Spotlight : Toad&Co Outdoor Retailer Summer 2018 Booth
There are tons of companies jumping on the sustainable/eco-friendly/upcycled/[insert additional buzzwords here] bandwagon because it’s all the rage and is a good way to gain some public favor. Amidst all the noise of these wannabe greenies, there stands a company that is walking the walk . . . or should we say recycling the recyclable. This mackenzie EXHIBIT Spotlight is dedicated to the one and only Toad&Co and everything they (and their award-winning booth) stand for.
Put Your Money Where Your Values Are
Plenty of companies incorporate sustainability into their workplace through providing recycling bins, using upcycled office materials and furniture, etc. — but very few carry that commitment through to their trade show booths. Trade show booths are all about saving weight, ease of assembly/disassembly, and beautiful aesthetics, but until now the green movement hadn’t quite caught up to this space. Enter: Toad&Co and mackenzie EXHIBIT, a match made in environmentally-conscious heaven.
It’s one thing to create a trade show booth that is made from sustainable materials — it’s an entirely different undertaking to make it beautiful. Thanks to the dedication and imagination of the team here at mackenzie EXHIBIT paired with the unwavering commitment of Toad&Co, we were able to deliver a newsworthy and enviable trade show booth design that made a minimal impact on the planet’s natural resources. Read on to learn more about the specific elements we incorporated to make this vision a reality.
Image of award-winning Toad&Co Outdoor Retailer Summer Market booth by mackenzie EXHIBIT.
Old Materials, New Tricks
Here’s a closer look at some of the materials that went into creating the Toad&Co Outdoor Retailer Summer Market trade show booth:
- Cork — In some ways, cork is the holy grail of eco-friendly materials in that it is both renewable and recyclable. Cork trees are not cut down in the process of harvesting the material, rather, their bark is stripped away which then regenerates. These beautiful trees can live up to 200 years while still providing materials to be turned into flooring, siding, bottle closures, and more. If you take a look at some of the pictures here, you’ll see that we used cork as wall paneling on the Toad&Co booth.
- Falconboard — Falconboard is a rigid graphics media board that is a fully recyclable alternative to the foam boards that have traditionally been used in exhibit design. This incredibly functional board is made from renewable forest resources and is 100 percent recyclable. When checking out pictures of the Toad&Co booth, you’ll see Falconboard used as the facing on much of the cabinetry.
- Beetle Kill Pine — Many companies want an all-natural wood look, but we took that a step further with Toad&Co by using beetle kill pine for structural and design elements of the booth. This material is exactly what the name suggests — pine that has already been killed by the voracious pine beetle that’s been sweeping through the Rocky Mountains for years. Rather than cut down healthy wood for booths, we prefer to use this already-dead pine that looks just as good as normal pine but doesn’t negatively impact the landscape because the trees already need to be cleared to make room for new growth.
- Steel — The steel that mackenzie EXHIBIT uses is made from 98 percent post-consumer scrap, so it was a given that we use this material throughout the eco-friendly Toad&Co booth. As with many of the features in the booth, we left this recycled steel unfinished to give it a raw and rustic appearance and to minimize the use of toxic products.
Final rendering of the Toad&Co Outdoor Retailer Summer Market 2018 booth.
What’s Missing
What Toad&Co decided not to use is in some ways just as important as what they decided to use. Many of the materials used in creating this booth were left unfinished — and no, we don’t mean that we stopped making them halfway through — unfinished as in there were no harsh chemicals used to treat the finished product. The steel, beetle kill pine, etc. is all left in its original and natural beauty so as to let the character of the material itself show through while also cutting back on the harmful chemicals required.
What’s It Worth to You?
While there’s no simple math to tell you that a sustainable booth will cost you “x” amount more than a traditional booth, it’s worth mentioning that recycled and renewable materials do generally cost more than their standard “brand new” counterparts. What this means is that it all comes down to where your values fall as a company — would you rather spend a little more to create something that you can feel good about when you unveil it at a show, or something that makes your eco-conscious side cringe? As with anything, there is a give and take depending on what means the most to you, and mackenzie EXHIBIT will be glad to work with you to come up with a solution that can fit both your wallet and your ideals.
Initial design for Toad&Co’s Outdoor Retailer Summer Market 2018 booth.
Leading by Example: Toad&Co
The Toad&Co booth serves as a beautiful reminder to everyone who sees it that sustainability is within reach for all of us. By thinking ahead and being creative, we can all incorporate more eco-friendly measures into our daily lives. Whether you’re a business owner who needs a little nudge to start recycling your company’s paper waste or you’re an individual who has been wanting to teach your children about creative ways to reuse household items, we hope that the Toad&Co Outdoor Retailer Summer Market 2018 booth will inspire you to take the leap and go green.
Ready to get to work creating a trade show booth that will perfectly showcase your company’s values? Great! Drop us a line here and we’ll be happy to make your vision a reality.
