Chris Gassner | March 29, 2026 |
There’s something magical about exhibitions. Not the romantic kind of magic… more like the kind where you walk in voluntarily and, somewhere between hall 3 and hall 7, start questioning every decision that led you here. It begins a few days before. People arrive from all over the world, carrying optimism, jetlag, and at least one missing component that was “definitely packed.” There might be a big team meeting. Or just a collective feeling that someone, somewhere, probably has a plan.
Then comes setup day. A masterpiece of controlled chaos. The hall looks like a battlefield made of cardboard, cables, and broken promises. Panels leaning, wires hanging, tools gone missing like they joined another company. And until the very last second before opening… there is always one more thing. One more cable. One more screw. One more “this should have been finished yesterday.” You literally see people still pushing screwdrivers through walls while security is already looking at their watch. And then… transformation. Suddenly everyone looks like a corporate brochure. Shirts ironed, smiles activated, posture upgraded. Quick group photo, because five minutes later someone will walk straight through it like it’s a tourist attraction. And then… the doors open. Day one. It’s full. Loud. Alive. Energy everywhere. Handshakes, business cards, QR codes flying around like confetti. Everyone is sharp, motivated, still believing this is going to be the exhibition. You check competitors casually… just a quick look… just a harmless comparison… just a tiny bit of industrial espionage disguised as curiosity.
Then evening. Dinner. Officially a relaxed team dinner. In reality a mixture of recovery, networking, and quiet emotional processing. Some celebrate, some drink, some stare into their plate like they are trying to reconnect with their former life. And then… day two. You wake up and your body negotiates terms. Energy reduced. Motivation slightly damaged. Maybe a headache, maybe just a deep feeling that you have already lived a full week. The crowd is thinner. The gaps get longer. And that’s when it starts. You begin to walk. At first casually. Then more. Then you realize you are doing laps like a confused racehorse in a very expensive maze. And everywhere you go… the same sentence. Hello my friend… do you have WeChat. Name card. Please come in… just have a look. You are wearing an exhibitor badge the size of a dinner plate. It clearly says you are not a customer. Doesn’t matter. You will be invited, pulled, almost adopted into every booth. Every single time. You pass once… they call you. You pass again ten minutes later… they call you again like it’s your first meeting. By now you know their pitch better than they do. And without realizing it… congratulations… you hit your 10,000 steps. Not because you wanted to be healthy. Because you were escaping conversations. Then the phone comes out. Scrolling. Calling the company. We need that sample… urgently… tomorrow latest. The sample arrives. The customer doesn’t. Perfect balance. Somewhere in between, things start breaking. A demo stops working. Something that was perfect yesterday suddenly decides it has retired early. No panic. You fix it. You improvise. You pretend this was always part of the concept.
Day three. The mood changes. It’s quieter now. Almost peaceful… in a slightly depressing, end of party way. You already know every corner, every booth, every competitor. You know their products, their faces, their weaknesses, and unfortunately their music. Because every booth has its own soundtrack. And it has been playing non stop. For days. At some point you don’t hear it anymore… you are it. You know exactly when the beat drops, when the logo appears, when the fake happy factory workers smile into the camera. You could probably perform their presentation better than them. And you hate it. Deeply.
Now let’s talk about food. Because food at an exhibition is not food. It is a survival strategy. A biological agreement that says this will not bring you joy, but it will prevent you from collapsing somewhere between hall 5 and hall 8. You get a plastic box with something inside. It has a color. It has structure. It might even be warm. But taste is optional. This is not lunch. This is maintenance. You eat it not because you want to, but because your body threatens to shut down if you don’t. And five minutes later you already forgot what you just ate, which is probably for the best. Back to the stand. Feet hurting. Energy gone. Conversations shorter. More efficient. Slightly robotic. Still smiling. Always professional. Inside… already mentally packing your suitcase.
And then comes the final phase. Waiting. You look at the clock. Again. And again. And again. Nothing happens anymore. And that’s when the real transformation begins. The entire exhibition falls in love with smartphones. Not casually. Not a little. Completely. People stand at their beautifully designed booths and stare into their screens as if the meaning of life is hidden somewhere between two notifications. Scrolling. Typing. Swiping. With a level of focus no customer has ever received in the last three days. Conversations fade out mid-sentence because something more important has appeared on the display. From the outside, the whole hall starts to look like a modern ghost city. Everyone is still there… but mentally already gone, slowly drifting into their screens, just waiting for that one final moment when they are allowed to leave. And when it finally comes… it is not a gentle ending. It is collapse. Walls down. Products packed. Cables ripped out. Within minutes, the perfect stand turns back into boxes and dust like it never existed.
And then it’s over. Everything disappears as fast as it came, and you stand there wondering if this was an exhibition… or some kind of social experiment to see how long humans can survive on bad food, fake smiles, and repeated WeChat requests.
Chris Gassner
March 29, 2026