Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

The Chemical Connection: Some Amusing Stories from APEX EXPO

Once again, it’s time for APEX EXPO, a chance to see what’s new in the industry, meet and speak with old friends and colleagues you haven’t seen in a while, and have face-to-face meetings with your suppliers. This last point is especially important for capital equipment suppliers like us, where months or even years might go by without physical contact. So often, contact is just phone calls and emails, and sometimes not even those.

Even if you are not planning on a new capital equipment purchase soon, it doesn’t hurt to drop by a supplier’s booth just to say hello and maintain contact. I can tell you from personal experience that it’s more than welcome, especially toward the end of the show.

Now, let’s get to my favorite APEX EXPO pastime: reminiscing about shows past, because old guys like myself are allowed (or even required) to do this.

My Legs Were Killing Me
I have been to over 40 iterations of APEX EXPO organized by the Global Electronics Association and its predecessors. While there have been some changes, things really haven’t changed much since my first show in 1976, the National Electronics Packaging Conference, later known as NEPCON.

Over the years, my attitude toward attending the show has evolved. The first few shows, for example, were viewed with excitement and anticipation. You were in the spotlight as an expert; people came to you with their difficult questions, and you got to impress them with your wisdom.

You had a special exhibitor badge that allowed you into the exhibit hall two days before the show to set up your booth displays, finishing just hours before the doors opened to the influx of potential customers.

This was heady stuff for a young and naïve process engineer, but it didn’t take too long to realize that, as technical support, I was not to speak until spoken to and under no conditions talk to any potential customers without a sales representative present. This meant a lot of standing around trying to look interested and alert while, at the same time, remaining in earshot of the various discussions that were going on in case my technical expertise was needed, and to make sure the more eager sales reps were not overpromising what could actually be delivered.

By the second day, my feet and legs were killing me from standing all day, and by the third day, I was praying for somebody, anybody, to pose a technical question or problem so I could sit down and relieve my feet and boredom. Needless to say, after a few years I viewed the coming of the show with considerably less excitement and anticipation. Nowadays, to my relief, I can leave show attendance to the younger folk, although not without some regret and sadness.

It's So Magical
It has been common to have some sort of entertainment on hand to attract people into your booth, and for the past several years, we have invited a professional magician. He’s very good, by the way. I’ve stood behind him for years, watching closely, knowing it’s all pattern and misdirection, and I still can’t see how he does it.

Some have questioned whether this is worth the expense, but I remember one year when a teacher at a local technical high school brought her junior high school class to the show as a field trip to introduce them to the high-tech world of circuit boards. They were, of course, fascinated by the magician and spent a good 15 to 20 minutes coaxing him to do every trick he knew while also looking around our booth. There was some grumbling amongst our staff about wasted time, but about 15 years later, I had a call directed to me by our receptionist from a customer with a technical question. It was a young mechanical engineer whose company had a difficult part to manufacture. Funny enough, he had remembered his visit to the show with his eighth grade class and recalled the booth with the magician and this etcher thing. That set him to wondering if his part could be chemically etched. I thought it could be, and we directed him to one of our photochemical machining customers that was near his location. They assured him they could make the part and got the order to manufacture it. It was enough new business that they needed to increase their production and ordered a new etch line. It was a relatively small order, but it proves you never know where a sales lead will come from if you attend the show.

The Not-So-Model Approach
One change probably not apparent unless you have attended the show over a long period of time is “booth babes.” It was once common, you see, for many exhibitors to hire attractive young women through a modeling agency to run the desk in the booth. This was with the obvious intention of attracting the attention of the almost 100% male show attendees. Yes, I know that’s very sexist, but we didn’t know any better at the time. Thankfully, attitudes have changed as the years have passed and there are noticeably more women on the attendees list (although still male dominated) and the women in the booths are there because they know their company’s products and processes.

However, occasionally someone will backslide and hire a model to be present in the booth. I remember one of our technical sales managers coming back from his first day’s reconnaissance of the show, and exclaim with some excitement, “You guys have to see the woman at booth such-and-such. If you want to talk to her, tell her JerBear sent you.” What made this memorable was that he didn’t realize that Mrs. JerBear, who had accompanied him to the show that year, had returned from her own reconnaissance of the show along with two other wives, and was standing right behind him as he extolled the virtues of the young lady. Mrs. JerBear had one of those “We’ll talk about this later, Buster” looks in her eyes. It was most amusing to see how flustered the normally self-assured and exuberant JerBear got when he realized she was there.

Another Story for Another Time
Last year, I concluded my APEX EXPO preview column by saying I had intended to tell the story of being kicked out of Disneyland at one show but that, unfortunately, I had run out of column space, and it would have to wait. I fully intended to include that story in this column but once again, I see I’m out of column space so it will just have to another year.

This column originally appeared in the February 2026 issue of I-Connect007 Magazine.