Every year, the EXHIBITOR Show gives industry professionals a chance to learn about new products, meet new contacts and share best practices. This year at EXHIBITOR2012, which was held March 4-8 at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, a few companies on the tradeshow floor stood out above the rest.
Global Experience Specialists (GES) won the EXHIBITOR Best of Show award for Best Large Booth. The 20-by-20 booth was built on the idea of changing perspective. It featured furniture attached to the ceiling, as well as inspirational quotes from world-renown innovators. The exhibit also featured an interactive wall where attendees could write their favorite inspirational quote or saying.
“This year is about changing perspectives,” said David Saef, executive vice president of strategy and marketing for GES. “One thing that we felt is that people have not seen the full scope of capabilities that we have. We could have gone about a more traditional approach to a booth, but it’s time to radically change and get people to stop in their tracks and see us in a different light.”
As for the Best of Show, Small Booth category, Elements took the award for one of its four exhibits this year. The “fire”-themed booth featured bright red and orange colors, with an animated fireball to catch attendee and judge’s attention.
Live Marketing was the winner for Best Booth Staff at EXHIBITOR2012. Judges said they felt welcomed in the booth, rather than pressured. The exhibit featured several podiums, at which Live Marketing staff was giving attendees brief, but intimate, seminars.
“We’re an engagement marketing company, and we are what we say,” said Elaine Cohen, president of Live Marketing. “We practice what we preach. It’s interesting to see that live marketing, which worked 35 years ago, is still working now.”
And although 60 companies exhibited for the first time at EXHIBITOR2012, The Rogers Company was chosen by the judges for Best New Exhibitor. Judges thought the company’s message was easy to understand and enjoyed the color and comfort the booth provided.
Among the winners of EXHIBITOR’s Buyer’s Choice Awards, which are selected from the New Product Showcase entries, were Lite Exhibit Systems, The Inside Track, Armodilo Display Solutions, Aluvision, Freeman and Apple Rock Displays.
But the EXHIBITOR Best of Show awards weren’t the only awards given out during the four-day tradeshow. The MOD Awards, which were held Tuesday, March 6, at the Hard Rock Café, honored the best in modular exhibit design.
The Best of Mod Award, as well as the Best Extrusion Award, went to MG Design for their VMware exhibit.
“Knowing VMware’s product sends information up to cloud servers, I immediately visualized the metaphor of sweeping fabric banners to symbolize information connecting throughout our world,” said Joe Massie, designer for MG Design Associates. “VMware’s color palette from the different divisions represented in the exhibit worked very well together and I used their triangular pattern branding to represent the data moving up to the banners.”
And this wasn’t MG Design’s first year winning Best of Mod. The exhibit design and event planning and management services company also won the award last year.
“To achieve flexibility and efficiency, you don’t have to sacrifice creativity and innovation, that’s illustrated by the many quality designs we saw entered in MOD 2012,” said Ben Olson, director of marketing. “Each year, the designs at the MOD A¬wards get more innovative and demonstrate the talent in our industry.”
The MOD Award for Best 10-by-10 exhibit went to Abex for their Nuvista booth, which featured a sleek, orange design that emphasized the company’s branding.
Purpose 1 Visual Marketing Group won the Best 10-by-20 MOD Award for their UniLife booth.
EEI Global took the MOD Award for Best 20-by-20, while Exhibit Concepts won the award for Best Fabric Booth.
And finally, Moose Exhibits won the MOD Award for Best Green Exhibit for their Ambush Firearms booth.
“While wanting take the top prize in other categories also, I can probably say the award we wanted to win the most was the one we took, Best Green Exhibit,” said Marc Mousseau, co-founder of Moose Exhibits. “This booth was as a-typical as they come and was a really fun build. The feather in our cap was having Ted Nugent show up at the show and decide to hang out with us because this was ‘my kinda booth!’”
The following companies were runners-up:
Best 10-by10: Xibita (Rogers)
Best 10-by-20: Moose Exhibits (Medshape Orthopedics)
Best 20-by-20: Moose Exhibits (Ambush Firearms)
Best Extrusion: Moose Exhibits (Daniel Defense)
Best Fabric: ACCESS TCA (ACCESS UNLEASHED)
Best Green: Trade Show Emporium (INI Cooperative)
