EMT #34 with Finn Yonkers - Designing Impact: Memorable Exhibits and the Future of Engagement

In this episode of Event Marketer’s Toolbox, Chris Dunn and Dana Esposito sit down with Finn Yonkers, EVP Creative at BlueHive Exhibits, to explore the art and science behind creating memorable exhibits and experiences. With over 30 years of experience spanning exhibit design, multimedia, and interactive experiences for brands like Amgen, Bose, Intel, Biogen, and Adobe, Finn shares insights on designing for impact, translating abstract ideas into reality, and leveraging brand DNA to create unforgettable experiences.

• Designing for memorability: How relevance and impact create experiences that leave a lasting impression.
• Brand DNA: Lessons from automotive styling and design language applied to exhibits.
• Turning abstract ideas into big concepts: A walkthrough of Finn’s approach with Biotechne.
• Neurological impact of engagement: How different types of interaction affect attendee perception.
• Future trends & AI: Why face-to-face interaction will remain critical as technology changes industries.

This episode is packed with actionable strategies and forward-thinking ideas for designers, marketers, and event professionals looking to elevate their events and drive meaningful engagement.

• Memorable experiences start with relevance: Design with the audience and brand in mind.
• Brand DNA drives design: Consistent visual and experiential language makes exhibits cohesive and impactful.
• Abstract-to-action: Translating concepts into actionable, engaging experiences is key to standout events.
• Engagement matters neurologically: Experiences should capture attention and leave lasting impressions.
• Future-forward thinking: AI is changing industries, but human interaction remains critical for authentic engagement.

Finn Yonkers shows how expert exhibit design and creative strategy can transform ordinary events into unforgettable experiences. From leveraging brand DNA to understanding the neurological impact of engagement, this episode is full of insights and actionable strategies for anyone looking to elevate their events.

👉🏼 Join us for more insightful discussions like this by tuning into 'Event Marketer's Toolbox,' where industry leaders share the tools, tactics, and trends driving success in the event world.

This Show is sponsored by Blue Hive

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome & Guest Introduction
• 5:39 Designing for Memorability & Brand DNA
• 12:39 Turning Abstract Concepts into Big Ideas
• 20:39 Engagement & Neurological Impact
• 28:39 Future Trends, Technology & AI
• 35:39 Key Takeaways & Wrap-Up

Transcript

0:00:00
 (Chris Dunn)
 Well, hello and welcome to the Event Marketers Toolbox. How are you today, folks? I'm Chris Dunn. I'm with Blue Hive Exhibits and I've got a couple of fantastic, creative folks that happen to be from Blue Hive with me here today. So my oftentimes co-host, Dana Esposito, is joined.

0:00:18
 (Chris Dunn)
 Hey, