Trade Show Booths
The Art of the Pitch
The Trade Show Booth
The Starting Line of Your Trade Show Adventure
Choosing your trade show booth isn’t just about setting up a table and a few chairs. It’s about creating a captivating, immersive experience that leaves a lasting impression.
Trade show booths are the physical embodiment of your brand’s story, values, and offerings, all condensed into a compact, creative space. Your trade show booth is the platform where first impressions are made, relationships are forged, and business deals are initiated.
We will embark on an exciting journey through the landscape of trade show booths. We’ll explore the art and science of designing an effective booth, delve into the latest trends shaping the industry, and share tips on how to maximize your return on investment.
We’ll highlight some of the most innovative and successful booth designs from around the world, providing you with inspiration and practical ideas for your own booth.
Whether you’re a seasoned trade show veteran or a newcomer stepping onto the show floor for the first time, this article will help you understand and master the world of trade show booths.
Getting The Perfect Trade Show Booth
Engagement Engineering
When it comes to live events, trade shows, trade fairs, when I said booth design, it can also refers to tabletop design.
It could refer to a full booth, which is usually a 10 x 10 size. You could also do a half booth, which is about 5 by 10, depending on the event. You could do a traditional either 8 foot or 6 ft wide table. Depending on the size you go with, you get more or fewer options when it comes to design.
When you have more space, you can do more.
You’ll learn how important it is to create a booth design that’s going to draw people towards your trade show booth to look at your products. We learn in how to get into a trade show, we are applying to the event.
Events want to know what your booth or your table or your display is going to look like.
They want to create an atmosphere that feels professional and entertains the customers walking through. They don’t want their customers at their trade show to think, “Wow, this is so not put together well. Nobody looks like they had thought about anything. It looks sort of messy.”
They want people to come through and think, “Wow, I cannot wait to get in and look at all these products in these booths what an amazing event.”
How are you and I going to make your booth stand out among all the others in the event? Now some trade shows can be large and have hundreds of booths, and that’s even more pressure because you want not to get lost in the shuffle. And some events are going to be more like a couple hundred or sometimes you might even be as one of 20 or 30.
You want to stand out.
Even if you’re doing a small event, and it’s not like a huge event or a corporate trade show, maybe it’s the craft market, perhaps it’s the farmers market, give your best at every event no matter what as far as your display.
Customers need to see you are serious about your image and about the branding you’re trying to present to the customer—every customer.
It doesn’t matter whatever you do, whether it’s a big or a small event, think through how to make your brand represent at these events.
When somebody walks up to your booth, for example, when they walk up to Finch booth, when I’m at an event, it’s obvious Finch is here.
I make it all about my branding; I have my black and white; I have my logo, I have all my products stand out because they are unique in that they are black and white. I make a big fuss over my booth design — the reason why is because I want people to stop and come in.
Or if it’s a table, I want them to come up to my table.
The first thing I want to talk to you about in this process is to be approachable. The number one thing you want to do is make your trade show booth friendly and approachable. I’ve gone to a lot of events. The booths that are not getting traffic are those which make you feel like you’re not invited to the booth.
Maybe it’s just the attitude or the energy of the people. Maybe the booth feels closed off, so you feel like you can’t even like look into it. Maybe there are so many things blocking the view, people don’t want to come in.
I have a story about this. It was the national trade show. I talk about this event quite a bit because there are so many lessons I learned at this event. Now when I did this event, I set up my booth the same way I had set it up in Chicago. I was now in Indianapolis doing this event, and so I thought, “Okay, no big difference.”
I was going to set up the same way.
The booth was the same size. It was a 10-foot by 10-foot booth. I had a table and a clothing rack. I had cards and tee shirts I was selling at the time. I had all my products.
I had had success with this booth design before, so I thought, of course, it’s going to work this time.
However, when I set up my trade show booth, I made an error. I had all my products on a table at the back of my booth.
Try to imagine that.
People had to walk into the booth. On the left side, they had t-shirts on the right side, there were the cards, and at the back there were bins, and it had all of my products.
And that was the problem. About a couple hours into the show and it’s a two-day show, I noticed the sales were low for me. And I was like what is going on. And I remember looking to my left, and there was a jewelry company beside me.
And they had set up their booth entirely differently. They’re on a corner, first of all. By the way, corners cost a lot more. But they’re on a corner, so they had their booth set up as an l shape with two tables on the corner.
They had their products right up against the corner so people could walk by and look at their products. Their products were right on the booth’s edge; whereas, my products were in the back of my booth.
It was like people had to walk into my booth to see my products.
