The NeoCon Team at the Merchandise Mart in Chicago announced an interesting solution to ongoing kvetching about problems of access to the 8th floor during NeoCon. They’re closing the 8th floor and consolidating the exhibitors on the 7th saying, “We have heard from many of you, our exhibitors, that traffic is not equitable between the 7th and 8th floors.”
Since the announcement, I’ve seen some “Chicken Little – sky is falling” discussions about it, but from where I stand the decision seems rather obvious and entirely rational. This year, the 8th floor appeared to be only about half full and while there were some interesting exhibitors, there were not so many as to make their relocation to the 7th floor impossible. Especially in light of the moves the NeoCon team announced in conjunction with the consolidation.
Unfortunately for those of us who use and enjoy the Press Room, it will be relocated somewhere else (maybe the 8th floor?). So too will the speakers’ Ready Room and any seminar rooms. That will open up a sizeable amount of extra exhibition space on seven; a little shifting of concessions and voila, seven will be the only temporary exhibit floor and the uneven traffic problem will be solved.
While I’m on the topic of NeoCon, there’s been a lot of discussion about the decision to move NeoCon East to Philadelphia. Some consistent exhibitors at NeoCon East in Baltimore have decided to take a pass. So while I was talking to the NeoCon team about the 8th floor, I decided to ask about sign-ups for NeoCon East. It turns out it’s looking better than I expected.
As of Friday, Herman Miller and Global had both signed up for very large spaces near the entrance, along with Indiana Furniture, Krug, and JSI all of whom have signed up for the large booths along the front. Teknion, Haworth and Kimball/National will be there. HON and Allsteel are back after taking a couple of years’ break. AIS, Groupe Lacasse, sitonit/IDEON and Spec are a few more of the larger exhibitors.
Newcomers include ICF Group, DVO-USA (Italian brand – Della Valentina Office), Transwall and assa abloy. Other returning notables include Humanscale, Bentley, Wolf-Gordon and Carvart.
Carpet and flooring exhibitors include: Mohawk, Tandus Centiva, Philadelphia Commercial, Shaw, Patcraft, Bentley, Atlas, Bolyu, Masland Contract, Mannington Commercial, 2tec2 (a newcomer with cool product from Belgium), Tarkett, Flexco, Roppe, Expanko Resilient Flooring and many more. So it looks as though NeoCon East will be reinvigorated by the move. What would be great is if a bunch of New Yorkers would take the train down and make it a truly regional show.
The next unusual thing that crossed my desk was the announcement of a legal action by DIRTT. It has filed a patent infringement suit against Allsteel, claiming that the Allsteel wall system, Beyond, infringes one or more DIRTT patents. Ours is a collegial industry unlike the tech industry where intellectual property suits is a multi billion dollar industry in its own right. In this business, a cease and desist letter from a company’s attorney will usually do the trick.
I spoke with DIRTT President Scott Jenkins to ask him what was going on.
“We’ve invested a lot of time and money in innovation,” said Mr. Jenkins. “It has been a conscious decision on our part to be a leader not a follower, and we’ve protected our innovations with patents in the US, in Canada and in Europe. If you decide to innovate and to lead and you go to the trouble and expense of protecting your innovations with patents, you have to be willing to defend them when someone violates them.”
We will follow with interest, the (slow) progress of the case through the courts.