an IT tech trade show. There was no good
giveaways. If you have good insight into who
your audience is and you can kind of figure out
who – what did they want? What would stand out?
What would be unique and interesting for that
person? We had a client that did a great job.
Their focus was medical billing software. So
their key customer was the office manager, not
the doctor, but the office management. Their
demographics of office managers at doctor’s offices
is female, to So they gave away – I forget
the person’s name, but it was like a Louis Vuitton.
Oh, wow. They had as a giveaway. Oh. But you
had to give up everything. You had to give –
I mean name, contact, everything to get – be
in the drawing. Oh, okay. Just to be in as a
drawing for it. As a drawing for it. And they
got all – everybody – I bet they would. They
did. They did a great job. Yeah, if you can match
that up, that’s great. That was the best I’ve
ever seen. There are those trends. And if we
have ad specialty people on the show, it’s the
same kind of question that I’m going to ask them
all the time. It’s the, hey, what’s cool? What
are people doing now? What have you seen that’s
really interesting? And it seems like that also
applies to the booth design. And what are the
components of booths now that are really cool
and interesting? And you mentioned one of the
questions. You asked what other questions I ask
clients. Yeah, yeah, yeah. When we look at the
show and we look at their booth space, and let’s
just go with the by space. It’s an island
booth. We look at who’s around them, and we say,
okay, who are your competitors, and what do they
do? What do they look like? Because we actually
go in. A lot of customers are very happy with
their trade show booth, so they put it on their
Facebook page. So if we look at who’s next to
them, what their booth is like. Because we don’t
want to match it. Yeah, you don’t want to blend
in. We don’t want to blend in. Obviously you’ve
got brand standards, you’ve got brand colors,
you’ve got everything you’ve got to adhere to
in the design of the graphics. But we do not
want, we want to make sure that we’re getting,
maximizing our space by looking at who’s next
to us and if they’re limiting us anyway. Like
if there’s a big wall there, what do we have
to do? And there’s a lot of different ways we
do it. But we, like I said, we ask, you know,
What is the objective? Like signing purchase
orders, you’ve got to have a thing to sign. What
kind of storage space? Because you’re going to
have people with backpacks and luggage on the
last day. What are you going to do with that?
And they’re going to say, we don’t allow that.
I’m like, well, guess what? Yeah, everyone does
it. Your senior VP of sales is going to come
in with his luggage and his backpack, and you’re
going to tell him no? Yeah. That’s not going
to happen. So we look at all those different
things, and the biggest question we want to get
is budget. Yeah. Because if they’ve got a
by space and let’s say it’s a very popular
show and they’re spending $,just on the
space, on the concrete, what’s their budget for
the booth? And it’s got to be appropriate. And
we do a little bit of research on who their competitors
are. So I’m trying to think if Coca -Cola comes,
we look at Pepsi. Because people want to… look
like they’re as successful as their competitors,
if not more. Yeah, you need to be on the same
playing field. You need to be on level with who
you’re trying to show up against. And that’s
a sad reality. I hate to say it. It’s actually
a sad reality. You want to look the part. I mean,
we just had a client do an amazing trade show
booth. It was at Pet Food Forum, which is here
in Kansas City. Amazing booth. But it looked
like none of the booth on the floor. And they
didn’t get the – because people thought it was
a rest area. Oh, interesting. They had a lot
of seating. It was very stylish. It was very
cool. But it didn’t look like a trade show booth,
so nobody thought it was a trade show booth.
And they’re all just in there lounging. And so
they were making changes. And because we were
like, man, this is really cool. It’s different,
and we told them it was different, and they’re
like, no, this is what we want. This will be
great, and we gave them the number, and they
pared it back a little bit, so we pared it back
a little bit. It all worked out. But yeah, we’re
redoing the graphics and making sure that people
are aware that it’s actually a product for sale
and display at the trade show. Yeah, experience
counts. There’s a lot of investment that goes
into a trade show booth. It’s a lot of money
that a company is investing, whether that’s for
like a… recruitment fair and we have to have
a table and some kind of backdrop. Or it’s the
island booth that’s by You’ve talked about
four hacks of ways to get that visibility and
make sure that you have some kind of return on
investment. Walk through those four hacks for
me. Well, the four hacks are things that you
can do as an exhibitor that don’t cost you money.
