How would this work?

Hi, everyone!

I went yesterday to a special business "Howdy". It was spectacular. It is basically just a group of businesses that pay to set up a table in the city convention hall, and give away advertising specialties & have contests. (My daughter won an mp-3 player, in fact.) Bush's chicken showed up to have a (no cost) chicken feed, too. They gave away lots of product samples, the massage parlor (or is that the word for it nowadays, lol?) came out & was giving out free massages, etc. You name it & it was there.

I have been to job fairs, etc but not ever that I can recall there being just a "businesses meet the people" type of thing like this. I think it is unique and very interesting, not to mention lucrative...there were about 100-150 businesses set up at ours, at least. In the flyer that went out about it, it said that it was there for the businesses to meet all the new people moving into town & vice versa. They had it broken down into the demographics as to how many 18-34 year olds there were of "impressionable ages" in town.

I'd be interested to hear the pros & cons from your point of view, if you've ever saw this type of set up before in your home town & how much trouble you think it would be to set up. I'd be interested in doing it in other cities around the nation. I've done a job fair before and basically all we did was sell the space & rent the hall - and done. This one, I might add, just went from 10am - 2pm and closed, yet it is hugely popular here! So much contests, food and fun! (They even had a rock climbing wall out for kids and adults alike!)

Ok, well, I'll close and wait for your opinions.

Thanks,

Bea