Your controller slides the quarterly P&L across the table after a strong run of shows. Revenue is up 42 percent. You should be smiling.
You’re not.
Gross margins look fine.
Orlando’s March calendar includes five tradeshows at Orange County Convention Center and Rosen Shingle Creek, led by Global Pet Expo and Vision Expo. Design and Construction Week will leave Orlando after its 2026 run and move to Las Vegas in 2027.
Today, an exhibit designer is required to do more than design 3-D architecture. Exhibit design is a creative and technical process of crafting immersive spaces (like museums, tradeshows, or marketing centers) to tell a story and convey a message through a blend of architecture, graphics, technology, and interactive elements, that focus on engaging visitors and guiding a visitor to become emotionally involved.
Chicago’s March docket brings a full mix of buyer-driven tradeshows, venue positioning, and big-ticket planning. McCormick Place anchors the month with The Inspired Home Show and a late-March run of healthcare and pop-culture events, while the Chicago Auto Show added an overlanding campout and its First Look for Charity gala raised $2.03 million.
Las Vegas briefs this month run from show-floor scale to the metrics that sit behind demand. March’s calendar stacks seven tradeshows across the Las Vegas Convention Center and The Venetian Expo, led by CONEXPO-CON/AGG, HIMSS, and ISC West.
Zol Bernard Harvey Jr. died February 6, 2026. He was 71. He lived in Las Vegas.
Harvey was born in Texas City, Texas, to Marion Oneta Quarantra and Zol B. Harvey Sr. He was raised in Dickinson, Texas, and moved to Corpus Christi in 1985.
Welcome back to “A Look Back at ECN Tradeshow History.” This month, the archive tracks how the industry kept adapting as events returned and expectations changed. From a post-COVID playbook built around contactless tools and hybrid access to the recognition, products, and parties that defined EXHIBITOR week, these clips capture what the business prioritized in the moment.
Most leaders assume industry rules change in obvious ways. A new policy. A public decision. A big announcement everyone hears about.
That is rarely how it happens. More often, rules change quietly. Through small interpretations. New “requirements.” A line in a service manual that no one questions. A decision made for convenience that slowly becomes the standard.
In Exhibit City New’s Quarter 2 magazine of 2025 the article “The Sustainability Myth” (page 80) appeared. Based on several interviews with executives regarding the misperception that sustainability costs more, the myth that sustainability was difficult to achieve was refuted.
In our book, The Invisible Industry, Bob McGlincy and I set out to tell the stories of how tradeshows have evolved to their present state in the USA.
So, where did exhibit designers learn to design a tradeshow exhibit?
Chicago opened 2026 with a mix of large-scale tradeshows, fan events, and hospitality updates across the city and nearby suburbs. February brings major draws at McCormick Place and downtown hotels, led by automotive and dental meetings.
The real risk isn’t that AI replaces your people. It’s that it replaces your organization’s thinking discipline—and you don’t notice until the bad calls compound.