And obviously, we want you to spend all your
money on the booth. We want % of all your
trade show budget to come to the booth. That’s
right. Forget hotels. Forget travel. Forget people.
We just want you to spend money on the booth.
If you build the booth right, there’s a bunk
bed underneath one of those storage areas. Somebody
can sleep there. You have to push on the counters,
and the bunk beds come up. Pops up. Oh, that’s
great. It’s really good. It’s either going to
be a bunk bed or a bar. We’re not sure yet. So
one of the things we thought about was, well,
how can we help our clients get more? And we
came up with these hacks, and we just started
educating our client what they can do more. And
the social media channel of trade shows is by
far and away Twitter. It’s by far and away X.
Every trade show has a handle, has a hashtag.
Event spaces have it. Now, tell people you’re
going. Use Twitter. Use all the channels. Definitely
use X because people are going to be scrolling
when they’re right at the show and say, oh, look,
go to booth And if you use it right, and
we help our client with that, but tell people
you’re going is the biggest hack. Because if
no one knows you’re there, no one’s going to
show up. I’ll reiterate. We love to be on all
of the appropriate channels. X does seem to be
the place where people can go. Under normal circumstances,
you can’t find anything on X. The average tweet
lives for something like seven minutes, unless
it’s terrible, and then it lives forever. But
it lives for seven minutes. But if you’re following
a show, if you’re following that show hashtag,
that show handle, Now X becomes something you
can actually navigate. And you should, should
be able to avoid all of the terrible things that
are there. So it’s a win -win. Yeah, it is. And
reference the hashtags for the show, for the
organization, and the handles for the show and
the organization. So tell people you’re going
is a huge hack. And make sure your salespeople
are telling people you’re going also. Because
they should prearrange meetings before the show
begins. Yes. So they should have meetings in
the booth scheduled before the show begins. So
hack one, tell people you’re going. It doesn’t
cost anything. Two, exhibit with a plan. If the
show is two days and it’s six hours each day
and there are three networking events, specify
who is going to each event. And who is going
to be on the trade show floor for those six hours?
So everybody doesn’t go to lunch at the same
time. Right. You’re there until o ‘clock at
the last day. You’re not breaking down at .
You’re there until or if the show ends at
But have that because everyone wants to be
there in the opening, my definition of perfection.
But at the end, at o ‘clock on the second day
or if there’s a third day, you’re tired. It can
be exhausting. You want to pack up early. But
that one client who hasn’t had a chance is coming
around at .and that’s your opportunity
to close. That’s exactly right. I can’t tell
you how many times we’ve had exactly that conversation
at the end of the show while the person across
the aisle has already packed up and gone. Yeah.
So exhibit with a plan, the whole thing, even
the networking events. Third, follow -up. After
the trade show, follow -up. I have a great plan.
I’ll tell you what. You collect business cards
during day one. Have a pre -canned mail, email,
ready to go to those to to people that
you got their cards and say, thanks for coming
by. Day one has been fantastic. And you may only
send it to or people, but that will make
an impact because they’re going to go to their
hotel. They’re going to catch up on emails. They’re
going to read that email. And what is even –
What’s amazing on this follow -up is if you offer
a deep discount at the trade show, a deep discount.
