ISS Atlantic City was a great success!
The Trip to AC
Matt and I left Chicago via Midway airport around noon. Due to AC International being a super small airport (apparently they're international because of a single flight to San Juan Mexico), we had no way of getting into Atlantic City directly from Chicago. The options were to either fly into Philadelphia and take a train into Atlantic City, or take a connecting flight into Atlanta Georgia, and on to Atlantic City from there.
We decided to take the flight into Georgia.
A quick rest and connection in Atlanta and we were back on our way to Atlantic City.
By the time we got to the tiny airport on the outskirts of Atlantic City, it was already in the early stages of the evening. We got to our hotel, grabbed dinner, and settled in. This would be our home and base of operations for the next 6 days.
Setup Begins
Wednesday morning we were up and anxious to get started with the setup. We knew we were in for a long day but we were ready.
Matt and I got to the convention center and it was all business. Our job was to find out where our truck is and make sure our booth is outfitted with everything we need to set up our equipment.
Trade shows are always an exciting sight. As incredible as they are once set up and running, they are an even greater sight to behold during the construction phase. The noise of power equipment and tools working their magic, foremen and show organizers yelling commands to fork lift operators. The intensity at which everyone works to ensure their booth is set up on time is phenomenal.
We spent the day working at a feverish pace, but with good results. A hard work ethic and a little bit of luck meant we were able to make good time setting up our press and dryer.
During Day 2 of setup we put the finishing touches on our Stratus II and continued to work on other aspects of our booth.
The Show
10 AM Day of the Show - Like race horses out of the starting gate, the visitors were allowed into the exhibition area. Within minutes the convention center was filled with excited Attendee's toting bags and credentials slung by lanyards over their necks.
This being my first industry trade show, it honestly took me a moment to realize that the sudden influx of people in the hall were all attendees and not exhibitors. This was evident by a small blue strip on the bottom of their badge holder, opposing the red strip exhibitors wore.
At this show, we were featuring our Stratus II Automatic Press with a brand new touchscreen control panel with our intuitive new operating system. The system streamlines the user experience and creates and environment that is truly user friendly. We knew this new control system was the only one of its kind, at this show or anywhere else, and our intuition was proved correct.
We had swarms of visitors stopping to sneak a look at the new interface. Getting drawn in toward our booth by the sleak design inspired by current technology trends, what they witnessed was revolutionary. A control panel that is actually easy and intuitive to operate! Menu's and buttons that not only looked great but make sense! Features and functions that performed exactly the way they were intended to without having to navigate several menu's.
Overall we had some great feedback about the new control panel. Everyone was excited to hear that this was not only going to be on our high end machine's but it's going to be featured on our Titan all the way up through the lineup to the Vindicator.
The Wrap Up
Overall the show was a success. We had great traffic to the booth and phenomenal interest in our new control panel. We know this is a system we're all very excited about at Anatol and we can't wait to roll out our full line of machines equipped with the latest in Screen Printing Control.
