exhibit concept inc.
Vandalia marketing firm puts showbiz on the road — literally
Friday, April 11, 2008
VANDALIA — What do you call a company that designs, engineers, builds and, in some cases, drives the way clients market and present themselves?
If you're the Crossroads Court firm celebrating its 30th anniversary this summer, you call yourself, "Exhibit Concepts Inc."
Gary Zehring (top) and Jon Bergstrom, employees of Exhibit Concepts, lay a sign on the floor prior to trimming it down. The business is located at 700 Crossroads Court in Vandalia.
But Matthew Ziessler, an Exhibit Concepts designer, has another take.
"Literally, it's show business," Ziessler said Thursday, April 10.
In a worldwide $110 billion trade show and museum exhibitory industry, Exhibit Concepts is on track to pull in a small-but-growing share: This year, the firm is expecting to achieve $26 million in sales, said Kelli Glasser, Exhibit Concepts' president and chief operating officer.
The firm's local client roster is a who's-who of familiar names: NCR, Teradata, Clay Mathile's new Aileron center. When LexisNexis decided to showcase its legal services in a tour bus, the company called Exhibit Concepts to remake the bus interior into something resembling a law office or library.
But Exhibit Concepts' 98 employees working in 186,000 square feet have a reach well beyond Dayton. The company is putting its mark on B.B. King's new museum in Indianola, Miss., and has been involved with the Oklahoma City Memorial and the Medal of Honor museum in Charleston Harbor, S.C.
And the show goes on, recession or no recession. In fact, Glasser has found many clients who use slow periods to re-establish themselves in their markets.
"We're not feeling the doom and gloom that you're reading about so much," Glasser said.
Adaptability is the firm's specialty, its leaders will tell you. A trade show is a way to draw new leads while a tour bus can be a way to go to customers where they work. Want to woo established customers further? Try a private trade show or event.
"We're a creative group that
delivers logistics," said Colin
Langley, marketing director for Exhibit Concepts.
The firm's decision-makers remain comfortable in Dayton. Here, costs and overhead remain relatively low and the employee work ethic remains strong, they said.
It helps, of course, that motorists can't miss the firm's sign off Interstate 75, just north of I-70.
"We serve the country out of this facility," Langley said.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2390 or
tgnau@DaytonDailyNews.com.
About Exhibit
Concepts Inc.
Founded: August 1978
Based: 700 Crossroads Court, Vandalia
Work: Designing and building trade show and museum exhibits and displays
Employees: 98
Revenue: 2006: $19 million; 2007: $23 million; 2008: $26 million (projection)
Clients/Projects: LexisNexis, NCR, Dell, National
Afro-American History Museum and Cultural
Center (Wilberforce),
College Football Hall of Fame (South Bend, Ind.)
Source: Exhibit Concepts