Make it worth their while. Make it worth their
while to come back the next day and sign the
deal. Your lifetime value of the client will
pay off, but your acquisition cost may be a little
expensive. But you’re at the trade show, so give
a % discount. on a product that needs service
over a year. Don’t discount your service, but
get that product. Or give double the commission
to your sales team for closing business at the
trade show. Oh, yeah. Really make them focus
on it. Make them focus on it. And they’ll be
focused. And salespeople love commissions. But
that follow -up is so critical. If you can set
the appointment at the trade show. Because the
week later, you’re already late. If the show
ends on Thursday and you’re waiting until Tuesday,
you’re already late. I’m now back at the office
and I have million things to do on my desk
and I’ve almost forgotten who I spoke with. Yeah,
so hack one, tell people you’re going. Hack two,
have a plan. Hack three, follow up, follow up,
follow up. And I tell people, you don’t follow
up, don’t go. Plain and simple. And hack number
four, stand out. Now, that may be a little self
-serving to a trade show booth company, but you
don’t have to. Spend it on your trade show. And
we talked a little bit earlier. Get matching
sneakers for your team and make them your brand
color. That way everybody’s comfortable and people
will remember the fact, oh yeah, it’s the company
with the blue sneakers or the red sneakers. Yeah,
remember they had double padding in their booth
and it was very comfortable and they all had
the same color hokas on that were all dyed purple.
And they’re focused on the comfort of their team.
They really focus on their people. So stand out.
I mean I went to a trade show. And they had a
bald eagle in a booth. It was amazing. Memorable.
The Denver Zoo had it. So they brought it into
the booth, and it was awesome. And as we walked
away, I asked the person I was with, okay, now
tell me the company that had it because it was
something. And the bald eagle had nothing to
do with the brand. And so that’s standing out,
but not in a positive way. But not in a good
way. Not in a good way. We do the same thing
with Super Bowl ads the next day, right? When
there’s a Super Bowl ad and everybody’s talking
about it afterward and you go, oh, that was great.
What soda company or what beer vendor was it
that had that commercial? And if you can’t tell
me the difference between Miller Lite and Bud
Lite, you didn’t do it right. One of the most
famous Super Bowl commercials was the Herding
Cats. Everybody remembers the herding cats. Do
you remember the company? I’m going to say it
was like a GoDaddy or something. No? It was EDF,
Electronic Data Systems. Ross Perot’s old company.
It got acquired by GM and finally got bought
by Hewlett Packard, became HPE. The reason I
know that so well is because the next day, I
was working for EDF. The next day, or the Tuesday
after the Super Bowl, my client goes, so we’re
like cats then. The current client base, my current
client base was not happy with that commercial.
But if you can’t connect the two, like if it
doesn’t connect to your brand, then it’s less
memorable. You need some way to make it make
sense. Stand out, but in a good way. I’ll use
that as an opportunity to throw out my, it’s
a book recommendation. And it’s one that I’ve,
when we’re consulting with somebody about their
trade show experience. I will throw that out,
and it’s a book called Three Feet from Seven
Figures. Oh, I saw that. Are you familiar with
that? Yeah. The idea behind it is really that
you’ve focused a lot on getting to this point
in the trade show. You are now standing three
feet from your next seven -figure deal. And how
we show up for that, how the booth personnel
show up for that is really important. You’re
away from work, but we don’t – like, you know,
stop work for you. So your email is still getting
hit nonstop. And so if you’re in the back of
the booth on your laptop, checking email, you’re
not presenting well for that company. You’re
eating lunch in the booth instead of going away
somewhere and you’re not showing up right. So,
you know, the investment that you’ve made, like
do the rest of it. Well, I – and there’s the
old adage where the miner was three feet from
gold. He was digging. And then he sold the mine
because it was a dud. And someone looked at it
and said, all you got to do is dig three more
feet. And he would have made a ton of money.
I agree with that three feet because if you’re
not present – and that’s why, one, I tell people
don’t build your own booth. If it’s anything
more than a pop -up – Don’t do your own booth.
Let someone else do it. So you’re rested, ready
to go, and you are ready to protect your client
base and plunder those who are not your client
base. Don’t assemble the booth yourself. Be networking
during that time. Because there are no decision
makers on the trade show floor during setup or
breakdown. But also, so now you’re ready, you’re
present, you’re in the booth, and you’ve got
someone in front of you that is a potential client.
