Bridal shows are a lot of work and can be fairly expensive. It is not just the booth fee but what you put in it that adds up. Even rental companies spend a small fortune on labor to get everything set up.

Depending on your market, you will have anywhere from one to fifty bridal shows. My little market has an even dozen. Well, a dozen that count anyway. You can add to that if you start counting all the little nearly free ones at malls and churches and community centers. It seems that about five years ago the rumor got started that producing a bridal show was a fun easy way to make a ton of money. (insert insane laugh here )

So how do you decide which one to invest your time and money on? Well here is what I tell my clients: What do you want to get out of the show, what is your objective? That may sound easy but it really isn’t. There is more to it than ”I want more business.” Do you do best with high end brides that usually hire a planner? Are you there to work on your branding with mass exposure? Do you need to get yourself better know within the community of wedding professionals? Or are you just there to pick up a new bride or two?

First define your objective and then look at the shows location and likely draw. You can look over lists of vendors in past shows; are they like minded in terms of the clients they serve? If you trend toward the high end bride is this show filled with mass merchants and low end newbies? What is the demographic of the attendants of past shows? The producer has this information, maybe not in dollar values but you can take a look at the zipcodes the brides live in to get a rough estimate. How many brides came to past shows? Be careful here; make sure you get the number of brides, not just bodies through the door.

Look at the advertising that is being done for the show? Look at where and how. Is it being heavily promoted on a radio station that your bride is likely to listen to and what about print media? Your bride is not reading the daily newspaper, but will probably read the local alternative weekly that has the club and event listings.
How long has the show been in operation? I will only advise a client to do a first year show if it is remarkably different; say a very cool new venue or done in a vastly different style.

Don’t take the producers words at face value. A few years back I was approached by a fairly new show. It was in a massive regional mall, they were going on about the high traffic the mall receives and their extensive radio advertising due to a tie in with a local station. All of what they were saying was true, however here is the but… The mall does receive a huge amount of traffic, mostly out of towners and tourists in the 30 to 50 age range and a host of local teenagers. Not your market. The advertising was on a local Christian station with a heavily conservative, married and settled demographic, again not a lot of clients there. The sales staff hadn’t lied, but they hadn’t told the whole truth either. It would have been a massive waste of time and treasure to do this show. (not to mention that load in would have been a true pain ).

Are there other ways that you can get exposure by doing a particular show? Can you present to brides from the stage by way of a seminar or performance? Is there a fashion show where you can shine? Is there pre-show promotions that you can get in on. I have done everything from print, to radio to TV spots as part of pre-show publicity. If you can hop on that gravy train, do the show even if the turnout is likely to suck.

So figure out your objective. Is your market likely to be there? How much effort are you likely to put in for the possible outcome. Don’t try to do them all unless branding is your objective.

Here is a clue, I don’t sell to brides anymore, but I still work the largest bridal show in the southeast to meet new vendors. They are, after all my target market and there are a bunch of them there!

For more good stuff on bridal shows, subscribers can check out this month’s Marketing Column at Think Like A Bride.

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