August 2013 – SHOT Show Blog

Who’s Who in SHOT Show Management: Meet ConvExx’s Kate Peterson

The firearms, exhibition and event industries, as well as the Las Vegas business community, have all responded positively to the announcement of NSSF selecting Las Vegas-based ConvExx as our new SHOT Show management company.

The news continues to be met with encouragement and congratulations from SHOT Show exhibitors and attendees alike.

For the next installment of the series of “who’s who” blog posts to familiarize you with the ConvExx team, we introduce you to Kate Peterson, who is the Director of Sales and Customer Service at ConvExx.

Name: Kate Peterson

Position/Title at ConvExx: Director of Sales and Customer Service

Family Members: husband, Larry; Son, Luke; Step-son, Jonathan; Step-daughter, Brittany

Education: Widener University, Chester, PA; Bachelor of Science in Hotel and Restaurant Management

Work history: Headquarters Plaza Hotel, Morristown, NJ – Assistant Front Office Manager, Reservations Manager, 1993-1996 ; Radisson Hotel at Cross Keys, Baltimore, MD – Revenue Manager, 1996-1998; DNA Computing, Baltimore, MD – Technical Writer, 1998-1999 Visit Baltimore, Baltimore, MD – Senior Housing Manager, 1999-2004; ConvExx, Las Vegas, NV – Director of Sales and Customer Service

Hobbies/Sports: Snow skiing

Favorite book: Any David Baldacci novel

Favorite movies: Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

Hometown (where were you born): Tokyo, Japan, but grew up in Sayreville, NJ

In Las Vegas since: 2004

Favorite Thing about Vegas: Friends always want to come visit.

Favorite Quote: Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it. — Ferris Bueller

What are you most excited about for SHOT: For me personally, getting to know the industry, in depth. For the SHOT Show, I am looking forward to helping make a great show even better!

Chris Dolnack is senior vice president and chief marketing officer for the National Shooting Sports Foundation. Follow him on Twitter at @ChrisDolnack.

SHOT Show Registration to Open in September

It’s almost that time.

Attendee registration for the 2014 SHOT Show will open in September, and, after that, the show will be right around the corner.

We apologize to those that are ready to apply now. We originally posted on the website that registration would open in August, but we’re still working out a few kinks, so we’ve moved our target to after Labor Day.

The last three months have gone incredibly smooth, between the show management transition and implementation of newly revised attendee qualifications. We want to make certain that everything is in order to ensure the best user experience possible when we open the floodgates.

If you’d like to receive an email when registration opens, simply click on the yellow “APPLY” button on the SHOT Show website and follow the prompts. It will take about a minute to complete. We’re sorry for any inconvenience this delay may cause. Thanks for your understanding and patience.

Chris Dolnack is senior vice president and chief marketing officer for the National Shooting Sports Foundation. Follow him on Twitter at @ChrisDolnack.

Why Individual Employees’ Email Addresses Are Required When Registering for the SHOT Show

Over the last several shows, we began requiring individual unique email addresses for attendees and exhibiting personnel and for the most part our 62,000 attendees and exhibitors were understanding and cooperative. There are a number of reasons we implemented this requirement:

Using a unique email address will allow each SHOT Show badge holder to utilize and customize the online show planner and the show’s mobile app. A full 54 percent of 2013 SHOT Show attendees downloaded and used the SHOT Mobile app sponsored by Armalite. A unique email address is required in order to activate the app.
All attendees will be able to receive timely SHOT Show information and communications. You’d be surprised at how often critical information is not passed along to key booth staff. This ensures that everyone gets the word.
Finally, the use of unique email addresses will help us in identifying non-qualified attendees. It’s not uncommon for manufacturer’s reps to use a personal email address. We get that. But it also stands to reason that the majority of retailer and exhibitor staff should utilize a company email address. Hence, we can more easily identify those that are bringing non-qualified attendees into the show.

