he day before the 2006 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Hopscotch Technology Inc. was still putting the finishing touches on its homemade exhibit. In less than 12 hours, the Boulder, CO,-based company would make its trade show debut and introduce its new product, BOB — a device that allows parents to set time limits on electronic equipment such as televisions, computers, and video games.

That fall, Hopscotch’s marketing coordinator, Tiffany Childs, read about CES in a trade magazine and approached company founders Brian Baker and Tom Gallop about debuting the company and its product at the country’s largest electronics show. It didn’t take the two entrepreneurs long to agree that CES was the best place to break into the marketplace.

Childs contacted CES only to learn that all of its exhibit space was sold. One month later, however, CES management called Hopscotch with the news that a 10-by-30 foot space had opened up. The price: $12,000 — a hefty sum for Hopscotch, a self-funded company without venture capital to blow through. Nevertheless, Hopscotch snatched the space and started to plan. After reviewing the company’s budget, Baker and Gallop could only afford to allocate $38,000 for show-related expenses, including the $12,000 they already spent for booth space — a modest allowance to say the least, compared to corporate giants with exhibiting budgets that run into six and seven figures.

With only a few prototypes of BOB in hand, the company literally had no consumer-ready product to launch. Further complicating matters, Hopscotch, like most startups, had no name recognition — and neither did BOB, since Hopscotch changed the product’s name just weeks before CES. Even if attendees heard about BOB through word-of-mouth, they wouldn’t know where to find it since the product was identified by its original name, “Jabble,” in the CES show guide. As if that wasn’t enough to make Hopscotch a playground weakling, the modest 10-by-30-foot space on which the company spent nearly one third of its budget was located in the backcountry of the South Hall — an area perceived by exhibitors as no-man’s-land. The fact that the company was a newbie to the trade show industry could have been the final nail in the coffin, killing any hopes of success.

With a child’s optimism, however, Hopscotch set out with a meager budget and lofty goals: Generate at least five media mentions, secure purchase orders with four small retailers, create real interest with at least four investors, and build overall awareness.

New Kids on the Block
Hoping to reduce their expenses, Baker and Gallop tapped the company’s
two-person marketing department, Childs and Yona Smith, to brainstorm exhibit-design concepts.

Childs, Smith, and Moria Slevin, operations manager at Hopscotch, developed seven different concepts. While the ideas ranged from a retro living room to various outdoor themes, each concept was meant to conjure the carefree era before television, video games, and computers monopolized children’s free time — when kids played outside, rode bikes around the neighborhood, and found ways to entertain themselves without the flip of a switch or the push of a button.

After reviewing seven concepts, the group chose a backyard-themed design. “We picked the backyard theme because the whole reason behind BOB is that children today are missing out on their childhood — more than any other generation,” Childs says. “Hopscotch isn’t against technology. We’re about providing balance and improving the quality of life. What that means to us is that children can watch television, but they should also enjoy other things, like building forts in the living room or having a tea party.” With that in mind, Hopscotch set out to create an idyllic backyard in the middle of the land of flashy exhibits on steroids.

When Life Gives You Lemons
Hopscotch met with Tony King, an acquaintance of a company employee and a construction worker by trade, to brainstorm exhibit components to fit its backyard theme. They agreed on a lemonade stand that doubled as a reception desk, presentation and demo area, and product display; a tree house that also served as a storage area, break room, and conference room; a dog house that included a lock so it could store the prototypes and televisions; Astroturf flooring; and even a white picket fence. Hopscotch commissioned King to build the custom exhibit from plywood and Styrofoam for a cost of $5,000 — a steal compared to the average cost of $52,800 for a 10-by-30 foot custom exhibit ($176 per square foot, according to the Exhibit Designers and Producers Association’s 2004 Economic Survey). To further reduce costs, all five employees helped paint the exhibit before it shipped to CES.

Plays Well With Others
But exhibiting isn’t fun when you don’t have any attendees to play with. To generate interest and compliment the exhibit’s theme, Hopscotch designed pre-show mailers to look like invitations to a child’s birthday party and mailed them to 1,500 prospects. The front side introduced BOB, and the mailer’s back side displayed the company’s logo and an e-mail address for scheduling a product demo. However, Hopscotch left for the show with only a handful of responses. After returning from CES, the company learned that 10 percent of the mailers were returned and marked, “Not At This Address” — a result of purchasing an out-of-date list.

Once on site, Hopscotch continued the theme with trinkets including branded kazoos, yo-yos, and whoopee cushions. Staffers also gave impromptu hula-hoop and yo-yo lessons, and treated attendees to lemonade at the lemonade stand — minus the typical bugs and sticky fingers.

The giveaways were a hit. They became instant traffic builders as attendees stopped each other on the show floor to ask about the whimsical items.

Honing in on the power of its nostalgic toys, staffers wrote the booth number in black magic marker on the remaining giveaways so attendees could easily direct others to Hopscotch’s promotional playground.

Childs and Slevin also walked the CES show floor with whoopee cushions, directing interested attendees to the booth to watch a demo and get a giveaway. “That literally got dozens of people to our booth to see our presentations,” Childs says. Over the next four days, Hopscotch gave 800 demonstrations and presentations, and distributed 4,000 branded trinkets to attendees.

Among them were small retailers who saw potential in BOB. “We were able to set up nine appointments with retailers that were interested in carrying BOB in their stores — from small electronics shops to regional chains,” Childs says.