Blog

This is the fourth year that we've exhibited at the BC Foodservice Expo. In past years we've seen a lot of cool things and met a lot of interesting people. This year we've been looking through the exhibitor list, the seminars, and other events that are being held and have picked out the three that we're most excited by.

The first thing that we're going to want to visit is the Coffee Roasters section located right beside the BC Chef's Association Hot Chefs Competition stage. Our Trade Show team is passionate about their coffee and I know they're going to want to explore that area and learn all that they can about the art of roasting coffee as well as sample the brews available. If you're passionate about your coffee, I'd highly recommend visiting the exhibitors and learning how good coffee can be. And if you need larger coffee mugs to serve your customers their morning caffeine jolt, we have you covered with coffee cups in 10oz, 16oz, and 20oz sizes. We also have cappuccino bowls.

Second on our list of things to see is the Winery and Microbrewery Section located right beside the seminar stage. Who wouldn't want to visit booths where you can sample some of BC's finest wines. And no one on the Trade Show team is going to say no to trying an interesting microbrew. If there's one thing the trade show team like more than good coffee, it's an ice cold beer. And if you happen to be looking for something to serve the wine in, we have our Serenity Crystal Stemware, our Copa Glass Stemware, and our Eclisse Glass Stemware. We also have beer glasses available in our Eclisse Line.

Finally, we highly recommend checking out the BC Chef of the Year Roasted Competition, The BC Chinese Chef of the Year Competition and the Hot Competition! Junior Chef Challenge. I have to admit that I spent an inordinate amount of time watching the Food Network over the Christmas Holidays (12 hour Iron Chef America Marathon? Don't mind if I do!). This is just like the Food Network, only live! We've been lucky of the past couple of years and our booth has been right next to the stage so we've been able to see a lot of the competition. If you need a break from visiting booths and are interested in seeing top chefs' techniques and meal ideas, this is an incredible way to spend some time.

If you're at the show, we hope you'll stop by our booth (138 & 140) and take a look at our products. We'll be showing off Polar White which is an incredible dinnerware line which we've just introduced. In addition, we'll have our other dinnerware and flatware lines available for viewing. Hope to see you at the show!

Coffee Cup Image courtesy of digitalart / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

This Saturday we were exhibiting at the Canadian Rental Association's Ontario Tabletop show which was held at the Nottawasaga Inn & Resort in Aliston, Ontario. While the show was held in a tabletop format we were still able to show off a number of our latest new product lines. We presented our new Wing Bowls (which have been hard to keep in stock), our latest dinnerware line, Polar White, as well as our Serenity Crystal stemware and Eclisse Glass stemware. Combined with our Tabletop and Table & Chair catalogues resulted in a full showing for our booth.

Bill and I were busy throughout the day meeting with a number of our customers including Mike from Happening Party Rentals, Collingwood and Christian from Totally Covered Events, Aliston each stopping by to check out our new Crystal Stemware and discuss some of the attributes of our NES Reliable Line of Plastic Folding Tables. We wrapped up the show with a long chat with Paul from Location Equipment Supply, Toronto about our extensive NES Reliable line of Plastic Folding Tables and Chairs including our NES Reliable 6ft Fold in Half Tables.

After the show everyone headed into the banquet hall at the Nottawasaga Inn Resort where we enjoyed a cocktail (or two) before sitting down for a superb dinner. We were served a Butternut Squash soup with a maple glazed breaded topping, a mixed greens salad with radicchio and spiced walnuts and for the finale we enjoyed Pan-seared pork tenderloin with a peach mango & chipotle glaze, with wild & white rice pilaf. The entire meal from start to finish was simply delicious.

To wrap up the evening we were entertained by Hart Entertainment with ‘Game Show Mania’, a quiz show where many of us were invited to be participants in the quiz based show. Contestants are asked simple well known everyday questions and raced to hit their buttons to be the first to answer. In the picture above we see Colin Wilson with his daughter Lauren (World of Rentals, Kingston), Paul Potvin (Location Equipment Supply, Toronto and CRA Ontario 2nd Vice President), Mike Maltby (Ingersoll Rentals and CRA Ontario President) and Gary Webb (LB White, Tampa). Paul and Gary were finalists in the contest with Paul becoming the eventual winner of the grand prize, half of the 50/50 pot that had been collected throughout the evening.

After the game show, Mike Maltby presented some awards including the Image Award to Hank from Tim’s Party Centre, Bowmanville and the Rental Store of the year was presented to Paul at Location Equipment Supply, Toronto. Wacker Nuesen were presented with the Ontario CRA Supplier of the year Award. Jeff Campbell the incoming CRA National President spoke briefly and noted the Canadian Rental Association was sponsoring a PR program that is available to all Members and Associate Members of the CRA. Since Jeff is being appointed CRA National President next month at 2013 Rental Show in Las Vegas, the PR firm used this as an opportunity to spread the news in Jeff’s local St. Thomas community. Jeff is now a celebrity throughout the community and has seen a nice jump in visits to his store, St. Thomas Rent-All.