Finally, an old lady beside me who has she was much older than me, and she’d been doing this a long time. She looks at me, she says, you know what your problem is.
And I was like what?
She says, “You know what your problem is?”
I says to her, “Tell me.”
And I’ll never forget what the old lady said to me.
She said to me,
“Your booth sucks.”
And I’m like pardon? Like I was just in Indianapolis, and this booth killed it.
What do you mean this booth sucks?
She was like, “Nobody in Indianapolis is going to walk into your booth.”
And I’m like why not.
And she’s like, “Because Hoosiers don’t like to walk into booths.”
I know Hoosiers can be more conservative.
She talked about her experience at events. She was saying the events she does Chicago, she finds that the Chicagoans don’t always want to walk in. And I don’t know if it’s just because Chicagoans are polite.
I was like, Is this like for real?
So while people were walking by, I redesigned my trade show booth. It took me about 10 minutes. I put all my products on a table at the front of my booth.
My booth was a square, but people were walking by only the front part of it.
I put all of my products in bins on the front of my booth. So it was the edge so people would be able to touch them as they walked by.
Immediately, before I had even finished setting up, people were already there at my booth. It was like they were eyeing my booth but not walking in. For some reason, among that crowd, they didn’t want to walk in. They wanted just to touch things from the outside.
When I started to put my products on the outside line, or edge, of my booth, I started to get sales. How crazy is that?
That’s a big lesson.
I went from not many sales at all and wigging out because I had spent money to get into the trade show, to making thousands of dollars in sales.
Just because I changed my booth.
If you don’t think your booth design is essential, you’re wrong.
I’m going to share with you some tips on how to make your booth approachable, not only friendly and approachable but saleable.
You want people to be able to buy things for your booth, not feel overly intimidated, unsure if they even want to walk in.
In Chicago, people are walking in no problem. They would walk in with their dogs. They are more aggressive. I’m just gonna look at your stuff, I don’t care, out of my way. Whereas, Indianapolis, no. They were like, “I’m not coming in.” So you have to meet them halfway.
Approachability is crucial when it comes to your trade show booth.
Your aim for a trade show exhibitor is to make your booth stick out from of the peripheral dozens of trade show exhibits and booths. How can you do so? You pull lots of traffic and make your booth stand out by putting your products front and center.
The next article in this trade show series is about your trade show booth size.
Trade Show Booth Size
The bigger your trade show booth is at an event, the more it’s going to cost. The largest booth size I’ve seen is 20 ft by 10ft. I’m sure there are larger sizes as well, but it’s considered a double-wide booth. A standard trade show booth size is 10 x10 feet. A lot of times, once a company gets big enough, they can afford to fill 20 ft wide by 10 ft deep. So this is only if you’re ready and have a lot of products.
A 20 ft by 10 ft booth works well for fashion brands because I need to bring in rocks and set up your t-shirts or whatever it is you’re selling, your dresses, so it feels more like a store. You can have the cash table and all that; it is like setting up a portable store.
A standard size like I said before was 10 x 10 ft; so, you can still have a lot of room to play depending on the audience.
You may have it set up for people to be able to walk in, where you can create an atmosphere as though it’s a room. These I find useful in spaces where you’re on a corner of an event like you’re at a corner unit, I find this works effectively because say if you are in a place like Indianapolis and USA where people may not want to walk into your booth. Still, either way, if you’re on a corner, it’s a lot less intimidating. so people can poke their head in and then walk out.
A 10 by 10 is the standard size you’ll be looking at. You can also do a half size, which is a 5 by 10. so you’re going to be 10 ft wide by 5 ft deep. A 10 ft wide by 5 ft deep both still allows you to have a wall behind you. In my case at the One of a Kind trade show, I had a wall behind me, and then a little half wall because I was on a corner. The little half wall became a display wall, so I had this nice corner unit that worked well.
If you don’t have a corner, you can still use the mini sidewalls as places to display your products. Maybe you have price lists on your Instagram handle and social media handles. Perhaps you have different signage and so forth to get people’s attention as they are walking by.
You can also hang things on the sides. And then your back wall in general no matter what space you do have whether you have a 20 by 10, a 10 x 10, or 5 by 10, or even just a table, your back wall needs to display our products.
You need to use the height and the space behind your table to use every ounce of real estate to show your products. Whether you’re making shirts, or products, or cards or whatever might be, use that space because it’s real estate where everyone can see it nice and large so the trade show goers will be drawn to your booth.
When it comes to your logo design for your signage, you can also use it on your back wall within your trade show booth design. But I wouldn’t make that the main attraction.