Get rid of your smartwatch. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Good thought, good thought. Because guess what
happens as soon as your phone – you’re not looking
at your phone, but as soon as you get a buzz
and your watch goes off, what are you going to
do? It’s nonstop. You’re going to look at your
watch and then people are going to say, oh, he’s
not paying attention to me. Yeah. And that nonverbal
clue is so important. So be present. Get rid
of any distraction instead of talking to that.
potential new client or that existing client
you want to keep as a client. Because the decision
makers that go to trade shows, especially post
-COVID, more decision makers are going. Before
COVID, there was kind of a lot of interns going.
But now, because they actually are more expensive,
we’re seeing the expenses gone up since COVID,
lockdowns are over, decision makers are going.
And so you’re going to have decision makers
walk by your booth who can do business with you.
And changed the outcome, changed your company’s
trajectory just by signing that one new client.
And I’ve seen it happen with some of my clients.
And they’ve signed with some of the largest brands,
and it changed their business, and they credit
the trade show booth. Now, they spent months
trying to get that client. Sure, sure. It takes
work. It takes work. That’s not a silver bullet.
It is not a silver bullet. You still need to
put in the effort. It is a tool in your business
development. toolkit and you need to use it because
that’s where your decision maker is going and
you have that opportunity to speak to them one
-on -one instead of your secretary making a or
your administrative assistant talking to their
administrative assistant or talking to their
director, and instead you’re talking to the senior
VP of purchasing for a large retail brand, and
all of a sudden now you have that deal. Direct
access. You can’t beat it out of face -to -face
marketing, i .e. trade show. It’s an important
component. It’s a healthy part of this nutritious
breakfast. Or something. I don’t know. Before
we trade show stuff, we’ll come back to things,
I’m sure. But I want to pivot a little bit because
the World Cup’s coming up. And Kansas City is
one of those host cities. And you’ve already
done a lot of brand activations for that thing.
You want to talk about some of that? Yeah, I
would love to. We do brand activations because
we have a fabrication team. We build in different…
whether it’s wood, whether it’s metal, glass,
plastics, anything. And we have this thing called
trucks, which means we can build, deliver to
locations. To a location, someplace outside.
Set it up, and then at the end of the event,
break it down. I mean, we’ve done breakdowns
at a .m. Saturday mornings. because the event
space needed to be up and ready and regular at
a .m. after the event. So we come in on a Friday
at a .m., set up all day, make sure it’s all
good to go. The event happens. It’s over at
o ‘clock in the morning. So at in the morning,
we’re taking the stuff out. So the brand activations.
require a skill set that’s different than trade
shows and different than a lot of other stuff.
But because we have these magical things called
trucks, we’re able to execute on them. So we’ve
done events at Coffman Stadium, at Arrowhead
Stadium, some other event spaces here in town.
And with the World Cup coming, we… This is
the week of the World Cup for Exhibit Associates
because we sat down on our Monday morning and
had a discussion. Okay, we got to start focusing
on it because there are going to be some brand
activations during the World Cup, you know, and
obviously. Yes. Well, our vendors started reaching
out to us. And unbeknownst, they’re like, hey,
we’ve got this new thing you might want to use
for the World Cup. Hey, we just – one of our
other vendors did something for the FIFA World
Cup championship game in Jersey. That just happened,
right? And he goes, they did it here. It’s coming
to Kansas City. What do you need from us to support
you? But here’s everything we can do for you.
Our vendor called us. And then we got – this
morning I got a request for information from
a marketing company who says, hey, World Cup’s
coming. We’re going to need some help in Kansas
City. Can you help us out? And so one of the
– hey, we’re glad to help. We’ve got trucks.
Literally, that’s my email back to him. We’ve
got trucks. I’ll send you stuff back. One of
my favorite projects we did was at Coffman Stadium.
It was for the World Series back in So
it’s a while ago. But what was really cool was
we opened up a container store. where you could
get custom -made jerseys with your name on it.
So basically it was a container. So the container
front door opened, and we had mannequins,
one for each MLB team, and then we had one extra
for the Mets and one for the Kansas City Royals.
So we had this container store, the size of a
container, and there was a store inside of it.
The reason they wanted a container is so they
could close it back up. put it on a truck, and
haul it off to Queens for the game three or five
and six. So now being a Royals fan, that was
an amazing time in the city. Oh, yeah. And I
think that changed the city. I really do think
it changed the city. The game was going on, and
I was like, man, if they go to game six and seven.
