PR and Marketing for NeoCon Exhibitors.
The manufacturers who get the most out of NeoCon start in January. What they build in the five months before the show is what is still working in September.
We are on the floor at the Mart and in Fulton Market every June, and have been inside this industry for seventeen years.
THE SHOW
NeoCon is not one show.
Permanent showrooms that run year-round sit in the same building as exhibitors who build and strike inside of a week. The Mart runs vertically, so a floor number shapes who walks in as much as a booth design does. Fulton Market Design Days runs its own calendar and its own footprint to the west, with its own openings, parties and editor routes.
Two events but the industry books one trip.
Planning against how the week actually behaves, rather than against the official show calendar, is what decides whether a brand is in front of the right editors and the right specifiers while they are in town.
THE CALENDAR
4 days in June. 12 months of work.
Award entries are written against deadlines that do not move, the earliest of them in March. Pre-show editorial is pitched into issues that publish before anyone travels. All of it needs the story settled in January, which is why the exhibitors who do well have decided what they are saying before the booth drawings are final.
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January to March
The story, the sector, the campaign strategy, award submissions open
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March to May
Press kit, pre-show editorial, award deadlines, booth and tour design, media training, campaign build
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June
Editor appointments, showroom tours, press events, live social, on-site management
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June to August
Editor follow-up, post-show coverage, segmented outreach
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October to December
The debrief, next year's launch calendar, editor relationships carried forward
Our Trade Show Services
The function almost no manufacturer staffs.
Every editor at NeoCon has more building to cover than hours to cover it in. What earns a visit is a reason to come and a story that lines up with something the editor is already writing that season.
A collection developed with an outside designer is something an editor can write about. So is a workplace manufacturer's first product for education, because it marks a move into a new category. A finish on its own is not. Finding that angle, and holding the editor relationships that make the appointment possible in the first place, is year-round work.
The press list has widened. Fast Company has covered the show, alongside the trade titles that decide specification.
We build the press kit and the appointment schedule, and brief the people running the tours, so the editor covering education gets the education story and the one covering healthcare gets a different one.
Not every NeoCon award is judging your product.
Best of NeoCon is the one everyone knows, the official product awards program since 1990.
The other two judge the space and the people. The IIDA Showroom and Booth Design Competition judges the design of permanent showrooms, temporary booths and pop-up exhibitors. A jury is judging the booth design itself, which is why it earns a creative brief in the winter, not just a fabrication spec in the spring. Interior Design's HiP Awards has categories for people as well as products, and it is the only one of the three that can put a leader's name in the coverage.
We write the submissions across all three, for the products and the people going out that year, against the categories where they can actually win.
A booth is not a campaign.
The exhibitors people can describe afterward decided what the year was about in advance and said that one thing everywhere. A booth showing the full catalog leaves the visitor to work out the point.
Most of what June is worth is decided months earlier, on a brand's owned channels. The contact data has to be primed so the designers who will be in the building can be reached, and social and email need to run against the launch calendar instead of starting the week before.
Then the show ends on a Wednesday, and most of the industry's follow-up goes out that Friday as one list to every badge scanned. The decisions NeoCon influences happen later, when a project comes up and someone remembers a name or product, and that is where most manufacturers fall short.
We run the channels in the months before the show and the outreach in the months after.
Specifiers are planning their route through the Mart in an AI tool.
The show's own directory is alphabetical. Anyone planning by category, acoustic products, or ergonomic seating, is asking an AI tool instead, and the answer it returns is built from editorial coverage, award lists, structured websites, and even social media.
That is what makes June compound. The coverage and the award wins stay published, so one June's work is what puts a brand in the answer the following spring, when the next round of planning starts.
We do not run this as a separate workflow. It is the same awards, marketing campaigns, content marketing, and press placements, written so AI tools reads them as well as an editor does.
CASE STUDY
Teknion
9 editor appointments across Design Days.
9 placements in the design press.
THE CHALLENGE. Teknion had moved its Chicago showroom to Fulton Market and was launching Aarea, a chair designed with Pearson Lloyd, in a week when editors were splitting their hours between the Mart and Fulton Market.
