Blog posts tagged with 'caterers'

Wow, I can’t believe it’s June already! We have been crazy busy since the start of 2012. We started off the year with the beginning of our Trade Show season, first with the BC CRA Regional show in Langley, BC in mid-January 2012, and finishing up in late March at the 2012 Quebec Expo in St. Hyacinthe, Quebec. Over the course of the winter trade show season, our team collectively travelled more than 46,000 km (almost 27,000 miles)--enough to travel around the world! In total, we did 7 trade shows over a 12 week period and met with hundreds of our customers and many more potential new customers.

Then in April, Diana and I were off to China to see some new suppliers as well as work on sourcing a range of new products. Over the next year I think you will see many exciting new additions from us including additions to existing product lines as well as entirely new product lines.

As a sample of things to come, in March we introduced our new Serenity line of lead-free Crystal. Prior to bringing in our first shipment, we wanted to test the quality of the Crystal so we brought some of the glasses home to see how they would perform. We have been using the glasses 3 to 4 times a week and washing them in our dishwasher. On a number of occasions we have also hand washed and hand dried them with a dish towel. More than 5 months into this routine, our Serenity Crystal Stemware has held up without any issues at all--no broken stems and no broken bowls.

Serenity Crystal Stemware is not only durable, but also has a classic look that will makes your customers smile. The 19 ounce and the 22 ounce glass are very similar in shape to two lines of Riedel glasses we have at home. And with our prices ranging from $2.65 to $2.95 they are a fraction of the price of several brand name Crystal wine glasses.

As a result of not just the quality but also the feedback we received early on from some of our customers on the attractive appearance of our Serenity crystal glassware, we decided to start stocking 6 different pieces to introduce the Serenity Crystal to our Customers. These 6 pieces are a 22oz, 19oz, 16oz, and 12oz wine glass as well as 7oz Martini Glass and 7oz Champagne Flute. The 22oz wine glass is great for use as a water glass or as a red wine glass. The 19oz wine glass on the other hand is great for use as a white wine glass. The Serenity Crystal is a great choice for anyone looking to offer the high end look that everyone is looking for while still keeping your costs reasonable and ultimately helping to improve your ROI. For measurements of our Serenity Crystal Stemware and other details, please visit our Serenity Crystal page.

After the two days of exhibiting, everyone headed to the Coast Hotel & Convention Centre/Cascades Casino for the Saturday evening Awards Banquet Dinner. As you can see, we had a full house in the banquet hall and we weren’t disappointed. After a fabulous dinner we were entertained by Michael Harrison, a Ventriloquist/Comedian and a finalist on the 2008 America’s Got Talent. Michael did a number of his trademark skits, including his first puppet, Mr. Tennis Ball and Dunlop and his Human Puppet routine that won him huge accolades from the judges on America’s Got Talent. Michael performed for almost an hour and had us laughing in the aisles.

After the dinner a number of awards were presented to various members of the CRA BC Local. Ted Cook, ARA President presented the CRA BC Local with an award for the greatest membership growth of all State and Provincial locals across the United States and Canada. Congratulations to the CRA BC Local for a great accomplishment as well as for hosting such a great 2 day event. We will definitely be recommending that all of our BC Rental Customers make plans to attend next year's show.

Our next tradeshow is also in Vancouver. We're going to be at the BC Foodservice Show which will be held at the Vancouver Convention Centre. I hope that if you're at the show, you'll stop by Booth 138 and say hello to Jonathan, Tony, or myself and take a look at everything that we have on display.

We`ve had a busy few weeks again at National Event Supply. After renaming our company back in the spring we finally got around to changing our building signage. The next time you drop by be sure to take good look at our new overhead sign. The sign looks fantastic, if we do say so ourselves. A big thanks to Bob at Whitehorse Signs for helping us make the changes in a cost effective manner. Bob was extremely professional and made sure we kept the proper balance with all the removals and additions that were made to the sign.

We also received a number of shipments in the last week which has helped our inventory position quite dramatically. Last year it was our NES Reliable 8ft rectangular Plastic folding tables that we couldn’t keep in stock, this year it’s been our NES Reliable 6ft rectangular Plastic folding tables. They have been flying off our warehouse shelves just as fast as we’ve been able to get them in. We have finally caught up with the increase in demand and should have lots of all sizes of Plastic folding tables available for the busy fall season.

We just got back from two days of exhibiting at the Alberta Foodservice Expo which was held in the BMO Centre on the grounds of the world renowned Calgary Stampede. Albertans came from all over the province to visit the show. We met with Leanne from the Longshots Sports Bar and Lounge from Fort McMurray, Donald from the Wok Box in Grand Prairie and places I had never heard of before like Greg who is from the Cactus Pub & Grill in Picture Butte, Alberta. Of course there was lots of visitors to our booth from Calgary in attendance and a number made the trip down from Edmonton.

The highlight of the show came when Narry Saini wanted to borrow some National Event Supply plating dishes for his food presentation in the Cooking Competition held during the show. Narry is an Executive Chef with Oh! Canada Restaurant & Bar in Calgary and is also on the board of the Calgary Academy of Chefs & Cooks.

Will (Stayer) and myself had a great time meeting everyone at the show and particularly enjoyed the fresh home-made muffins that Duane from Pearson’s Berry Farm brought around to us just around lunch time on Monday. Duane was one of the fresh and local exhibitors who was just across from our booth. Their Muffins are to die for.

We are looking forward to returning in 2012. There is a possibility it may alternate to Edmonton for 2012 which would give our Northern Alberta customers an easier opportunity to see our products on display as well as meet some of our staff at the show.

On a side note, if you are planning a trip to Calgary, I highly recommend staying at the Westways Guest House. This bed and breakfast is just a 10-minute walk to the south entrance of the Stampede Grounds and is close to downtown as well. There are some great walking paths that travel alongside the Elbow River that are only minutes away from the house and the Calgary Arts District is also very close by. And the breakfast you are provided with in the morning is just amazing. Don and Ross were helping out Jonathan who was away on vacation and the service they provided was just fabulous. Great place to stay and great prices too!