I did it in the past. I regretted it. Because the main thing you’re trying to show is not just your logo. You’re trying to show your products and get those products out to them as accessible as possible so they can see them, pick them up and look at them, and discover whether it’s for them.
If all you have in the trade show booth is a table, you can still make a killing, because you can use a tabletop space designed explicitly so it gives you the most effective area. You can always build up onto the table, which we’ll get to in a moment when it comes to display cases.
A table works well if you sell stationery or cards, which you can build up on the table. You can make a customized build. Or you can buy things. I find it’s easier if you customize it. I know it’s a pain in the butt to find or to build something, but I find you get a bigger bang for your buck, and you also are not going to look generic when it comes to your branding.
I’ve seen people use boxes. I see if he’s all kinds of different things to display their products just on the tabletop. And then a lot of times even if you have only a table, you’ll be allowed to have maybe a wall behind you. So you can possibly put a little bit of product up on the wall. Or you can use a stand. I’ve done this many times where I used a photography stand or a portable backdrop stand, and I hang curtains on it, or I hang burlap, something to be a backing behind me even if I was just setting up a table.
If I don’t do that, I’m just wasting space. Using a stand works well if you just have a tablespace. Your trade shows will allow you to do this. Sometimes they might say your backdrop can be only a certain height. It may be only eight feet. If all you can do is afford just to set up a table, that’s great. just get into the event, especially if it’s the right audience for you. Just ask them if there are any limitations on my backdrop height.
It will be between 8 and 10 feet. Ten is high, so I find the higher you can go, the better because then people can see you from a mile away when they walk into the trade show. Push the boundaries and see how much you can get with just a table.
Frequently they will just give you a chair and a table, and that’s it. So you have to bring everything else which we’ll cover in the next section. But those are generally the sizes you’re going to have to choose from. So a table which is usually six feet or 8 feet wide, which is a fold-out table. Or you’re going to have a 5 by 10 booth. Or you might have a 10 by 10 booth, which is the standard size for a trade show or a craft fair. Or you might be able to graduate to the largest size, which I find my experience has been 20 feet wide by 10 ft deep.
Some trade shows might even allow you to be portable. A renegade craft fair lets you have a mobile cart you move around throughout the event. So you’re mobile, you’re not just in one place.
You might even be on a bike or something and have like your products connected attached. So sometimes depending on how creative the event is, you might be able to create something wholly off-the-wall and different.
I’ve also seen in the past where the trade shows would allow you to have a trade show stand which might be only a few feet wide and then maybe eight feet tall. So it’s almost like you’re standing in hanging out beside a narrow stand.
I’ve seen this happen before it large trade shows where they’ve got all the different sizes of trade show booths, but then we’ve also got another area that’s moving a craft area or an Etsy section where it’s like a standing-room-only. You might be able to have a stool beside it, and that’s it, so you only get a full table. You might just get a stand.
I would check your options depending on the event you’re going to go to, and see what they have to offer.
I find nowadays the more modern and progressive events they’re opening their eyes and their minds to selling people space in a unique way, not only the traditional trade show booth way.
The corporate trade shows will probably restrict you to using standard sizes, but you never know until you ask. And you might even say them, they look I don’t think I have enough, I can’t afford the table. Do you have half tables? Can I share a table? And that’s another thing; you can always share space, you can share a table. You can share a booth; you can share half. You have your friend could be on one side of the booth, and then your products could be on the other side. And that can be cool; you can do a bit of collaboration in that way.
Check out the booth sizes to see what will work best for you based on the budget you have to spend on each trade show.
Frames & Displays
When it comes to frames and trade show displays, it creates an environment when you are using a specific form of framing and displaying within your booth design. The challenge is, what if you don’t have walls?
A lot of times I use frames, to have them displayed around your booth, then you may need to create walls.
What if you don’t have the option? What if you are setting up in a flooded space. So maybe your booth design, or when you arrive at the trade show, all you’re going to get.
You always want to ask what it is going to look like when you arrive at the trade show. Are there going to be walls there, are there going to be curtains, is it going to be just nothing, are there going to be tents? If you are doing an outdoor event, make sure you ask about tents because, say you arrived, and you’re in a tent, or you’re in a space in a large auditorium or indoor convention space, for example; and you don’t have any walls. And you have to think how am I going to ask to hang art on walls that aren’t here.
You can use things like portable grid structure walls. I find it’s a bit distracting because they’re still see-through.
