Commercial Vehicle Show Visit

By James Wilcoxson

Venue Account Manager 

A few weeks ago I was invited to the NEC Commercial Vehicle Show for a retailer promoting exercise.

Carole our Makro account manager and myself were asked to put together a plan explaining what we would get out of the visit and what we were looking to achieve whilst there.

After a couple of weeks planning and preparing for the trip it was the night before we were going and I was at home having a cup of coco before I got my head down for a good long 5 hours worth of sleep!  What felt like a couple of minutes later my alarm was going off, 5.30am is still night-time to me!

Carole was driving and picked me up on the dot at 6am, after about an hour of driving she turned to me and said “if I’m driving too fast, make sure you let me know ” - it's OK Carole, I’m used to it now!

We arrived at a service station a couple of miles from the NEC, had a quick espresso and it was back in the car with 'The Stig'!

The NEC, Birmingham

On arrival we parked and were sent in the direction of the NEC.  It was about a  mile or so walk to the entrance, the place is absolutely massive!

After checking in we did a lap of the first area and then found another espresso whilst we reviewed the floor plan and discussed the best way to attack it.

The first few hours were great, we spoke to what felt like hundreds of exhibitors.

Meeting Graham Taylor

We also accidentally photo bombed the Graham Taylor England football legend stand!  Carole and I had walked straight through it and it wasn’t until we reached the other side that we realised what we had done!  Then, like a couple of slick account managers, we slipped into the queue and got a autograph and a photo....EPIC!!

The Commercial Vehicle show caters for every operators requirements, from trucks to vans and all types of trailers. The show provided the truly unique benefit of genuine face to face encounters with decision makers and we came away with loads of leads from interested companies either looking to expand their brands, or hoping to gain a new customer and revenue stream.

Since we have been back we have collated all of our leads into a database and have been re-introducing ourselves and our services. 

The next step is to convert these leads to sales.  We will be keeping as record as we go so that we can judge the success of the this type of activity, and hopefully we will become part of these companies marketing strategies time and time again.