mike_s
Contributor
So if a internet connection for a computer cost $1200 (per computer)....
what did a booth cost? (for what size booth)?
what did a booth cost? (for what size booth)?
DEMA - What the hell?!
- Thread starter DiveBandit
- Start date
Please register or login
Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.
Benefits of registering include
- Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
- A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
- You can make this box go away
Well said.
I would add that a lot of our time there is spent in classes and seminars learning about new products and new programs, standards and practices within both our agencies and our suppliers, so we can effectively sell them to the consumer with facts and not BS. It's very different than a consumer show; as Tommy says, the "deals" consumers expect to find at a consumer show aren't at DEMA, so if you're a consumer, don't feel like you've missed 'em
They'll be at the consumer shows around the country.Rick
The Chairman
Chairman of the Board
SteveC
Contributor
I don’t think the consumer is expecting to buy merchandise at Dema, we just want to check out all the new stuff, and then go home a buy from our LDS.
This subject gets tossed around every year. One dive professional stated that the reason they don’t want the divers there is because they talk about wholesale prices. Couldn’t the consumer wear a badge that identified him as a consumer? Then manufactures would know who to talk numbers with. Actually, we would rather see the show with out being stopped at each booth. We aren’t trying to step on anyone’s toes, we just want to be informed consumers, and we simply enjoy learning about new dive stuff.
This subject gets tossed around every year. One dive professional stated that the reason they don’t want the divers there is because they talk about wholesale prices. Couldn’t the consumer wear a badge that identified him as a consumer? Then manufactures would know who to talk numbers with. Actually, we would rather see the show with out being stopped at each booth. We aren’t trying to step on anyone’s toes, we just want to be informed consumers, and we simply enjoy learning about new dive stuff.
Not at all. In the games industry the big consumer show was GenCon. I've never been to it as the cost vs reward just wasn't there for me. There's no point going to a show like GenCon to try and talk to your suppliers/manufacturers. Mostly they all send lower level staff to those shows and actually set up real games for consumer participation - the bosses might cruise by occasionally to see how it's going. It's a completely different vision on the aim of the show. It's really good for the consumers, and possibly some of the US shops as the consumers there are also their actual customers - but for me, seeing how US consumers are reacting to new product doesn't teach me much about how the Dutch market will behave - which was where I was based.
Funnily enough I saw an example of roughly that in Japan a couple of weeks ago!
Delegates from all over Kyushu that had to do with Kindergarten education, including the Provincial Education Board all came to Kotake Kindergarten for the day. The kids came for 75 minutes in the morning between 10 and 11.15 then went home. The whole day after was then a series of presentations, lectures, analysis, and "best practice". Not a kid in sight!
You wouldn't need a consumer badge. If you don't happen to have a "buyers" badge most won't talk with you at all. There are some exceptions like Zeagle, GMC, DUI, (Atomic last year) who seemed to actually enjoy talking with us lower-than-life independent instructors
I'm not sure there is that much "new" stuff each year, but its about the only place you can do stare-and-compares of most products. I attend for the additional training that's available. And if you take the training at DEMA it's one location and your not traveling all over the US trying to get into these classes.
DEMA is their own enemy here. If they didn't advertise in the consumer forums and magazines - divers wouldn't feel as left out as they do now.
-s
It's more a matter of numbers. It's costing those who display some big money just to get to the show, stay at the city of the show, rent booth space, set up the booth, and possibly pay employees. They've essentially got 28 hours spread out over 4 days to write up as much business as possible in that time.
The representatives in the booth are likely going to spend a good 10-20 minutes or more (oftentimes more) with each serious buyer going through product and maybe writing orders. Just for fun let's say it all averages out to 15 minutes per serious buyer, that means they're maybe doing serious business with maybe 100 accounts over the course of the show for each person they have manning the booth.
I don't know what the actual numbers are, but let's say maybe 3000-4000 dive businesses have somewhere between 1 and 4 personnel attending representing their businesses, as a booth operator you want to spend as much time as possible with as many of the decision makers of those buisnesses as possible to service existing clients and gain new ones....
Now add the consumers.... If thousands of consumers show up it's going to make it more difficult to service your existing clients and pick up new ones. There's several things to consider:
1)Frankly, it gets crowded in there sometimes, you've only got 8'-10' of aisle space at these shows, and there may be 2-5 thousand dive industry people in the hall at any given time, adding thousands of window shoppers will only make it worse.
2)For every consumer that just wants to walk the floor and look at stuff, there will be another making inquiries taking up a reps time.
3)Bottom line is money... What's gonna make you more, talking with 3000-4000 consumers and maybe talking 3 or 4 hundred into buying your product once in the next year.... or landing 20 new accounts that can each move 50-80 units or more of your product every year, another 30 or 40 that can move 10-20 units a year, another several dozen that will at least make a minimum order of a couple grand, and talking existing clients into upping their orders?
A manufacturers rep or marketing rep can only reach so many consumers directly, their goal at this show is to essentially make the LDS an extension of their business and they need to spend the time with them to help them be able to present their product to end users. There's just not enough time in the show to do much more.
bvmjethead
Contributor
Way off on that. It's not a secret. Markup is typically 70-110% on big items, sometimes less, probably 150-300% on small stuff. This is typical with lots of retail stuff, clothing and gift items are often higher yet.
Similar threads