It’s coming back and that’s more revenue for
Exhibit Associates. But as a fan, I’m like, win.
Just go ahead and – Just win. I’ll take one for
the team. I will just win. But we got to build
that container store. That’s pretty neat. And
then the company that was responsible for it
and the brand responsible for it, they have the
picture of it set up at Citi Field in Queens.
And so we sometimes – that’s actually on our
website, that photograph. And the case study
is you can – We got photos of the container coming
in to Kauffman Stadium area, and it’s literally
on a crane putting down, and we open it up, and
we’ve got to outfit the store. It’s absolutely
amazing what we can do. Volleyball is coming.
Most people don’t realize this, but the NCAA
Women’s DVolleyball Championship game will
be in Kansas City again. Oh, okay. Nebraska is
very big on volleyball, and so we had done a
project years ago for the University of Nebraska.
As a matter of fact, they have what we call a
volley wall, and we did a pseudo locker room
form. So when they have recruits come in, there’s
like a locker room form. Now they put their –
we want Smith here as a volleyball player. They
put their name up on this. So it’s a recruiting
tool for the University of Nebraska, but they
dominate in women’s volleyball. it’ll be really
good. And we’re looking to do additional work
because of the work we did in the past for that
activation. We did it at Power and Light. They
called us, they said, we have this concept and
we’re not good at origination of idea, but based
on our experience, we’re really good at expanding
that idea and saying this works or this doesn’t
work. We just did a project for the women’s soccer
championship game and they wanted to do an event
in the parking lot at at um cp at kc stadium
and we’re like no you don’t because it was a
dirt parking lot it’s not gonna it’s not gonna
be effective and they had this great concept
but we’re like that’s not gonna work yeah don’t
don’t I appreciate the voice of reason and experience
goes a long way in brand activations and trade
shows. There’s so much that you can learn if
you’re willing to have a conversation. Well,
I mean I’ll go the other way. I’m telling people
not to do something. We had a client who was
going to a trade show. We were speaking about
it earlier, going to SuperZoo coming up. And
they had all these requirements, long -term customer
of ours. They had a by space. And I looked
at all their requirements and said, you can’t
do that. And they had a firm budget. They had
a firm budget. And I’m like, oh, man, that budget
is going to be tough to meet. And I said to the
president of North America for this company,
I said, there’s only one way you can do this,
and that’s go up. You’ve got to do a double -decker
to make all this work. And she was like, what?
And she was like, snapping her fingers, she was,
I want that. Forget the budget. Forget everything.
Wow. And we’re executing on it and they’ve had
it for about four years now. And it’s all because
basically I upsold them a booth and they love
it. And they’ve gone through, they’ve gotten
a lot of investment and money, been very successful
in their brand. They’re in all the big box stores.
They’re on Chewy .com, but I think every dog
food is on Chewy .com. And so they’re being very
successful. And so now they want to expand that
booth. So we’re like, okay. That’s not a triple.
No, no, no, no, no. You’re expanding. Yeah. Well,
I don’t think you can do that. I don’t know that
I feel good about it. Yeah. That’d be really
cool. I’ll bring it up. I may go ahead and throw
us into the lightning round if you’re ready for
that. You know what? My time is your time. All
right. Well, let’s go. Let’s find out. Let’s
find out where we go from here. And I’m going
to start. We’ll start controversially, if that’s
all right. Fire away. And I’m looking at your
LinkedIn, the people you follow for advice and
inspiration. And Tom Brady is on there. And,
hey, I’m not going to be one to deny seven Super
Bowl rings. Sure, there’s some talent there,
but he’s a bit of a divisive character if you’re
in Kansas City. Do you want to just say why Tom
Brady, the why of Tom Brady? Well, strange things
happen. You never know what life is going to
happen. I grew up in a small state called Rhode
Island. Most people don’t even know where it
is. It’s really great. And I grew up being a
Red Sox fan. I grew up being a Patriots fan when
Steve Grogan. was the quarterback. Now, Rogan’s
a K -Stater. I didn’t know that. I didn’t know
where Kansas was when I was growing up. The Kansans
feel the same way about Rhode Island. Yeah, exactly.
