ABA Thursday - Wow…what a day!

February 6, 2009 by Chris Harrower, CTIS.

Thursday morning in Charlotte dawned early and cold, but it’s back to the floor for more floor tours, and more walking (but only about 3.5 miles today).  It’s the first “real” day of Marketplace, and things are really starting to hop!

But you can feel the effects of the economy…while attendance for the week was on par with past years, people are starting to come more for just their appointment day, and not staying for the week.  Personally, I think this is a mistake, and we need to help our supervisors understand that you might get away with that at some of the other shows, but ABA (and some of the others “big” shows) is different.  I do as much business at the meals and social events as I do on the business floor. So it’s still important to get as much face time as you can at this show.

Kudos to Philadelphia for a great opening luncheon.  I was never a huge fan of Harold Melvin & The Bluenotes (and I was surprised how many “kids” at my table at lunch who knew nothing about them!), but they were tremendous!  I knew more of their songs than I expected, and ended up doing a nice duet with Cynthia from Birmingham on one of the songs (she wanted to get up and dance, but the guys on stage had smooth down pat, and I would have looked more of a jerk than usual if I had tried!).  I could have done without Mr. Smith’s welcome, especially when he called attention to how cheap our beloved State is right now, but it can’t all be perfect.  I know that Ryan and his team will do an excellent job in a couple of years in the City of Brotherly Shove!

Back to the floor for more tours, then it’s time for the evening event.  A high school marching band welcomed us to dinner, and NC did a nice job, with some really good food.  But our minds were on something else.  It’s Bowling Time!  All the smack talk comes to an end tonight, as we hopped on the buses (glad I didn’t try to walk down to Strike City, as that’s NOT where we ended up going!  Whoopsie…).  Did we have fun?  You bet.  Did we roll the ball down the lane? Certainly.  Did we stink up the joint?  Of course!  I never promised we’d win, but we had a ton of fun.

For me, the highlight came later in the evening…the entire event was a benefit for Carolina Breast Friends, and the Pink House they’re building to help Breast Cancer patients.  The entire story of Kristy Adams-Ebel was very moving, and her husband continues the work after living a very difficult life, losing a bunch of family members in a very short time span. The whole time Chris, her husband, was talking, I kept thinking of my teammate and hero, Gwen Elmore, who was sitting there at the table with me.  I wanted to go meet him after he spoke, and introduce him to my friend, but we had to keep moving.

During the bowling, to my surprise, Chris came around the lanes, and thanked everyone personally.  So I DID get to introduce him to Gwen, and they had a very nice chance to talk.  It was very moving, and I think they both appreciated it.  I know I did.

That’s what is so important about an event like this.  A city like Charlotte pays a lot of money, and invests thousands of man-hours in planning and implementing something like an ABA Marketplace.  We can (and should) give something back to our host city for all they do for us, yet I would say that only maybe 25% of the people in attendance at Marketplace actually came out and supported the bowling event.  Don’t get me wrong…we raised over $16,000 for CBF, and that’s phenomenal.  But what could have happened if more people had participated?  Maybe next year…

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