Are Booth Babes Going Away? (Video)

Michael Steinhart, Editor in Chief of The Enterprise Cloud Site, went to this year's New York Cloud Expo, and saw only one booth with beguiling, scantily-dressed females trying to attract people to their employers' display. But Michael says one booth with babes was one more than last year, when the same show had no booth babes at all. So we wondered: Are booth babes going away? And if they are, is it because of political consciousness or tight budgets? Since Michael has put more time than we have into thinking about these questions, we fired up our webcam and had a little conversation with him about the future of booth babes at IT conferences and trade shows.

Comments

Babes may not be what's wanted...

[cianduffy]

Based on the IT industry here (Ireland) at least, there's been a huge increase in the number of gay men in IT, or out gay men at least. Not much use in having a booth babe if the guy buying the product doesn't like boobs.

Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, the only people who really give two craps about booth babes are a) hypersensitive gender warriors and b) tech writers on a slow news day.

Re:Who cares?

[i kan reed]

Next thing you know, you won't be able to get all the good seats in the front of the bus without the negroes getting all uppity about it. Check your privilege.

Does this phrase ever work? All it ever seems to do is turn a debate personal.

I'm confused.

[BenFenner]

This year the expo had more booth babes than last year, which raises the question "Are Booth Babes going away?".

Say what now?

really, does anyone care?

[MetalliQaZ]

They will probably be a fixture at car shows for all time, and in Korean gadget reveals, but they seem so out of place at a software conference.

Re:really, does anyone care?

[roc97007]

Not sure I agree. There's always room for booth babes.

...ok did I say that out loud? Anyway, the market will decide. If booths with a couple of local models on deck do better business than booths without, they'd be crazy not to do it. On the other hand, if booth babes are neutral or a liability, they'll (eventually) disappear.

The last trade show I worked, (which was some time ago) the large company with whom I was employed at the time hired two local talent (show was in las vegas) to accompany us during the show. They didn't dress overly provocatively (safari getup, in keeping with the booth theme, no excessive cleavage or leg showing) and they did a good job managing the crowd, making sure we weren't overwhelmed, and taking prospective customer information. Don't get me wrong, they were drop dead gorgeous, but they also knew what they were doing and helped out a lot. "Booth Babe" is a somewhat disparaging term for what can be a difficult job. It's not all about standing in the aisle and doing the "vanna wave" towards the booth.

During a rare slow moment I got to talk to one of the girls, and asked her if she was an employee of our company. (There being a group in the company tasked with handling logistics for these shows, and I at first thought she might be with that group.) She looked shocked, and said no, she was from a local agency, and makes most of her living working booths at trade shows. (Which explains why she was good at it.)

Not really sexist, just good psychology

[dgatwood]

Even women are more likely to want to talk to a well-dressed, attractive woman than the pushy marketdroid or worse, the obese engineer wearing a t-shirt and ripped jeans who smells like he hasn't bathed in a week. It's not just about appearance; it's also about appearance. Know what I mean?

I resent them

[Bruce Perens]

I resent that some business is attempting to grab me by the balls rather than by my rational self.

No. They just dress more conservatively.

[HockeyPuck]

I was at a recent tech conference and the booth babes were not the ones from Comdex of yesteryear in bikinis. They were hired women who were very attractive but were wearing acceptable clothing. Mostly business casual, slacks and a button down blouse.

IT folks they were not, pretty faces yes. As someone has to scan your badge or hand out a trinket.

Re:No. They just dress more conservatively.

[MozeeToby]

Here's the question. If you meet one of these women in the elevator and happen to remember which booth she was working, would you feel confident that you could ask her a question about that company/product and get an informative answer? If yes, they're not booth babes, they're marketing people who happen to be attractive (which certainly helps their career, don't get me wrong). The problem isn't attractive women manning the booths, the problem is when the women are there solely to be attractive (in a very literal sense).

Marketing

[Karmashock]

Booth babes are pretty.

Pretty is attractive.

Attractive is good marketing.