THE APPROACH. We concentrated editor visits into a dedicated press day instead of spreading them across the week, and built an interactive press experience with a passport-style map that walked guests through eleven product touch points.
THE RESULTS. Nine placements, including Interior Design, Metropolis, officeinsight, Azure and Business of Home, plus a Metropolis Likes award for Aarea and increased foot traffic to the Fulton Market showroom.
"From fleshing out weekend activations to setting up strategically-timed editor appointments that maximize the amount of foot traffic into the Fulton Market showroom, UpSpring has become a reliable and trusted partner in helping to build up our design trade show presence year after year."
Oona Walsh, Senior Director, Corporate Marketing | Teknion
Frequently asked questions.
What does a PR agency do for NeoCon exhibitors?
A PR agency working NeoCon for a product manufacturer covers three stretches of the calendar. Before the show it settles the story behind each launch, writes the award submissions, builds the press kit, and pitches editorial into the issues that publish before the doors open. During the show it runs editor appointments and showroom tours and handles press on the floor. Afterward it follows up with editors and works the post-show roundups.
What does a marketing agency do for NeoCon exhibitors?
Marketing for NeoCon starts months before the show and runs several channels at once. It means priming the website and the contact data so the designers who will be in the building can be reached, and running social, email, and paid against the launch calendar rather than starting the week before. Afterward the follow-up goes out segmented, so it reaches people individually rather than as one list.
For a first-time exhibitor or a new line it can also mean a compressed go-to-market: positioning, messaging, booth materials, and landing pages built together.
How should a manufacturer choose a PR or marketing agency for NeoCon?
Ask three questions with checkable answers. First, which editors did you host at the Mart and in Fulton Market last June, and what ran from it. An agency that works the show answers with names of people and publications. Second, which award entries did you write last cycle, and in which categories. Third, what happens in July. If the answer stops when the show does, so does the program, and nobody is working the months where specification gets decided.
When should we start planning for NeoCon?
January at the very latest for both, earlier if a new product line or a new sector is involved. They start from the same decision: what the year is about, which sector the launch is aimed at, and what the show has to produce for the business. Media relations then runs against external deadlines, since award entries open in early spring and editorial is pitched into spring issues. The campaign runs from the same brief, settling the audience, the channels, what the space has to do and how the follow-up works before any of it gets built. A March start means going without the pre-show editorial window, and building a campaign around decisions already made for you.
What is the difference between NeoCon and Fulton Market Design Days?
NeoCon takes place at the Mart and is produced separately from Design Days, which runs in the Fulton Market district the same week with its own showrooms, openings and programming. The industry treats the two as one trip, and editors and specifiers split their time between them.
Which awards can a NeoCon exhibitor enter?
Three programs, judging different things. Best of NeoCon is the official awards program for new products from exhibiting companies, running since 1990, judged by architects, designers, specifiers and facility managers plus a separate Business Impact Jury of journalists. The IIDA Showroom and Booth Design Competition at NeoCon judges the design of the space itself. Interior Design's HiP Awards covers people as well as products.
How do you get editors to visit a booth or showroom?
By giving them a reason to come that the product cannot supply on its own: a story connected to something already on their calendar, a launch with a named design collaborator, or a first product in a new sector. A press day concentrates visits into a window instead of scattering them across four days. The people running the tours have to be able to carry the story.
How is NeoCon success measured, if not by badge scans?
Badge scans measure traffic past a scanner, not interest, and many attendees decline the scan. More useful measures tie to what the show is for: editor appointments held and coverage that ran, award wins that stay published, conversations with specifiers at named firms, and specification activity in the two quarters after. A trade show is one of the few investments where a company sets its own definition of success.
What if this is our first year exhibiting?
The first year is mostly decisions: where to be, what to launch, what the space needs to do, and which events are worth the time. We work with first-time exhibitors on the launch messaging, the showroom experience, the press materials, and a realistic target list of editors for year one.
When is NeoCon 2027?
NeoCon 2027 runs June 13-16, 2027, at the Mart in Chicago.
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