All attendees and exhibitors alike will be required to provide unique email addresses. With your help, we can ensure that all exhibitors and attendees receive all the information they need, are able to utilize the show planner to its fullest and also help us in our continued efforts to ensure the SHOT Show remains a trade-only event with qualified attendees and exhibiting personnel.

SHOT Show is a Place for Business. Help us keep it that way.

One of the more consistent complaints that we receive about the SHOT Show over the years pertains to unqualified attendees, that is, people not engaged in the shooting, hunting or outdoor trade and who lack purchasing authority or the ability to influence purchasing. It has been suggested that better screening SHOT Show® attendees would result in a better show experience for attendees and exhibitors alike, and we have invested considerable time and money into screening out unqualified attendees. However, the biggest opportunity to screening out non-buyers who are not engaged in the industry (consumers) lies with the exhibitors and attendees themselves.

How can that be? Even if you count every manufacturers’ rep and company staffer working the booth, that still leaves a lot of room for non-buyers — who have a place at an industry trade show and conference — ranging from lawyers to engineers to investors to suppliers. That also leaves a lot of room for fraternity brothers, college roommates, cousins, former neighbors and, well, you get the picture.

And on the attendee side, there are retailers who bring some of their most loyal customers as a reward or perquisite of sorts. Some retailers bring customers who have a specialized knowledge to lend a hand in sorting out newer or lesser known products. And some still bring their extended family to make the week of SHOT Show a working vacation.

We have reinstituted the limit of four exhibitor credentials for every 100 square feet of exhibit space. We have also challenged requests for large numbers of exhibitor credentials. So with this blog post I’m once again asking for the industry’s help in cleaning up our collective act. We need those of you who bring non-qualified persons to SHOT Show under the guise of being exhibit staff or part of your retail store’s sales or purchasing staff to take a hard look at the qualifications of those you bring to the 2014 SHOT Show and join us in being part of the solution to the non-qualified attendee issue rather than part of the problem.

NSSF and PGA Tour Partner for Charity Golf Event at the 2014 SHOT Show

NSSF will once again be hosting a charity golf event at the 2014 SHOT Show® in partnership with PGA Tour® for Birdies for the Brave® on Jan. 11-12 at TPC Summerlin in Las Vegas. Birdies for the Brave is a national military outreach initiative founded by PGA Tour pro Phil Mickelson and his wife Amy and proudly supported by the PGA Tour. It’s a great opportunity for our industry to provide even more support for those who have sacrificed so much for our country.

Proceeds from the Birdies for the Brave event will benefit eight military home-front groups.

Last year’s second annual event raised $100,000 for the charities supported by Birdies for the Brave, and our goal for 2014 is to net $125,000. It’s a great opportunity for our industry to provide even more support for those who have sacrificed so much for our country.

Attached is the Sponsorship/Registration Package. Please take a moment to review the Sponsorship/Registration Package and consider being a part of this fund raising effort. If you would prefer to make your payment by credit card, please complete the credit card authorization form.

To learn more about how your company can participate or to donate an item or items to our silent auction, please contact:

Nicole Tassone
Chair / Registration
2014 Birdies for the Brave Charity Golf Event Hosted by the SHOT Show
Sponsored by the NSSF
January 11-12, 2014 at TPC Summerlin, Las Vegas, NV
P: 702.256.2000 x229
F: 702.256.2505
nicoletassone@pgatourtpc.com

Who’s Who in SHOT Show Management: Meet ConvExx’s Susan Schwartz

The announcement of NSSF selecting Las Vegas-based ConvExx as our new SHOT Show management company has reverberated throughout the firearms, exhibition and event industries as well as in the Las Vegas business community.

The news continues to be met with no small number of words of encouragement and congratulations from SHOT Show exhibitors and attendees alike.

For the next installment in the series of “who’s who” blog posts, here is more about Susan Schwartz, who is the Managing Director at ConvExx.

