Read on to discover our five top tips for maximising your event budget across an entire tradeshow calendar.
If you exhibit several times a year, it can be a real drain on your budget.
We see it all the time: businesses book multiple events with stands of all different shapes and sizes, but little thought goes into making these marketing efforts as cost-effective as possible.
But it doesn’t have to be like that. There are plenty of ways to attend lots of exhibitions and trade shows in a short period of time, without eating up your budget. All it takes is a little planning!
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1. Plan how your stand could look at each event
If you’ve booked multiple exhibitions for your brand or business, it’s a good idea to get a clear understanding of how each stand will look ahead of time. With good planning and a strong initial concept, it’s likely that parts (or all!) of your stand can be reused later down the line.
A good piece of advice at this point is to book similar size spaces if you can. Don’t book a 10x3m at one event and a 5x5m at another!
If you’re attending events where you have the same size floorspace, you can use the same stand over and over again. Or you can easily tweak the design to make it fit slightly different spaces throughout the year or longer, without having to start from scratch.
We work with businesses not just for a single show, but across their entire show calendar. When coming up with an initial concept, we make sure our customers understand how it could look across all of their upcoming events and work with them to identify ways to recycle elements.
“If your stand sizes are radically different, make sure your stand designer is involved in the plans from the start. The best trade show designers will know how to tackle the project and work with you to make sure the stand suits your audience for each show and stays on point with your branding. Doing one show at a time can end up costing more — there’s an economy of scale in planning every show for the year in one go.”
says Motive Exhibitions Managing Director, David Hennessy
2. Design your exhibition stand specifically to reuse
Businesses want to create bespoke stands, without breaking the bank. Of course they do!
Well the easy way to do that is to design your stand – or elements of it – with the intention of reusing or recycling elements from day one.
A great way to do this is to reuse all of the stand elements and framework (like the walls, signs, reception desks etc) but change the graphics and messaging.
We’ve had great success doing this for Andersen EV and Brew Tea where we’ve used the same framework but modified the graphics to suit the audience of each event or exhibition space.
You can also reuse the same panels, graphics and signs, but give each stand a different look by moving them around. We’ve used the same components, custom signs and graphics several times for Danfoss but managed to create a bespoke-looking stand every time.
The great thing about reusing and recycling elements isn’t just that you’ll make your budget stretch further; you’ll also be contributing to making the events industry more sustainable and eco-friendly!
“We’re seeing more brands wanting to understand the carbon footprint of their stand and getting involved in the Better Stands initiative. It looks at every element against set sustainability criteria. Our client, Cleveland Cable Company, uses it to report on their stand’s sustainability, and they’ve hit Gold for their last two builds.”
3. Design modular stands to maximise your budget
When people think of modular stands, they often think of ‘out of the box’ solutions that look low-end.
But modular stands are actually a great way to maximise your budget across the year.
The personalisation options are pretty much endless. Explore adding custom elements to your space to make it look bespoke and professional. “Our projects are often a mix of custom and modular elements” says Dave Hennessy.
We love working with clients to design a modular space to fit their needs and goals. All it takes is for us to know upfront that there is the intention to reuse the stand, so we can work out the best design to suit different spaces.
4. Prioritise your stand over your space, and maximise what you have
We see it time and time again. Businesses book the biggest floor space they can, and then realise they’ve blown their budget. They’re left with a massive space, but no money to spend on anything to fill it!
The key point here is that it’s not worth spending 90% of your budget on your space, and leaving yourself with hardly any options on what you can do with your stand. Even the scales out; budget for a smaller stand which looks great, rather than going big on floor space for the sake of it.
We can advise you on what budget you should allow for what you are trying to create, and make sure that you have an awesome-looking stand which is the perfect size.
After all, there’s nothing worse than having a big space, but nothing to fill it!
5. Look at how your budget will be spent across the year
Make sure you have a long-term view of your events and exhibition stands across the year, and understand where (and when) your money needs to be allocated.
Having a proactive approach to your event budgeting is key – it’ll allow you to identify where costs need to be reined in, or where you can be a little more lavish, throughout the year.
When working across a show calendar with multiple events, planning ahead is crucial. As well as helping you plan your visuals, we can also give you advice on the costs associated with your calendar – so there’s no nasty surprises along the way.
They keep raising the bar every time"
“Wow, what can I say!
I have arrived today and the stand looks incredible. The team at Motive have done a fantastic job as always - they keep raising the bar every time.”
Gareth, UK Marketing Communications Manager, Danfoss
Motive Exhibitions, 3 Orion Court, Ambuscade Road, Colmworth Business Park, Eaton Socon, St. Neots, PE19 8YX
