Trade fair season 2018 - A review
Four weeks after the last trade fair, Ambiente in Frankfurt, I'm back in my comfortable office chair in Lübeck, refreshed and ready to share with you over a cup of coffee our story of our trade fair marathon of the past two months. For us urban gardeners, it took us across Germany – from Munich to Hamburg via Essen and finally to Frankfurt, the metropolis on the Main . In concrete terms, that meant four trips: packing fruit crates with produce, loading the van, unloading the van, unpacking the fruit crates , setting up the trade fair stand, dismantling the trade fair stand, loading the van, and, once back in Nordhorn, unloading the van again. Over the years, Jan and Derk have developed their very own system and can now load the van in under 30 minutes! Back in the day, the two of them must have been at least level 14 at Tetris ! (Note from Torge: Derk had to leave a stool behind in Munich...baaaaah!)
These were my first trade fairs ever as an exhibitor – a complete sensory overload of thousands of products, colors, smells, and people from all over the world! We gave away more seed balls than ever before at the trade fairs this year – around 4,000! So we also heard sayings like "Would you like a flower meadow ?" or "May I give you some flowers? Have you heard of seed bombs ?" 4,000 times. But hey, it was all worth it and a lot of fun ! We brought back to Nordhorn plenty of orders and feedback from our customers. A big thank you to all our existing customers for their diligent repeat orders, and of course, a thank you, thank you, thank you, to our new customers for your tremendous enthusiasm and trust in us!
But the other exhibitors also make trade fair life worth living. The guys, for example, have been friends with Julia from Denmark for years. Kreafunk , the company for which Julia travels across Europe to trade fairs, stands for Bluetooth speakers with a Scandinavian design . Minimalistic and at the same time with a very simple attention to detail. Each speaker can be placed in different places thanks to its handy size and stylish leather carrying handles. The speakers are available in different colors and shapes, including a retro look - my favorite - and the sound is really fantastic! The lanyards, which allow you to always have a smartphone charging cable with you, are also very stylish. I think Julia's stand was definitely a highlight of the trade fair! 
"You're ugly and you know it." I don't really like hearing that, but what could I have expected when I unwrapped a black cookie? Jan pressed the " Pechkeks " into my hand on my first day in Hamburg and then introduced me to the crew behind the Pechkeks! The black cookies with their nasty sayings are certainly not entirely innocent of the decision to replace our beautiful, colorful flowers with weeds and little monsters. Our Satan's Garden, the revenge seed bombs , and the nasty meadows celebrated their premieres at the trade fairs ! At Trendset, in the rather stuffy Munich, the Satan's Garden was deemed "not such a schee deifeswerk!" In Hamburg, on the other hand, at Nordstil, the humor was a hit!
Of course, "the ones with the green T-shirts" caused quite a stir at the trade fairs again, and we definitely don't want to keep that from you. The stuffy, dry air at the trade fair is to blame, well, probably also the good gin and tonic from the friendly bartender at the booth next door (thanks to the graphic workshop!) and the usual trade fair madness, yes, and then there was that booth with the inflatable sharks, donuts, and flamingos, and those oh-so-tempting treadmills.
By the way, at the trade fair in Frankfurt, it feels like it takes 1.5 hours to get from the main entrance in Hall 1 to our booth in Hall 11.1. Finally, it's worth mentioning: we were nominated for Ambiente's Ethical Style Guide, and we're really proud of that!
Best regards,
Your Lotta