Its not just about sex. Its about hiring some attractive people to represent your company. Because your engineers are probably unshaved smelly cave dwellers that probably don't make a good impression at conventions. So how do you make your engineer or software developer seem credible? Put a 21 year old aspiring model next to him that smiles and makes eyes at everyone that gets near the booth.

Is it dumb? No more dumb then the people buying your products. Which isn't an insult against them... people are just like that. Get over it. We're not robots. We're semi intelligent social opportunistic primates. And even women like having attractive women around.

Open a women's magazine. What do you see? Is it lots of half naked men? Nope... half naked women.

As to getting the attention of gay men... All respect, but they're by definition a minority. Were they not the species itself would be in some trouble. So while it might make some sense to reach out to any demographic, the reality is that its probably a marginal issue at best.

All of that said, possibly there is something to be said for not having such aggressive marketing at conventions. Rather, put your unshaved cave dweller out there sans smiling boobs... and just see what happens.

It will either be fine or it won't. And we'll learn something either way.

Booth babes don't work well on straight geeks.

[Anonymous Coward]

Most geeks learned early on that babes aren't interested. The more attractive a female was, the more likely she was to snub any geeks that approached.

So, geeks associate hotness with unattainability (and, in some cases cruelty), and as such their feminine wiles don't have the same effect as they might on a grown-up football player.

Geeks respond better to fellow geeks with a common cultural background and a solid technical understanding of whatever is being advertised.

The market is simply adjusting to what actually works for this demographic.

Re:Booth babes don't work well on straight geeks.

[tnk1]

The thing is, booth babes aren't there for geeks, they're there for non-geek distributors who are salesmen that probably had a much better relationship with hot girls in school.

That point aside, I think you underestimate how male geeks can be, despite the possibly bad experiences they have had with attractive women. Put enough boobs in the room and even the bitterest of male, heterosexual geeks is going to notice a lot more than they might even let on.

Of course, the world is nothing like it used to be. Geeks used to be outcasts, and now attractive girls whose greatest technological achievement is working their Twitter account and watching Anime regularly call themselves "nerds". You can still be an outcast as a geek, but being a geek no longer makes you an outcast by definition.

Re:Booth babes don't work well on straight geeks.

[K. S. Kyosuke]

So, geeks associate hotness with unattainability

As a geek, I've always associated hotness (which is almost always partly synthetic) with misplaced priorities.

Re:Booth babes don't work well on straight geeks.

[Richard M Stalman]

I disagree. My sex life - such that it is - revolved entirely around females I meet at conferences and shows. I have certain expectations in that I can not actually have genital-on-genital sex, and instead require stimulation via mammary-genital contact, thus I require large breasted females.

Unprofessional

[Scutter]

I like looking at booth babes as much as the next guy, but c'mon. It's just unprofessional. And frankly, I don't want to talk to a hired salesmodel at an IT conference, either. I want to talk to a technical person who knows the freaking product and can answer detailed technical questions about it. If I wanted a brochure, I'd go to the website. It's a waste of my time and your money to have anyone in your booth that doesn't know the product inside and out.

Re:Unprofessional

[HornWumpus]

The marketing droids never know any more then the hotties. I fact, because the marketing droids lie and the booth babes just smile, the booth babes are better sources for true information.

Re:One less reason to go to Expos

[CAIMLAS]

Seriously. The better question is, "Are pointless, expensive marketing booth conventions which provide middle management a convenient excuse to get shitfaced and hook up out of town going away?"

Re:Who wants booth babes, I want Booth studs :3

[durrr]

I read an anecdotal story about a girl that used to be hired as a booth babe and got neat money from it. Used to, because the feminazis destroyed her job opporuntities.

What happened with womens rights really, It's a voluntary job after all and it apparently pays well?

Feminism!

[argStyopa]

Feminism: letting women be whatever they want to be...unless it contravenes our image of what they should be, then we require that they conform with our idea of what's "right".

I'm sure they're feeling empowered already!