I know that. They know where Quahog is located,
but that’s for family guy. That’s family guy.
And they know Taylor Swift has a mansion there.
That’s about it. So basically, I just think his
work ethic, because him coming out of high school
and coming out of Michigan, he wasn’t. He wasn’t
Tom Brady coming out of Michigan. He wasn’t the
Tom Brady we all know and love or hate. And he
got the opportunity, and he practiced, and he
was ready for that opportunity. Now, he could
have just – I’m back up to Drew Bledsoe. Bledsoe’s
a legend. He’s a John Elway, Dan Marino -style
quarterback. He’s going to be there forever.
I can just – go have all the lobster out of Maine
I want and get fat and stupid. And he worked
his butt off. So when the time came, he took
them to the Super Bowl. And matter of fact, when
they won their first Super Bowl, I went and got
a customized jersey. You know, Patriots and my
favorite number is And I was like, what am
I going to put on the back? Should I get Brady?
No, because how long is this guy going to last?
He may be a flash in the pan. So I literally
got my name on the jersey. But his work ethic
and doing what he’s done. And I remember I think
Shannon Sharp was talking. He was at a party
in March. And Shannon Sharp, tight end, Baltimore
legend. He said he was at a party in March and
he was with Tom Brady and Tom Brady was there
and they’re like, hey, you want to do this? He
goes, no, I’m in training. And Sharp is like,
it’s March and this guy’s in training. That’s
why he has their suit. That is the work ethic.
That’s good enough reason for me. How does the
trade show know what time my flight is? Because
I know the closer my flight time is, the later
they will get my crates back to me. That is the
universe. That’s the universe. And that’s why
I always tell people, don’t set your own booth
up and don’t break down your booth. Because if
the show is over at you can be gone at or
and let the team, let our team take care of
it. And we will. And that means you’re not paying
for extra hotels, you’re not doing it, but you
can schedule your plane ride out of Vegas, Orlando,
Kentucky, Chicago, without any hesitation. But
trust me, if you’re trying to get out of there
quick, The laws of the universe will fight against
you on that one, no matter how you’ve stashed
your luggage underneath the table. You’re going
to wait for that crate. So speaking of flights,
in your past, you planned conventional and nuclear
missions for the F -Yes. Give us just a
brief of the background there. And my real question
is, is there something you learned from that
job that has helped you today? Details matter.
Details matter. That’s a good takeaway. This
was before GPS. I’m dating myself now. But in
Reagan bombed Libya. I was part of that raid.
It was very similar in profile to what the B
-s just did in Iran. Yeah, yeah. Long flight,
a lot of refuelings, bomb, and then come back.
Had to fly around French airspace, as I recall.
Yes, yes. And so we learned a lot in that. And
then Desert Shield, Desert Storm came along,
and we were planning those missions. to kick
Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. And because literally
in July of nobody knew where Kuwait was.
Nobody really cared. It’s a geography lesson
for Americans. Yes. And so it happened. And so
the attention to detail that you have to apply
in mission planning, because when that final,
when we draw it on a map, and this was before
GPS, so they had to follow the map and the headings
we gave them. If it was magnetic heading,
we had to make sure the line was at and the
information in the package form said from
what we call the initial point to bomb release.
And you couldn’t put You couldn’t have it
off. You had to have attention to detail. Same
thing because one of my favorite things I always
joke with clients about is, where’s Bob? And
they’re like, what do you mean? And I go, well,
you don’t want to be at the trade show and not
know where your marketing material is or who
has the table throw, the banner stand, who made
the reservations. And maybe it’s Bob and he’s
on the plane and he got delayed. So plan everything
out. And we try not to allow our clients to make
those simple mistakes. And we’ll give them as
much support as they want and some clients don’t
want it. A lot of clients do because it is an
investment, but details matter. Yeah, yeah. Probably
a long answer to your question. Oh, no, no. Hey,
spot on. Because it reminds me that one of the
secrets to success that I think we’ve learned
over time in all of our trade show kind of backgrounds
is everyone going. If you’re going and there
are logistics involved with any of this trade
show material, everybody has a packet that has
physical paper in it with all of the receipts
that you need and all of the, here’s where this
comes in and here’s when this gets delivered
and here’s when this happens and here’s breakdown
and here’s the contact for this. Here are all
of your receipts for the advanced warehouse.
