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Dreams Come True
in Columbus, Ohio
page 1 | page 2 | contents
About the Show
"The show is the largest trade event in the region and benefits everyone working in the restaurant industry-owners, operators, chief executive officers, front-line cooks, managers, and food and beverage managers," said show chairman Ann Reichle of Angelina's Pizza in Olmsted Falls, Ohio. "The show is one-of-kind and brings in people from other states including New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Connecticut, Iowa, and Kentucky."
In addition to more than 400 booths, the excitement of the U.S. Pizza Team trials and the Pizza Pizzazz competition, several informative seminars took place. One was the seminar, "Recession Proof Your Pizza Store" where Marc Slutsky, Marc Ankerman and Ed Zimmerman offered their expertise in helping pizza operators stay in business during tough economic times. Big Dave Ostrander was there, too! In his seminar, "Big Dave Unleashed" he shared some of his easy-to-implement tips to beat the competition with guerrilla marketing strategies and savvy. Other speakers included: Jim Cowler, Divisional Vice President of Buca Di Beppo in Minneapolis; Theodore M. Fowler, FMP, President and CEO of Golden Corral Corporation and Chairman of the National Restaurant Association; Dan Young, CEO of Young's Jersey Dairy and several others.
As usual, PMQ scoured the exhibit floor and found the best ideas of the show and have them here for you, but don't let this be a reason to miss the next show. "With the excitement, the free trips to Italy and the U.S. Pizza Team Trials add, this show is gaining momentum and more of a festival-type atmosphere," says Steve Green, publisher of PMQ Magazine. "All of the Pizza Pizzazz competition spots were filled, we had several competitors for the Dough Stretching competition and had a lot of people gathered around watching all of the festivities. These events add fun to the show." Now let's take a look at the top three ideas from the 2002 Mid-America Pizza Show.
TOP IDEAS FROM
THE MID-AMERICA PIZZA SHOW
Kool Kups (idea 1)
Make messages, logos and images appear, disappear, or change colors with the pour of an ice cold drink. That's right, when you pour a cold beverage into the glass, the temperature change makes hidden messages or logos appear right before your eyes. These are one of the 'koolest' things we've seen in cups. Kool-Koncepts, makers of Kool-Kups, has many different marketing and promotional ideas they can share to help generate customer excitement.
Kool-Koncepts
Paul Wakefield
316 Walnut Street
Lawrenceburg, IN 47025
866-539-4600
Fax: 812-539-4601
paul@kool-koncepts.com
www.kool-koncepts.com
Free appetizers (idea 2)
Appetizers are a great way to increase average ticket sales, but the key to selling new appetizers is getting customers to try them the first time. Another problem is installing expensive vents and hoods if you want to offer fried appetizers. Here's one solution to al of your problems. For a limited time, when you buy an AUTOFRY system, you can get up to $3,700 in free appetizers. The AUTOFRY system is a self-contained frying unit and when you purchase one you get dollar for dollar rebates from the following companies: Brakebush ($5000), Anchor Foods ($2,000), Seawatch ($500) and LambWeston ($700). You can use the rebates to offer free samples to your customers and you have an economical frying solution.
Autofry
Gary Santos
6 Huron Drive
Natick, MA 01760
800-348-2976 ext. 102
Fax: 508-653-1736
gsantos@autofry.com
www.autofry.com
Neon-looking signs without the neon price or problem (Idea 3)
Everyone will admit, neon signs look good, but the problem is neon is expensive and fragile. If you want that neon look, but not the neon price, here's a solution. Menu Master signs by IndoorSigns have a very durable sign that uses colored LED lights to flood an acrylic message area with bright, brilliant color...and it looks as good as neon. Signs can have permanent messages or can be made so you can wipe away the message and write something new. You can set the illumination to be a constant light or make it flash. Colors available are red, blue, green or yellow.
IndoorSigns
812-335-2020
Chad or Andy Baker
www.indoorsigns.com
P.O. Box 2176
Bloomington, IN 47402
