Home Expo 2001

Date: May 5 & 6

Time: 10AM-4PM

The DeKalb County Building and Development Association's Home Expo 2001 was a successful step forward.  Participation, attendance, concession sales and cooperation were significantly higher than last year.

The show was held in a 40-foot by 120-foot tent that was placed on the parking lot at Stock Lumber in DeKalb.  Inside the tent were 34 booths, staffed by an excellent team of DCBDA members.

Some team-members deserve some extra praise for their contributions.  Randy Hawkins (Stock Lumber) went out of his way to make sure everything ran as smoothly as possible.  Ken George (Mascal Electric) provided us with electric and worked through some minor power-supply problems.  Donna Westergren (Fox Title) ran an excellent concession stand and, with short notice, provided an extra tent for the show.  Ivan Krpan and son, Brock, with Dave Conlin (Castle Bank) provided me with some much needed rest, helping to pull guard duty during off hours.  Jerome Plant (Pro-Sat) made staying overnight at the tent a little more enjoyable by leaving his remote control and 500 channels of TV to watch.  Ivan left me his cell phone and I figured out how to hook it up to the pay-per-view module but I am sure he won't mind the bill. :-) And of course, Sal Bonanno (DeKalb Associates) made sure he came through on his promise that Home Expo 2001 would end up in the black. All exhibitors deserve praise for parking on the side lots allowing more convenient parking for our visitors.

There were some great ideas expressed during the show on how to make Home Expo 2002 even better.  Among those discussed were: Perhaps moving the show to a Friday evening and Saturday event.  Charging general admission to the show but giving each booth exhibitor 200 free tickets (coded) to give to their customers. The exhibitor who gets the most tickets redeemed would be refunded their booth fee.  Perhaps next year we will give away a $500-$1000 voucher redeemable at any booth.  It would also seem productive if we offered seminars and how-to exhibits.  That would be possible in a larger tent and we are working on that.

See you next year!

Mac McIntyre