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Visitors flocked to the kitchen-themed stand to enjoy their Harveys with a slice over ice

Thousands of brands flock to exhibitions in an attempt to engage with consumers, but when your stand is just one among many, what qualities make you stand out from the crowd? Last week we spent five days with Harveys® (www.harveyshalfhour.co.uk) at The Ideal Home Show at Christmas and introduced over 31,000 consumers to Harveys over ice with a slice of orange. Hours spent chatting to visitors, listening to feedback and making trays of samples faster than they can swipe them, means we’ve gained enough insight into the world of sampling to bring you The Focus PR Guide To The Perfect Stand.

1. Size. They say size isn’t everything but when it comes to exhibitions, bigger can be better, although you need to know how to use it. Otherwise it can – literaly – be a huge waste of money and space. The Ideal Home Show Spring left us believing that given more space we could increase our sampling numbers, create more impact and get consumers to engage for longer. Therefore, for round two at the Christmas show, we re-negotiated an increase of over 30% in the size of our stands and expected an influx of consumers ready to take their Harveys Half Hour on the seating provided, either at our vintage garden stand or in our vintage kitchen…
2. Design. Now we come to the crux of the matter; despite waiting with bated breath to receive our visitors we found that, although people loved the product and were keen to take samples (7,000 per day on average!) from the edge of the stand, fewer people than envisaged wanted to actually take a seat in the garden. In comparison, the kitchen table hosted an ever-changing rotation of visitors taking a seat to chat, drink, relax and even breast feed! Despite their similarity in size, the kitchen stand was clearly the more popular choice and by day two we were itching for guests to  explore the garden stand further. So, we stripped it back; we took away some of the plants, creating more open space for people to wander through and drew them further into the stand: result! The tables were finally full with guests enjoying their Harveys over ice with a slice of orange in our vintage garden – phew!  But there was still a longer dwell time in the kitchen. So, when you have a good position, delicious product and a charming sampling team in equal measure, what makes one stand more inviting than the other?
3. Lighting. We realised it boiled down to lighting. Rigged above the kitchen was a rack of spotlights, arranged to focus on key points of the stand, bathing them in a warm glow. We concluded this made a strong impression on consumers, encouraging them to take the time to relax on the kitchen stand. The lesson we learnt: if dwell time is high on your list of priorities, invest in good lighting.
4. A great team. Finally, and it goes without saying, you need a great team on the ground. Exhibiting allows you to reach thousands of consumers but it is only through the hard work of our own team here at Focus PR and the professionalism and enthusiasm of the dedicated team from Wine Sorted, that we got consumers to engage with and believe in the brand.