What I’ve done in the past is use my backdrop poles as a wall structure. Then what I did is I stretched burlap over the top of them and stringed burlap together to make a larger piece. That burlap became like a portable thin wall. Burlap in itself is so thin and light, you can roll it up, then you’re done with it. I’ve used burlap in several trade shows, and it works well in that way.
I can attach my frames, which I always take the glass out of any frames I’m going to use. If you’re buying frames, you don’t want to use frames on your display that have glass in it, for a couple reasons. Number one it’s reflective, so people are not going to look at your products easily if there is glass on them. Also glass is heavy. Anything you put on the wall, you want to be light. The last thing you want is for it to fall. You don’t want glass flying everywhere.
How can you create walls that are light?
Maybe you want to try the burlap idea. Get burlap at Home Depot or any Home Improvement store. Get a massive roll of it for like $35.
I used a burlap string to pull it and keep it secure and sturdy.
You can also buy perforated walls. You can buy a chipboard, which is thick, corrugated cardboard.
You can find it at a home improvement store. Corrugated cardboard or chipboard can be effective because it’s already got holes in it. You put hooks through it, you could put hangers through to hang your products. And then that way you can move things around depending on what you want. It’s like a grid already set up for you.
Arranging Your Trade Show Booth
Stand Out or Sit Down
Another thing you can use for walls is called foam board. There’s foam core, which is only about a quarter of an inch wide. The foam board I’m talking about is used for insulation. At my recent event, we were doing a massive display wall at the back of the stage. We ended up using foam board.
It’s made for insulation in walls. The great thing about it is it’s 8 ft High and 4 feet wide. Many trade shows don’t want you to go past eight feet. You can paint them, or cover them with a covering. There are a hundred things you can do to make them not look like insulation.
That may work well if you’re just hanging paper products on them. For example, you may not want to use frames. I’ve just hung my pieces on the wall, and I’ve hung them on paper clips. I put nails in the walls, and I’ve attached the clips holding the products on there. That’s another idea you can use as well.
Ways you can display your products are essential, especially on the walls. The trade show booth walls are the highest-value real estate. The next highest is the tables. Because the walls are what people are going to see as they’re walking by, they are going to see them at a glance. They are going to be drawn to your booth based on your walls, even if you have to create the laws to put the stuff on the wall.
With those insulation walls, you could cover them with wallpaper. You can get creative. To make the trade show booth look like you are in a room, even if you’re only at 1/2 booth, even if you have only a table, you can have cool walls behind you that are wallpapered or covered in chalk paint.
You want all of these things to drive home the message of your brand. You want your trade show booth to convey the message and tone of what your brand represents.
Trade show displays
There are lots of different kinds of trade show booth displays you can do. I find if you’re doing greeting cards and stationery, having slightly vertical displays on your tabletop is a given. It everything is flat on the table, the people have to look down. When people are looking down, it’s harder for them to see things correctly. There’s all this bustle going on around them. But if everything is upright and displayed well for them, they can glance at it, look at it, and go; I want that, that, and I want that.
The texture of what those displays are going to be will depend on your brand’s message. For example, if you are a slick, modern brand, you may want your display to be white and black. And slick, nice, shiny satin finish. Whereas if you’re doing something more earthy, you may want to use boxes, you may want to use burlap boxes, you may even want to use wicker boxes. Like baskets and so forth to display things.
Shelving is also a great way to display things on your booth. It’s all about getting things up off the table and creating height. You want to make people feel like they’re in a regular shop.
You want to set up height and things for the people to look at. It gets their attention as they’re walking by.
The next thing we’ll learn about is trade show booth textures. The texture of your booth says a lot about your brand. Maybe you are using a vibrant floral wallpaper, and it’s the vibe in your business. And you can have your logo on top of that. Perhaps you are modern neon colors, and you wanted to be a pop-culture vibe. It depends on what you’re trying to say with your trade show booth.
Booth textures, baskets, and bins
If you’re selling anything customers can flip through, then you’ll want to use baskets and bins. People can flip through your flat products as if they’re looking through records. If all you have are products on your wall and nothing for them to touch and flip through, you can do better. Baskets and bins are not only a display item; they are a way to promote interaction with the customer.
You can also use baskets and bins if you are making sales. For example, a last-chance bin can work well if you’re selling small items or prints. It also helps to make your booth feel neat and tidy. You want things to look organized and orderly.
I hope these ideas on trade show booth design have helped you. I can’t tell you how to design your trade show booth because your brand is different from mine. Explore your options and have fun with it.
I always set up my booth at home first because I want to see how it looks. You may want to do that, do a dry run. Those that come prepared for a trade show make money. Those that don’t prepare usually do not make money. You want to hit the ground running When you get to the trade show.