Hank from Tim's Party Centre	Paul from Location Equipment Supply

Our Next Trade Show has us heading back out to the west coast for the BC Foodservice Expo on January 27 and 28, 2013. If you aren't going to be able to see us at a show, why not request our catalogue to see what we have in stock!

It's been a little over a month since we posted our last stress test video blog on our NES Reliable Square Plastic Folding Card Table. It's taken us a little time to get back into the swing of things, but we have a new stress test video—this time starring our Tall NES Reliable Round Plastic Folding Cocktail Tables. We love this high top table and are frequently asked just how much weight it will hold—so now it is time to find out! How much weight will it take to cause the high top table to collapse? Will Dennis make our Resin Chiavari Chair Collapse when he stands on it holding a 20kg bag of road salt?? Can I come up with a third question that's halfway reasonable??? Apparently not, but you should watch the video and find out just what it takes to break a Tall NES Reliable Round Plastic Folding Cocktail Table!

Now that you've see just how strong our NES Reliable Round Plastic Folding Cocktail Tables are, if you have any questions about them, please feel free to contact one of our incredible sales reps. They'd be happy to answer any questions you might have about our Cocktail tables or any of our other fine products!

Image courtesy of Grant Cochrane / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The National Event Supply trade show team just got back from BC where we were exhibiting at the CRA BC Regional show which took place at the Cloverdale Rodeo Show Barn. The show took place over two days running from 4pm to 9pm on Friday and from 10am to 3pm on Saturday. We had a substantially larger booth than last year which took Jonathan, Tony and myself a good part of the day to get set up. This year the show had a section of the hall set aside exclusively for the Party and Event side of the rental business, a rare occurrence for a regional show like this.

In the Party and Events section, Impact Canopies showed off their Sky Flags and Branded pop-up tents, LB White and Patron Heaters had a section dedicated to tent heaters, Wacker Nueson displayed one of their Generators and AE Sales had their Granite Industries Staging Solution. We rounded out the Party and Event section with a large display including our porcelain dinnerware, cutlery, glassware, chiavari chairs, black and white resin folding chairs, bistro chairs, and of course our always popular plastic folding tables, wood folding tables, and plastic folding chairs. With the expanded booth we were able to show most of our lines of porcelain including our always popular Quadrato Square dishes, our Ovali dish line and our new Polar White dinnerware line. We were also able to show a number of new items including several sizes of wing bowls, sloped bowls, and cappuccino cups. Based on the feedback we received, many of the attendees were pleased with our wide range of rental ready products.

 

After dinner there were a few brief speeches from Jeff Campbell who is the incoming CRA National President (of St. Thomas Rent-All) and Paul Kenyon, the ARA Region 10 representative (Absolute Tent and Event Rentals). As always the BC Regional CRA put together a fantastic event that is always great to be a part of. We look forward to seeing many of them at the show next year as well as at The Rental Show in Las Vegas in February.

 

We’re back in Vancouver in less than 2 weeks for the BC Foodservice Expo which will be taking place at the Vancouver Convention Centre. But before we head back west, we’re doing the CRA Ontario Tabletop Show which takes place January 19, 2013 at the Nottawasaga Resort in Alliston, Ontario. We are looking forward to seeing our Ontario Rental customers and relaxing with a beer after the show.

When we put together our Table and Chair Catalogue it was a huge undertaking. We spent the better part of 2011 taking pictures of all of our products and cleaning up the pictures for publication. We wrote copy for the catalogue, describing our outstanding products, and providing reasons for you, the customer, to purchase our fine wares. We learned a lot of software, and spent time looking for companies to print our first stab at a catalogue. When the catalogue came out we were thrilled. We finally had something we could put into the hands of customers and potential customers.

And then, shortly after we received the catalogues, they started going out of date. We started adding to our product lines, expanding our offerings. There were new folding chairs, new folding tables, new chair carts, and new dollies. We had expanded our product lines, offering chairs in new colours. There were new cushions for our resin chiavari chairs, and a blow-mold stacking chair too.

Luckily, in mid 2012, Stephanie joined our team and we put her to work revising our table and chair catalogue. She added the new products we already had in our warehouse and included products that we were expecting for spring 2013. Stephanie worked hard on the 2013 Table and Chair catalogue, and now I'm pleased to announce that the 2013 Table and Chair Catalogue is available!

This 28 page catalogue contains all the products that we are offering in our Toronto, Vancouver, and Indianapolis Warehouses. It includes all of our plastic folding tables, our wood folding tables, our plastic folding cocktail tables, and our wood cruiser tables. You'll find information about our Plastic Folding Chairs, learn about our resin chiavari chairs, and be the first to see our NEW Folding Pedestal Tables.

Now that the 2013 Table and Chair Catalogue is complete, Stephanie has begun working on putting together our 2013 Tabletop Catalogue and hopes to have it finished shortly. She is also putting together a 2013 French Catalogue which we hope will be later this spring. If you interested in receiving one of our new 2013 Table and Chair Catalogues, please fill out this form and we'll have one sent out to you as quickly as possible. If you have any questions about any of our products, or would like to talk to one of our sales reps, please don't hesitate to contact us. We're always happy to help with all of your needs!