My First Trade Show - Personal Trainer Community - Forum

[KPG]

Sunday I was an exhibitor at my first Trade Show. The show was strictly a wedding venue. I knew going into this show that many of the attendees would not be my target Clientele, but hoped that many of the Mother’s of the Brides might be. My target is the 40+ female. I also wanted to get a feel for the entire trade show environment so I could determine if I would want to exhibit at the really large wedding shows that occur in January.

Let me just give you a “visual” From the time I booked to attend and the actual show date was only 7 days. In that time my booth location moved twice and I ended up sandwiched between two bakeries. Needless to say there was a lot of people trying to look anywhere but in my directions as they passed between the bakery booths and ate from sample cups filled with cake and cake fillings. Their uneasiness must not have been to overwhelming, I watched a handful of ladies “resample” numerous times.

The average age of the Bride-to-Be was approximately 20-25. As I people watched, I was absolutely amazed at the number of young women who were out of shape and apparently not fazed by the fact that they were getting ready to be married and were 10, 15, 50 pounds overweight. The majority was sporting designer jeans, cute little form fitting tops and bulges from hell.

Another thing I noticed was a booth that had foundation garments (the garments that cover from bra to knee) had a lot of traffic. I guess it’s more acceptable to compress the fat than loose it. It certainly is easier, but you have to take that garment off eventually!!

On a better note, I did make a few contacts with other professionals (hair, skin and teeth) that were exhibiting and we are getting together to discuss structuring a referral program.

America’s reputation for being an overweight nation is not unearned and it didn’t take this show to convince me of that. I am located in California, but unfortunately not near the epicenters that have populations much more health and fitness conscious.

Just thought I’d share my experience.

KPG

[Christina]

When I was in college back in the early 90s I worked in a bridal shop part time. Looking back, we did not have a lot of overweight brides. Those girls dieted big time before their wedding day. They even used to buy dresses a couple of sizes too small so that they would be forced to lose weight.

Every bride has the right to feel beautiful on her wedding day -- don't get me wrong -- but it seems as a society we just keep catering to people who are overweight. It's amazing to me how socially acceptable being overweight has become.

I am located in California, but unfortunately not near the epicenters that have populations much more health and fitness conscious.

I grew up in West Virginia, one of the most obese states in our country. Last week my parents and I went to Colorado for a few days. My mom (who still lives in West Virginia) noticed immediately how thin everyone was there. It is amazing how fat (or thin) people are based on their geographic location.

By the way, I went to a trade show a while back for people in the health care industry. I was the only personal trainer there AND the employees were given a wellness incentive of a few hundred dollars to spend how they like. I had this awesome display, handed out brochures, gave away Cliff bars, informational handouts... all kinds of stuff. I went to the show thinking I would get more clients than I would know what to do with. Several of the people I talked to seemed extremely interested but in the end do you know how many contacted me? Zero.

[kaiserS]

Yeah, I did a few of these early in my career and had little success with them, although I had a friend who used to do them along with her gym at street fares and always signed up several big packages on the spot -

If you have the money to spend, I prefer an advertisement with a strong website backing it up - save the time, and let them do the talking for you!