Like everything is in a packet and you could
just look through your email, but. I’ve been
on a show floor before, and sometimes that cell
signal is just terrible. It is. And they don’t
set up Wi -Fi until the day of the show. That
you have to pay for. Yeah, and I’m going to need
a pair of scissors. Accessible, I’m going to
need. It’s just those details that just so matter.
Oh, no, and I agree with hard copies, especially
on the orders from the Freemans and the Ferns
of the world because the person at the service
desk, they’re trying to do their best job, but
sometimes they don’t have all the information.
If you can help provide that information, they
– appreciate it and you get better service. It’s
faster. It’s just so much better. Let me talk
about big wins. How do you celebrate a big win?
And that could be a family thing. It could be
a work thing. How do you celebrate that? I like
that question a lot because as adults, we don’t
get… participation trophies anymore. True,
true. We don’t, you know, we need to reward ourselves
for the wins. And so I do one of two things.
One is I buy myself something that I normally
wouldn’t. I used to go flying. I have a pilot’s
license. I have to get recertified. I haven’t
been flying since last year. But I would love
to go flying, spend money. So spend money. Spend
money is number one. Spend money is the short
answer. Reward yourself in some way. Reward myself.
I like dinners. I’ll take – my wife and I will
go out to dinner and we’ll do a – if nobody from
the office is listening, you can all shut off
at this time. We’ll go to a restaurant and have
wine and there’s some – we have our favorite
restaurants and we’ll go there and then we’ll
be – after a couple glasses of wine. We’re done
for the day because you’ve got to unplug. You’ve
got to enjoy it because, believe it or not, when
you have the losses, you’ve got to work at fixing
the problems, fixing the issues. So reward yourself
because, again, it’s important to – I think for
mental health, if you don’t reward yourself,
then why are you doing it? My wife likes to travel.
So do I. We’ll go on warm water, beaches. um
we just in april we’re at british virgin islands
for a week so it was It was a wrong time to take
a vacation. We were very busy. But if you don’t
take that vacation, you’ll burn out. You will
absolutely burn out, yes, %. It seems like
the people we talk to, the entrepreneurs, fall
into a couple different categories. They’re either,
no, it’s important that you celebrate, and here’s
how I do it, and it marks a time and a success,
and we can look to the next thing. And you don’t
burn out that way. And the other side are, oh.
I should really stop and celebrate the wins more.
I just keep going. And you can succeed both directions.
But it is nice to celebrate and take a moment.
At Exhibit Associates, when we hire someone new,
we tell them there’s life in this work. And if
you have kids, that fourth grade play is never
coming by again. True, true. Go to it. Do not.
Do not miss that fourth grade play because that’s
more important than whatever’s in your in -basket
or whatever like that. Now, we just finished
up a museum install in D .C., and we did it the
week before th of July. Well, our main project
manager on that, his family celebrates th of
July the Friday before th of July always. Well,
he was in D .C. that weekend, and he missed it.
And I was like, man, why didn’t you say something?
And he goes. He goes, you know, I’ve been with
Exhibit Associates since like This is the
first family thing I’ve missed. I’m good. Don’t
worry about it. But that’s like you shouldn’t
be here. Right, right. And we tell people that,
and we’re serious about it. One of our workers
today is not in today because he had an unexpected
death in the family. His cousin passed away unexpectedly.
And so, you know, he’s taking care of that and
his family. But no one expects him to be one.
No one would want anything different. Exactly.
And that’s a good culture. That’s a good culture.
Let me finish up with – we’ve had advice all
over the place, but I’ll have you put your entrepreneur
hat on. The best business advice that you’ve
ever received, that wisdom that kind of sticks
with you and says, yeah, I’m going to keep this.
