Six degrees of July

Given that I was born in July, I tend to be partial to the month. I mean, who could take issue with a 31-day span that brings us fireworks, the baseball All-Star game, and birthdays for Will Ferrell, Pamela Anderson and Kevin Bacon?     Not to mention Keith Baugh, who once invested in a garage to which Chris Sibley brought his car after playing a round of golf with Dennis Donahue, who once sold Kevin Bacon a pair of jeans.

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A bird in the hand is worth two in the workplace ... A man entered a pet shop, wanting to buy a parrot. The shop owner pointed out three identical parrots on a perch and said, “The parrot to the left costs 500 dollars.”

“Why does that parrot cost so much?” the man wondered. The owner replied, “Well, it knows how to use a computer.”

The man asked about the next parrot on the perch. “That one costs 1,000 dollars because it can do everything the other parrot can do, plus it knows how to use the UNIX operating system.” Naturally, the startled customer asked about the third parrot.

“That one costs 2,000 dollars.”

“And what does that one do?” the man asked.

The owner replied, “To be honest, I’ve never seen him do a thing, but the other two call him boss!”

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Puttin’ on a show … The recently completed National Lawn & Garden Show in Chicagoland might have been the best NLGS yet. Given that we’re talking 14 years of high-powered networking, the preceding sentence says a lot.

I observed more good new products than I’ve seen in recent memory, plus NLGS President Bob Mikulas and the staff of his new business partner, Urban Expositions, made sure there were enough new buyers and vendors to keep things fresh.

In essence, that’s the key to success for NLGS — or any other trade show/conference. Eventually, when you’re seeing the same old, same old — be it product or people — a show can grow stale on you. This year’s NLGS had lots of new, along with a smattering of improved.

Still, the thing that sets this event apart is the appointment format. Each vendor has prearranged 10-minute visits with prospective buyers. During that time, he/she touts the products, and the buyers decide if the vendor’s pitch is a strike. There’s also ample opportunity to meet and greet at a variety of social functions. All in all, there’s plenty of bang for buck. If you’ve never tried NLGS, or if you haven’t taken part in a while, I would recommend checking out www.nlgshow.com. Next year’s conference will be held June 16-18 in Atlanta.

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Gillette Player(s) of the Game … There are countless reasons why I love this industry. Two are the great Allen Spigelman and the equally great Andy Conrad of Contech Electronics.

I met these gentlemen at last year’s NLGS; we shared my table as they prepared for appointments with the various buyers at the show. We reunited at this year’s event in Chicagoland, and it was like we had never missed a beat.

Allen and Andy are funny, resourceful, bright and driven, the kind of people we frequently meet in the green world — and the kind I want to salute with this month’s edition of GPOY. To check out what Allen and Andy are up to, visit www.contech-inc.com.

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Just wondering … If a man yells in the woods and no woman hears him, is he still wrong?

- Yale Youngblood

July 2008