Once the 2012 KLM Expo was over, Kristian Gragg figured life would return to normal around the Virginia-based marketing firm that serves as a manufacturer’s representative for some of the nation’s top security-technology firms.
No such luck. After about three months of nose-to-the-grindstone organizing with an “all hands on deck” spirit at KLM, the two-day event drew 220 participants for the March 6 edition in College Park, Md., and another 144 for the March 8 version in Norfolk, Va. Gragg discovered after last year's expo that the show goes on even after it's officially over, thanks to the cross-pollination that occurs between the distributors, system integrators, dealers and end-users who attend.
“[The expo] really energizes a lot of people because they start thinking about jobs, like ‘you know what? This would be great. I can win this job now,’ as opposed to putting it off until some other technology comes out,” Gragg said.
Originally dubbed the KLM Road Show, the event has evolved. At its heart, it remains a series of training sessions to bring attendees up to speed in such areas as fiber and network system design, wireless transmission systems, audio-monitoring legalities, and browser-based access control. But with about a dozen vendors manning displays of their products the past two years near the teaching area, the 2012 event was renamed the KLM Expo.
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