Well said. Anybody who, like me, ran a company that had booths at conferences, needs to take a realistic view.
When you buy a booth (or rent it.... but buying one is more presentable), you have to keep it yearly fresh. Costs money.
You have to generate printed and software materials & advertising doo-hickies & thingamabobs...... costs money.
You have to staff up with attractive people to smile and draw people into your booth environment.... costs money.
And most important, you need to staff up to make repeated follow-up sales calls and sales pitchs to those who showed interest.
Now, this makes it logical that this little company would NOT go to a San Francisco show. The idea that they are doing it in their geographical area is EXCELLENT manegerial business common sense. You don't even need to be as smart as the average village idiot to realize that it would be all but impossible to follow up on a big portion of the leads you might get out of a San Fran show when you are a small outfit in Western New York.
And they are SPEAKERS, primarily. Perfect way to do it.
This reduces the need for the several expense items I list above.
JBII is doing this right.
Keep it local. Keep it regional. And choose to present as a forum / speaker session company rather than a booth company.... this time.
Maybe next year they can grow into the booth world, but as an experienced hand in trade shows, I look at what JBII is doing as evidence of excellent management decision making.
JMHO
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