Most important is to be approachable. Make your trade show booth so welcoming people will either come inside or come to the edges of your trade show booth. Make it, so they want to get into your booth. And see what you have to offer.
In the next trade show booth section, we’re going to learn about product display and lighting.
Trade Show Lighting
When you’re displaying your products at a trade show or craft fair, it’s essential to know the lighting scenario you’re going to be in before you get to the events so you can plan accordingly. You may have the most beautiful products, you may have a great booth design, but then when you get there, you don’t want your products to be half in the dark or shadows.
Maybe you’re at an outdoor event, and then you don’t remember, Oh yeah, the sun is going to go down, and I have no lights at the end of this thing for the last two hours of the event.
You want to think about lighting. Lighting is a big deal. When a booth is lit well, bright, and happy, that’s when you are going to draw in a crowd. Light always draws a crowd. When you go into a store, in a mall, or any setting, the lights are always there. The lights are always a cool color than not like yellow lighting. You don’t want to have all these yellow tungsten lights. So what you want to use daylight lights. Because we’re selling products. People want to see your products in the lighting, which is generally just a neutral temperature.
I sometimes find when people use tungsten lights and ordinary traditional lamps; then they emit a yellowish tone onto the products. So your beautiful white paper, for example, the light turned it into a yellow product, which is not as attractive. It is not what you’re trying to get across.
When you are looking for lighting, make sure you look for the right color temperature, which is daylight.
Think through what lighting will work for your booth.
You can use lamps if you want to create like a soft ambient vibe, but make sure they’re still bright enough you can see all your products clearly. You may wish to use tabletop lamps or portable lamps to shine light downward on the products on the table.
I’ve done this many times, mainly when I used to work with my friend, who was a rock musician and we traveled all over the world.
You need to think about electricity and how you’re going to get electricity to the lights unless you have battery power. You can have camp lights you can hang around say in an event that has tents set up. Think about lighting to make sure your booth is well lit.
When it comes to lighting up walls, maybe you have to build the wall to the walls are already there, but if you’re displaying things on walls around you, you want to have overall bright lit lights. For example, when I did the one of a kind show in Chicago, I clicked on some nice bright lights that shined on to each of the walls. There’s a back wall just 10 feet wide and a 5-foot deep wall. I used the light from one wall to light the opposite wall.
If you’re clipping your light onto the wall, it’s hard to light the wall with it because you’re going to be pointing the light downward, and that’s harsh lighting for products. I find it works better if you point the light on one wall onto the opposite wall.
When it comes to electricity, you’re going to need to ask the producer who’s putting on the trade show, what is the situation with electricity. Often you have to pay for electricity on top of your fee to get into your trade show. It might be like $50 or $75 extra. But to have power wired to your booth, this is often the case at indoor events. At outdoor events, they won’t wire power to your trade show booth because they’re not going to have wires running everywhere, in case it rains.
There’s tents set up for an outdoor trade show, it’s rare to have electricity run to your booth. If you’ve experienced that, then you can let me know, but I haven’t experienced it myself. But you can still have lighting in your booth if you have portable camp lighting and battery-powered lights. Think he’s things through, do you need lighting at the event? What lighting is it required for your booth? Are they going to be battery-powered or electrical?
If they are electrical, you need to pay for electrical connectors, which will be brought to your booth by an electrician. So that’s usually an extra fee. So be aware of that.
Think it through beforehand, because you can’t ask for electricity once you already get to the trade show. They’re going just to say no because they’ve got so many things going on. They’ve got hundreds of people arriving with their products setting up trade show booths, so they’re not going to oblige on the day of the trade show.
The End of the Trade Show Trail
As we reach the end of our trade show adventure, it’s clear that the world of trade show booths is as diverse and dynamic as the industries they represent.
From the initial concept to the final execution, creating a successful trade show booth is a journey of creativity, strategy, and meticulous planning. It’s about more than just attracting attention. Creating a trade show booth is about fostering meaningful interactions, conveying your brand story, and leaving a lasting impression.
Every trade show is an opportunity to connect with your audience, showcase your offerings, and strengthen your brand’s presence in the market. The strategies and insights we’ve explored are your compass, guiding you towards creating a booth that stands out in the bustling trade show landscape.
As you step off this trail and onto the show trade show floor, remember the most successful booths are those that are authentic, engaging, and memorable.
Take these lessons, infuse them with your brand’s unique flair, and create a trade show booth that’s not just a space, but an experience.