Well, my wife always says cash is king. Because
as an entrepreneur, you’re in it for a lot of
different reasons, but your employees want that
paycheck. So if you don’t have cash to pay payroll,
that’s a problem. But the best advice I ever
had was it’s not about you. It is not about you.
And as soon as you think it’s about you, then
you’ll start losing. You really will. And just
remember, it’s not about you. And it’s about
what the team can provide. I like to say, and
I need to give my team the tools and the training
to be successful, and then I need to get out
of their way. We have a show services manager
who’s incredible, and I don’t know what she does
half the day or three -quarters of the day. And
you know what? I don’t need to know. I just know
that when I need that hard copy, it’s ready for
me. It’s there. It’s there. I know when there’s
a problem with a hanging sign in Dallas. She’s
on. I know when the phone rings on a Sunday morning,
she’s answering it. Does she take Friday afternoons
off or does she take Thursday afternoon because
of kids’ stuff? Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, please
do. By all means. Please do. Let me keep you
happy. But on Sunday morning, she’s answering
her phone, which is what I’m in trade show business.
Sundays are important. You mentioned something
about the flight. That’s a trade show truth.
And the HDMI cord is never long enough. That’s
another one. That’s true. And something’s important.
Everything is important to someone, and you’ve
got to remember that. And then the other thing
is the weekend means you have two more days to
set up before Monday. That’s it. I can talk about
this for the next three hours. Solid business
advice. I’ll take you out of the lightning round.
Okay, that was easy. There was nothing to it.
No, you shouldn’t be afraid of the lightning
round. But let me just circle back just a little
bit. It’s not about you. If you’re going to start
a business and you’re serious about it, write
down the plan, do the business plan, make sure
you figure things out, and on that business plan,
put it in writing. And remember, it’s not about
you. Pretty soon something’s going to happen
that’s out of your control. I will go to the
COVID lockdowns. Trade show business, it was
devastating. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. months
between projects. Everything shut down. It was
absolutely incredible. How do you plan for that?
You can’t. But you’ve got to have the team in
place. You’ve got to be. You’ve got to have a
team that trusts you and you trust them, and
we did. But it also was – that was brutal. Yeah,
how do we pivot from that? We tried pivoting.
We’re not a great pivoter. We do trade show booths.
We design, build trade show booths, corporate
displays, and museum exhibits, and we do marketing
locally in town, experiential marketing. Yeah,
we didn’t do plastic shields. Yeah, your Hy -Vee.
We didn’t do the plastic shields at your bank.
We tried. No, it wasn’t us. We couldn’t do it.
We know where our lane is and we try and stay
in it. That can be the secret to success if you
know what you can do. All right. Yeah, I agree.
Well, I’ll take you out of the lightning round
then. Tell people where they can find you if
they want to know more. How do they find you
or the company? Well, the neat thing about Exhibit
Associates is we’re everywhere online. ExhibitAssociates
.com is our website. It’s real easy to remember.
ExhibitAssociates .com. We’re on TikTok. We’re
on LinkedIn. We’re posting constantly on LinkedIn.
X, we’re all over X, and we’ve developed some
great relationships through social media. We
mentioned before, I think we were talking earlier
about promotional products. We do not do promotional
products well. I have someone out of Atlanta
that I refer people to. Arm’s length, go talk
to Hildy. Hildy is amazing. But social media,
we’re all over it. Just Google Exhibit Associates
and you’ll find us. If you do trade show booth
Kansas City, we should be first in the organics.
Probably up there too. Good, good, good. All
right. Don Jalbert, partner at Exhibit Associates.
Thanks for being with us today. Thanks, Jeff.
Really appreciate being here. Thank you. And
that is our show. Thanks so much to our friend
Don Jalbert. Great conversation. And thank you
for listening to the Small Business Miracles
podcast. Remember to subscribe. Drop us a line
on the website at eagadv .com if you have any
thoughts. Until then, we’ll be out here helping
entrepreneurs with another small business miracle.