SIA Denver: Day 1 and 2

I am currently in Denver for round two of the SIA tradeshow. I went with Rome again this year so it was great to see everyone again and get another inside look at the company and product.

Day one started off rough. I planned to wake up at 7:00am, ride to Silverthorne to meet up with Steve, and try to be in Denver nice and early to meet up with Rome and help them start setting up the booth. Unfortunately, I somehow screwed up my alarm, and didn't end up waking up unitl 9:30am to Steve calling me and wondering where I am. We didn't get on the road unitl 10 and got to Silverthorne around noon. My friend Kayleigh gave me ride, so I hooked her up with some gas and delicious Burger King. From there Steve and I rolled out to Denver and arrived around 1:30pm. After having major parking issues, we made it to the Denver Convention Center.

We went to registration, got our passes, and headed in... and immediately got lost. We wondered around the main floor of the Convention Center for at least 20 minutes before calling Ron, the guy who hired us, and found out the whole show was on the second floor. So we headed upstairs, passed through security into the show... and got lost. The SIA show is huge. Plus the ski section is right inside the doors, so we didn't really recognize any of the companies. After wondering around and running into some friends from CMC who are working for Nomis/Technine/Sound Outerwear, we found a map and realized Rome was on the opposite end of the show. We finally rolled up to the Rome booth fashionably late around 2:30pm. We apologized for being late but they didn't even care, they were just stoked to have more free help. It also turned out that David, a fellow CMCer, was working for Rome as well. So after saying whats up to everyone and catching up a bit, we got to work.

Th day was filled with putting up walls in the booth, painting a bunch of the walls since they're white and have gotten quite beat up over the years. We also had to unload a few things from Home Depot out of the Rome van, but other than that, the day was pretty short since we got there so late. From the show, we went out to eat with the Rome guys to catch up a bit at an amazing local burger joint called Cherry Cricket.

After gubbing, it was time to finally meet up with our buddy Chuck and get to his Burton-paid-for hotel. Unfortunately, he was out with the Burton crew, so Steve and I decided to meet up with his buddy Carson at DU. But just our luck, we got incredibly lost. After driving around for at least a half hour, most of those minutes Steve spent on the phone with Carson trying to navigate the mess of one ways, we finally made it. We chilled there for a couple hours before Chuck called us and we finally made it to the hotel, and thankfully the ride back went a lot smoother.

We are staying at the Mariott Residence Inn about 4 blocks from the tradeshow. It is super nice, Burton definitely hooks their interns up. I'm not complaining about Rome since all of us interns are getting a board and bindings, but this hotel is awesome. We were all crazy exhausted from the day, so we passed right out when we got to the hotel, excited to get back to work in the morning.

Day 2 started nice and early at 8:00am when we got up for the Mariott's delicious complimentary breakfast, then rolled out at 8:45am. Little did we know, but today was going to be a VERY long day. We got there at 9 and immediately went to work. We spent a crazy amount of the day painting the entire booth as well as setting up a back room full of shelves for everyones stuff during the show. Ron and the owner of Rome, Josh, spent close to 10 hours putting up vinyl stickers on their signs and walls of the booth with some sick graphic displays. Even thought that doesn't sound like that much work, all the random jobs throughout the day added up to a 11 hour day, 9am - 8pm, but we got the booth very ready for the product coming in the next day.

After the show, we went out to dinner with the Rome guys again, but this time we switched the style up and got cultured. We went to a restaurant called Little India, which doesn't sound to authentic, but it turned out to be the opposite. I ordered Lamb Saag, which I still don't know what it is, but it was delicious. When the food came out, most of us were surprised to see that all our food came out in bowls and looked like dipping sauce. After that came the delicious bread and rice, and from there the dinner got phenominal. I learned you were supposed to pile the rice and dish on the bread and eat it almost like a taco. This still might not be the correct way to eat Indian food, but it worked out well for us.

Since it was crazy hard to get up from the table after an 11 hour day, I passed right out when we got back to the hotel after a much needed shower, ready to do it all again the next day. Peace.