Again this month, we’re excited to drop another exciting installment of “True Tales of the Trade Show.” This no holds barred series sets out to capture the the dynamic world of trade shows through the eyes of seasoned veterans who have witnessed it firsthand.
Our third episode continues with Duane Hayes, Echelon’s Uber-creative Integration, Quality & Graphics Lead, and 30-year trade show industry vet. You’re gonna love this one…
(Image above: there can only be one king of the trade show at NAMM.)
Interviewer: How long have you been in the trade show industry?
Duane Hayes: Since 1994.
Interviewer: How’d you get your start?
Duane Hayes: The old-fashioned way: pounding the pavement. While completing my architecture degree, I was exposed to the industry by a friend of the family who was doing this type of work in upstate New York. I readily connected with exhibits as hands-on, fast-paced, small-scale architecture. At the time I was interning for an architectural firm, and you’d find yourself chained to the same project for months, or often years. Sometimes you’d ask yourself, “What happened to the last year of my life?” So that was the appeal of the trade show industry: you’re able to witness the architecture come alive in very little time just on the other side of the building.
Interviewer: What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever had to do in this industry for a client or for a build?
“You never know what’s going to happen. Equipment breaks. Logistics can fall apart in the wake of national disasters or forest fires; we must be ready for anything.”
Duane Hayes: There’s not a singular, outlandish, crazy thing that comes to mind. It’s more a series of just being at the ready to respond to a sudden need. We work across so many disciplines with many partners. You never know what’s going to happen. Equipment breaks. Logistics can fall apart in the wake of national disasters or forest fires; we must be ready for anything. I used to set a show in San Francisco every January, where trucks leaving the Midwest must go through the Donner Pass. In winter, The Pass can hit blizzard conditions, mandating tire chains for all traffic. So, if your driver isn’t prepared, that can become a major issue that can delay your freight. You really need to be prepared for anything in this business. A lack of a few chains can make or break a project.
(Image above: come rain or snow, clear skies or gray, Duane delivers.)
Interviewer: What are some of the latest trends that you’re seeing in the design and the architecture of trade show exhibits?
Duane Hayes: In the late 90’s the penchant was wood veneers. You could almost answer the phone, “Hi, this is Echelon. What species of wood would you like to build with today?” We’ve seen the transition to plasma, to LED screens, and now LED tiles. Everybody had to have a 42-inch flat screen in their exhibit, which quickly grew to larger sizes and bezel-less HD monitor arrays. Now it seems to be a combination of lightweight aluminum framework with LED skins fitting into these skeletons, following curves and arches integrating form with the video expression. I anticipate a future trend that encourages texture and rich material to integrate with the video dynamic, breaking with the flat, harsh glare of backlit tiles.
Interviewer: What tips or tricks would offer a first-time event planner or marketing manager going through the process of designing and getting an exhibit fabricated for a show?
Duane Hayes: It comes down to the timeless maxim: know thyself. If you are embarking on a design project, you first have to know who you are and to be confident in that. There’s a book entitled, Start with Why, which is a great read. Start with that. Know who you are and start with why. Why are you doing this? What is your focus? Then have the freedom and the bravery to embrace the process and strive to zig when everybody else zags. If you want to differentiate you have to be bold. We’ve seen the trend that Apple’s marketing induced. For a decade it seemed everything was reduced to white, white, white everywhere. Public consensus was anyone could be a designer by simply stripping things down to the bare essential forms. The vacancy of color alone would induce product and messaging to jump off. Well, that works great until everybody is doing it.
I try not to have a predisposition in a project. When you come in, let’s keep that vision open until we discern what the intent is. From my experience, many people don’t know what they want until they see it. They lack the necessary language or skillsets to express what they want or envision what they want, but they sure as heck know what they don’t want when they see it. Sometimes they provide vision boards of things that they like. These can be helpful. From there I can discern what some of their taste levels are and try to bring some coherency to them, if that makes sense. Hopefully…
Interviewer: Four years after the pandemic, trade show attendance is higher than ever. What challenges exist in this market today?
“Now is always the time for bold decision-making.”
Duane Hayes: People are eager to meet and they’re very eager to do business, but the biggest challenge across the board is lack of staffing and key decision makers. There are still a number of people that decide by consensus. Decision-by-committee can work, but when you’re trying to be bold and have a vision, consensus-making trends towards the vanilla-bland variety. I think this is a big challenge for marketing managers coming up through the ranks. For some of them, it’s their first rodeo and they don’t have the experience to forcefully manage upward and push their vision through to management or sales teams. Subsequently, we get put into very reactive situations where consensus can’t derive a bold enough tagline, which can hold up an entire project from fundamental branding and graphics, to even basics like coloration. We’re like, well… you don’t know what your brand is and you’re five weeks out from your show. It’s staggering sometimes some of the anxiety I’m seeing in the market post pandemic. A certain amount of that stress existed pre-pandemic, but on the backside people are understaffed and indecisive. Now is always the time for bold decision-making.
Interviewer: That actually leads into my next question. Given the hundreds of trade show and exhibit design companies across the country, what are some things that you’re doing at Echelon to stand out against the competition?
Duane Hayes: We’re holding to our ground and forging our lane. Once again this goes back to knowing who we are, and partnering with clients who have a vision and want to do something amazing and creative. During the pandemic, we had several of our long-term partners saying, we know we’re coming back to trade show exhibits even though we can’t yet, and nothing’s even on the docket yet. But here’s our budget. Here’s the timeline. Show us what you can do. Because we know when we come out on the other side, we want something fresh, we want something strong, we want something that’s us. We built some of our best work during that time because we could have the discourse, and the time and the energy to really focus some attention and build some cool stuff.
Interviewer: Where’s the most interesting place this job has taken you?
Duane Hayes: I did a job in Frankfurt, Germany. That was fun to do an international show for me because I don’t tend to travel with the company internationally. Equally, it was fun because you could immerse yourself into a non-English speaking crew and see the different styles that things are crafted and assembled in Europe, and be absorbed in that. That was an interesting experience.
(Image above: Duane’s smile amplifier goes to 11.)
“Once you’ve worked in the trade show industry, and you survive in the trade show industry, you get hooked like an adrenaline junkie.”
Interviewer: If you had one single word or a phrase to describe the trade show industry, what would it be?
Duane Hayes: Invigorating.
There’s an energy about the trade show industry and the pace that’s almost like a drug. Once you’ve worked in the trade show industry, and you survive in the trade show industry, you get hooked like an adrenaline junkie. This takes me back to where our interview began. You have weeks to accomplish sometimes that other industries might take months to build. And our deadlines are firm, PERIOD. The show will go on with or without you, so you learn to do what it takes to succeed.
I absolutely love it.
