Is New Hope Prejudiced Against Bloggers?

At Expo, one can enter the show’s doors as either an exhibitor selling products, a buyer looking for products to order, a retailer looking to make deals, a consumer who’s there to do their own thing, or as a person who is associated with a media source, looking for either a story or to sell ad space in a publication. I fall under the media category, and my show badge bears the label of “Press” under my name and title. I’ve attended the show as Press two years in a row, and I value Expo as an important source of information about what’s great and what’s not. Expo provides me with a good basis for the information that I pass along to you guys.

But, according to one pert and unpleasant New Hope employee, it is going to get harder for me to attend next year. New Hope Natural Media is the company that organizes and runs ExpoWest, ExpoEast, Biofach, and several other shows. They are known for being difficult to work with and for being intensely legalistic, though I must say that I and some of my family members have worked with individuals at the company who have been extremely helpful and kind. With that being said, I think those people are the exception that proves the rule. But the pert, unpleasant woman I mentioned above? I can guarantee you that she’s no exception.

Here’s what happened*: when I walked downstairs at the convention center to collect my Press badge, I was given a thorough lecture by this woman about how blogs that aren’t a legit source of income for their authors won’t be considered a valid media outlet come next year’s registration time. She said that exhibitors pay a lot of money to show at Expo (which is true), and that they’re here to make deals, not to chat with troublesome bloggers who aren’t running a “commercially viable” outlet. She said that I was bound to be viewed as undesirable waste of time to those who exhibit on the show floor. To illustrate her point, she told the tale of how she had just seen a meeting between an exhibitor and a retailer rudely interrupted by a media source who intruded by wedging their camera crew into the booth and shoving a camera in the exhibitor’s face. I agreed that this was indeed rude, though when I pressed her about who had done the intruding, it turned out that it had been a reporter from a respected, widely-circulated, “commercially viable” media source. So… why was she using it as an example? I took a good look at her: the woman’s face conveyed disapproval, her nose slightly turned down at the thought of bloggers circulating the show floor, bringing with them pestilence and plague. In short, she was judging me. She was judging bloggers as a whole, and letting me know that New Hope didn’t approve of them, either. I decided that there was nothing I could say to change her mind, so I let her finish her lecture. When she was finished, I thanked her for my badge, and walked away.

Though I didn’t show it, I was upset. Who was she, or New Hope, for that matter, to decide that bloggers don’t belong on the show floor? Why does a media source have to be “commercially viable” in order to provide value to those who exhibit at Expo? Don’t they know that blogs provide access to the most desirable demographic, the trend-setters? And for FREE? Despite knowing the answers to these questions, the pert woman’s comments still shook me a little bit. What if nobody wanted to talk to me this year? Was she right, was I just a nuisance, a waste of the exhibitors’ time?

The answer was no. I had a great show, and plenty of people were willing (excited, even) to talk to me about their products and practices. One broker even told me that he’d send me all of his clients’ products for review, provided that I allowed him to see a preview of the posts because of their educational value to his clients. This, and all of the other great interactions I had at the show, prove to me that there is definitely a place for bloggers at Expo. That’s not to say that there weren’t plenty of booths that I perceived as being uninterested in talking to me; through experience I’ve learned to avoid these booths, thus preventing a waste of time for everyone involved. I understand that some exhibitors really do just want to make deals at the show; if that’s how they get a return on the investment in their booth space, then more power to them.

But there are still plenty of companies who are glad to talk to competent bloggers with a decent readership. When a person at Pixie Mate, or Juniper Ridge, or Wholemato or Hugo or gDiaper takes the time to talk to a blogger at the show, they’re reaching not one, but hundreds or perhaps thousands of people at once. If any company at Expo doesn’t want to talk to a good blogger for any reason other than a financial one, perhaps it’s because they don’t want what they have to say to get exposed on the internet. Any company that’s worth their booth space will be willing to chat with a blogger about their products without feeling any apprehension.

And as far as the issue of commercial viability goes, my feeling is that blogs who aren’t selling any direct ad space are perceived by readers as having less of a bias, and therefore offer a more trustworthy opinion. In my case, I don’t owe nothin’ to nobody, so I’m free to tell you guys what I REALLY think. If I give a good review to a new product, you can be sure it’s because I really, truly love it. And what kind of company doesn’t want that kind of press?

So, if you’re a blogger and you are passionate about natural and organic foods, my advice is to register for next year’s ExpoWest. There are plenty of traditional media sources at the show, so let’s balance the scale and show the folks at New Hope that there is value to be found in a blog write-up. Good press is good press, and free press is even better. Let’s show New Hope that there are plenty of sources of “new media” besides sites like iVillage, where today I see that they have a video titled “Britney Spears’ Sitcom Surprise.” If that’s what New Hope considers to be commercially viable media, then I hope that they consider me to be an utter failure.

*UPDATE: The woman I’ve mentioned above has contacted me. Though I stand by my point of view and I look forward to discussing it with her, I would like to make it clear that this post is about my impression of our interaction. As always on The Sustainable Scoop, I’m writing about my opinion, so take it for what it’s worth. With that said, I still believe that New Hope has a long way to come until they grasp what exactly blogs are all about. Let’s hope they “get it” before next year.