Trade Shows: What Does The Future Hold?
Trade shows have been an integral part of the free market economy since as early as the middle ages. These events, at which businesses showcase their latest products and technologies for the benefit, inspiration, and edification of other businesses and the general public alike are popular because of their interactive nature and the up close view of upcoming business innovations they provide to visitors.
Having had such a long history and being so widely implemented in the 20th and 21st centuries, one might well ask what the future of trade shows might hold. As the digital age deepens and evolves, what innovations will it bring to trade shows? Here are a few ideas:
Pop up Displays
The main thing that happens in a prosaic sense at trade shows is that products are showcased along with their relevant information. This may come from a literal company representative who simply talks to interested parties and gives presentations from signs and literature that accompanies the product or service. It takes little imagination to foresee things like electronic pop up banners. In fact, such technology may well have already been utilised. This could take the form of large LCD screens that displays product information, as well as displaying product-specific information that “pops up” when people are in close proximity to the object, perhaps activated by a laser sensor.
Interactive Programs
Along these same lines but slightly more involved in terms of information, there are (and will increasingly be) interactive programs that allow users to page through information using a computer and read all about a certain product, service, or company. These are similar to the sort of thing you might see in museum displays and other such arenas. They may become more interactive in the sense that they could respond through product specific interaction – sensors, eye movements, and so on – to provide users with information in a quick and efficient manner.
Holographic Product Displays or Company Representatives
Holograms are virtual 3D video displays that people can walk around just as they would a real 3D object. This is different to 3D video that only appears to be 3 dimensional to the viewer – holograms really are three dimensional. They occupy apparent space in such a way that is very convincing dimensionally, though one can walk right through them. In tradeshows of the future, sophisticated and convincing holograms may be used to showcase products or services. One might imagine the interactivity above coming in here, with products seemingly materializing in front of the eyes of spectators when they click an icon with a mouse – or even simply walked into a certain area. If a service was being displayed, holographic video sequences could demonstrate the activities that the service offers, leaping into action around a viewer in response to a prompt.
There might even be interactive, holographic company representatives beside the products to describe and provide information about them. If voice recognition technology were integrated into this, these virtual holographic presenters might even be able to answer questions about products or services.
It isn’t hard to see how what begins as simple digital enhancements in information presentation can move in a “virtual reality” direction as greater and greater technological savvy is introduced. The merge of the information age with the real physicality of products and services will produce more of an interface between these two “realms” so that the products and their information will become, in some senses, more interchangeable. Trade shows may thus in the future become something more along the lines of virtual reality festivals in the commercial sector.