Name: Susan L Schwartz, CEM

Position/Title at ConvExx: Managing Director

Family Members: Husband Chuck, Stepchildren: Harry, Dani, Pam, Sunny, Mindi, Mark, Jeff, Grandchildren Savanna, Race and Jacob. And of course, Lucky!

Education: Bachelor Degree at UCLA in 1979

Work history: Executive Director, Tifereth Israel, 1979 – 1984; Epic Enterprises 1984-1996 — Vice President; Housing on Line-Sales Director 1996- 2001; ConvExx – Managing Director 2001-current

Hobbies/Sports: Reading, volunteer work

Favorite book: Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen

Favorite movies: The American President, Shawshank Redemption, My Big Fat Greek Wedding

Hometown (where were you born): San Francisco, CA

In Las Vegas since: 1996

Favorite Thing about Vegas: People watching is great – it’s also amazing how away from the strip people have ordinary lives and the rest of the world doesn’t see it

Favorite Quote: Two – Underpromise and overdeliver; Windows close, Doors open

What are you most excited about for SHOT: Meeting people who are passionate about their jobs. I love it when people have their avocation as their vocation.

Chris Dolnack is senior vice president and chief marketing officer for the National Shooting Sports Foundation. Follow him on Twitter at @ChrisDolnack.

Freeman Named Official Services Contractor for SHOT Show

NSSF has awarded Freeman a five-year contract to serve as the official exposition services contractor for the SHOT Show®, beginning with the 2014 show.

In this period of transition, our goal is to maintain continuity for our customers to help make their SHOT Show experience the best it can possibly be. Our new agreement with Freeman provides that continuity and continues to deliver best-in-class services to our exhibitors.

Freeman is the leading global partner for integrated marketing solutions for live engagements. It produces more than 4,300 expositions annually, including 135 of the 250 largest U.S. trade shows, and 11,000 other events worldwide.

Said Freeman President John O’Connell, “Freeman is most appreciative of continuing its longstanding partnership with NSSF. It is a privilege to be associated with the production of SHOT, clearly one of the iconic events in America if not the world.”

Who’s Who: Meet ConvExx’s Jeff Pressman

The news was met with no small number of words of encouragement and congratulations from SHOT Show exhibitors and attendees alike.

As part of a series of “who’s who” blog posts to introduce you to the ConvExx team, here is more about Jeff Pressman who will be the Show Manager for SHOT Show.

Name: Jeff Pressman, CEM

Position/Title at ConvExx: President/CEO as well as the Show Manager for the SHOT Show

Family Members: Wife: Jill and two daughters, Amanda (5 years old) and Rachel (3 years old)

Education: B.A. from Rutgers College, New Brunswick, NJ and J.D. from Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, CA

Work history: Began my career during law school working for Management Plus Enterprises, a boutique sports management firm that represented Shaquille O’Neal and other high-profile athletes. Then went to work for Premier Sports Management, a sports agency that primarily represented NFL players such as John Randle and Willie McGinest, and coaches such as Pete Carroll. Joined ConvExx and the tradeshow world in 2006.

Hobbies/Sports: It was golf until I had a family; now my free time is spent with my wife and kids (not that I’m complaining)

Favorite movies: When trying to be sophisticated, Citizen Kane. Favorite movie I can watch over and over though is Hunt For Red October

Hometown (where were you born): Los Angeles, CA

In Las Vegas since: 2002

Favorite Thing about Vegas: While Vegas has everything one could hope for in terms of entertainment, it truly is a small town where you tend to know everyone.

What are you most excited about for SHOT: Working with an industry that is truly passionate about what they do and excited about coming to work each and every day. I consistently hear that the people I will be encountering are the nicest people, and so far I have found that to be true.

Chris Dolnack is senior vice president and chief marketing officer for the National Shooting Sports Foundation. Follow him on Twitter at @ChrisDolnack.