Comdex Operators File for Bankruptcy

VileScum writes "According to this article in The Australian, Los Angeles-based Key3Media Group, the company operating the giant Comdex trade show, filed for protection from its creditors yesterday in the United States Bankruptcy Court. Does this mean I have to start buying cloths again instead of getting them at trade shows?" Also see a story in The New York Times. Concerns of bankruptcy were voiced last November.

Comments

Conventions are doomed anyway

[Mononoke]

Ever exhibit at a convention? Ever seen the bills you have to pay? The convention support firms (Freeman decorators, various unions, et al.) are killing the business.

Just a few of the typical expenses (daily rates):

• $20 to rent an $8 table.
• $25 for access to an electrical outlet. Don't plug anything in yourself, though, or some teamster will break your fingers.
• $200 for access to a fractional T1 (a very small fraction, most times).
• $10 to rent a $4 chair.
• Want carpet? That'll be $100. Want that carpet unrolled?...
• Bring your own equipment? Too bad, you've got to pay a fee to be allowed to use it.

You haven't dealt with monopolies until you've tried to exhibit at a convention. One company controls all access, labor, and equipment, and you've got no say over how any of it is handled.

A manufacturer's money is much better spent sending out press releases and designing an infomative web presence.

Another victim of the economy

[Vapor8]

As an IT professional for the past 10 years, I can tell you that my employer has stopped expensing people's trips to Comdex. There's just not enough ROI there to approve the expense anymore. And with companies losing money left and right, extraneous expenses like trips to Comdex are the first things they look at when they want to cut costs.
Once the economy rebounds, either Comdex, or another trade-show will rise from the ashes and become *the* place to be if you're an IT professional. Until then, corporations are more worried about bottom-line and stockholder expectations, than letting Joe IT go on a trip to Vegas...

Perspectives

[Deton8]

You know, it's all in how you look at it. Since Comdex was surrounded by clouds of doom, virtually none of my competitors exhibited and thus anyone looking for my type of product had little else to do but to visit my booth. We got a thousand leads during the week, and many of these have turned into sales (we make expensive enterprise stuff, so a handful of orders can pay for the show). Another interesting thing was that due to the shitty economy, it seemed like the only people walking the hall were people who worked for companies who actually needed to buy things. Nobody was sending people to Comdex just for the hell of it. So there were a lot fewer morons asking for shirts, pens, mouse pads, and, of course, nobody asked for a cloth. I do agree, though, with previous posters who rail against paying $25 to rent a $3.99 power strip, and other such atrocities. How someone can go bankrupt doing this is beyond me.