$16.98
Las Vegas is a series of resorts-cum-biospheres, where the designs discourage walking out of them (unless you have a lot of time and like having cheap escort flyers shoved in your face) and you’re treated like a captive audience within the boundaries. Add in the incredibly bad traffic that discourages getting in a car, and you’re often stuck with that $16.98 breakfast – and other eating/lodging compromises – being your best option. That’s no value by any measurement.
There’s also the argument of location. Sure, it’s not too hard to find a flight to Las Vegas, but that’s also assuming that the masses of stone fabricators and installers out there have the time and the cash to hop a plane at least halfway across the country – and then ask them to do it again and again. Driving there is not an option, unless you happen to be working Phoenix or Los Angeles (a place where it’s difficult to get people to drive 40 miles for a show, let alone several hundred).
Frankly, many of the same arguments can be made for Orlando, Fla. With both places, the location adds absolutely nothing to the effectiveness of the event, as far as attendees are concerned. And the idea of doing the ol’ show-vacation combo is a tired-and-tattered fantasy of visitor bureaus and travel agents that needs a final retirement.
There’s a vast part of the country being underserved for a blue-collar (or, since a T-shirt is the garment of choice, no-collar) trade that would relish going to a place within a half-day’s drive where it’s feasible to take several folks from the shop, and the predominant customer service by hotels and restaurants isn’t attaching a vacuum cleaner to your wallet.
Take Collinsville, Ill., where the Stone Fabricators Alliance (SFA) runs its Megaworkshop. It’s not glamorous; you don’t have celebrity-name steakhouses and go-go dancers working a runway between the blackjack tables. You do get a place where thousands of fabricators and installers live within 400 miles, with a major city 15 miles away and a bunch of lodging within easy and unmolested walking distance.
And, a Jackson buys a heckuva breakfast for two, tip included.
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