A Wider Net

We’re starting to get set up for Innovation Day which takes place next week. The exhibit areas (pretty much every open space in our 70,000 sq ft facility) are getting cleared out. The exhibits are starting to arrive. Custom video is being produced for about a dozen of the 60 demos. The registered attendee list looks great. Everything is looking good, yet I still may not sleep until it’s over. I have to speak at this one, and (confession) I haven’t even started on my presentation. I have to do that over the weekend but, as you probably know, sometimes it’s a lot easier to write away from the office. Like right now, for example (how did I ever live without a laptop and WiFi?)

There are going to be some surprises for next Wednesday. The Lightspace interactive dance floor is going to be even bigger and better than we thought. There are some incredible promotional items coming that are “high tech pharamceutical-themed tchotchkes.” My favorite is the “hypodermic syringe USB drive”. We have some “living tables” coming. And you know your event is growing up when you start talking about measurements of weight in “tons”, lengths in “miles”, and linen order costs in “are you freaking kidding me?”

Turning your own production facility into a mini trade show has it’s plusses and minuses. On the plus side, we know where the venue is. On the minus side, there seems to be a natural law that mandates that “the more open a space is, the more likely it is that that area has no power or data”. On the plus side, if we need something we know just where to get it. On the minus side, that thing we need is probably buried behind a million temporarly dislocated items cleared out of those aforementioned open spaces.

You start to hear amusing quotes like “when you cleared the table out of the conference room, did you happen to remove the internet connection to the room by accident?” and “no, I haven’t seen a 10′ long coffin-shaped crate. Why?”

Perhaps the best aspect of events like this, is that it puts us in the shoes of our customers who own events. We get to see what it’s like to produce an special event while still satisfying all of our customer’s needs. And we have to repel an endless barage of really-great-yet-impossible-to-execute-on-top-of-everything-else ideas. I will be able to identify the people who read this blog. They’re going to walk up to me and say “See? See what it’s like?” Please do, I look forward to meeting you.

For the folks who are not coming, I look forward to hearing from you here.