Do we really need all of these dental trade shows?

By Kevin Henry
Editor, Proofs

The Big Easy awaits, my friends. Next week, I’ll be in New Orleans on Thursday and Friday morning to speak to a group of dental assistants at the New Orleans Dental Conference/Louisiana Dental Association meeting. I’m looking forward to interacting with these valuable members of the dental team and learning from them. Their thoughts will comprise some future articles that will appear in our monthly Dental Assisting Digest e-newsletter. By the way, did you know you can subscribe to any of our e-newsletters that reach dentists, hygienists, and assistants for free? Just click here to reach the subscription page. There might be some great nuggets of knowledge in there for you that can help you reach your customers.

This will be my second consecutive year to speak at the show in New Orleans. I’m always interested to see how the state shows fare in terms of attendance and show floor traffic. Last year seemed pretty quiet at the NODC, so we’ll see if there’s a more festive feel inside the convention center this year.

The Dental Trade Alliance recently conducted a national survey to better understand dentists’ attitudes towards dental meetings, exhibitions, show specials, and acquiring CE credits. One of the most eye-popping statistics pulled from the survey concerned consolidation of dental meetings. A whopping 70% of dentists polled for the survey were in favor of combining a city, state, and regional dental meetings. This would allow dentists in a particular geographic region to attend one larger meeting with more CE courses, show amenities, and a larger exhibition hall with more products, equipment, and new technology demonstrations. These same dentists prefer travel only within their own geographic region. While this begs the question of how far a local dentist is willing to travel within his or her region, consider how our industry could dramatically reduce the number of domestic dental meetings and significantly increase attendance and the quality of these regional meetings.

I do believe local shows are important for the dental team. I believe shows like the NODC (and even my home state show in Oklahoma that alternates between Tulsa and Oklahoma City) have a place in the annual routine for dentists, hygienists, and assistants … but is it worth having an exhibit hall? Could a CE-only meeting be held in a state with no exhibit hall … and it wouldn’t matter to the industry or the attendees? I dare say yes. Granted, much of the money placed in the state dental associations’ treasuries come from these exhibit halls, but is that the only reason they exist? Is it worth it to your company to attend smaller state shows, or do you exhibit because you feel like you have to be there? I’d love to hear your feedback at [email protected].

You’ll see more from the DTA in regard to the trade show survey in future editions of Proofs, so stay tuned. In the meantime, I’ll see you in Jackson Square.

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