Well the 2 big spring shows are officially a wrap! SURTEX last month and the Licensing Expo last week. The first thing I can tell you is it was HOT in Las Vegas – I was playing tourist on Tuesday – the first day it hit 100 degrees. Too hot for this artist but I survived. 🙂
Wednesday morning I was a part of the Brand Yourself For Success in Art Licensing panel, moderated by Paul Brent. Kate McRostie and Jay Burch – CEO of the Laurel Burch art line – also participated. It was really interesting to get a variety of perspectives on the topic of branding and the feedback was that artists in attendance learned a lot.
If you couldn’t be with us, don’t forget that Paul did a teleseminar by the same name is available as a replay and transcript. Learn all about it at www.ArtLicensingInfo.com/branding.html.
I had about 2 hours to walk the show – which obviously meant I only saw a fraction of it! There were 73 exhibitors in the Art & Design section. The word on the floor was that attendance was up and people were making good connections – which is fabulous! Two cab drivers told me they heard 20,000 people were expected for the show but that seemed really high to me – will be interesting to see what the final numbers were.
I walked the show 2 years ago and was pleasantly surprised by the change in booth design from the tv and film people. They were definitely more elaborate this year which to mean – is a sign that things are turning around. We have to assume that we are part of the turn.
I had an interesting talk with a friend who was telling me to “check your ROI on each show before you sign up for the next one”. (ROI being Return On Investment) I said these shows build on each other and it’s hard to make a decision on one year’s show before the next. Just last week I closed a nice deal with someone I met at SURTEX in 2010. This is a relationship business and it sounds like some good ones were started at the Licensing Expo.
If you exhibited, we’d love to hear your thoughts. If you blog about it – please let me know and I’ll share the link.
Wishing you much success!
– Tara Reed
I walked it for the first time and went on a tour for potential future exhibitors, and they said it was a record number of exhibitors and square footage this year. Hope that is a good sign! I don’t have other experiences to compare it to, but it sure seemed busy to me! Met lots of really nice people and had lots of fun. Sure hope it was a huge success for all the exhibitors!