I Brought the Swag

Just a quick post this morning to wrap up the series on my recent trip to Kansas City.  My team was there for a trade show, which was part of one of our big promotional initiatives for the year.  We ended up in Baltimore, San Francisco, and Kansas City - a tally of three shows.

Thinking about it over the history of this blog since 2007, I've probably been to at least one trade show every year since then - mostly it is the NFMT show in Baltimore, where I have spoken frequently, but there is also the sister show in Las Vegas, which I have been to three times, always to speak as well.

So this year it was a new thing to go with a booth set up to do marketing and outreach - at least with the current company.  Somewhere along the way there are some past posts about trips to San Antonio and Orlando for trade shows with one of my previous employers.

You can imagine that I have collected some pretty good squishee toys from all of this, and you would be correct.  That is the indulgence that I have for this kind of trip - whether it is the little hard hats that we got for ourselves (paired with carpenter pencils, which have been a surprise hit), or these two surprises my friends helped me find in Kansas City.  I think I have around thirty of these objects in my collection.

I have to admit, when we found the squishee hand grenade, it brought a tear to my eye.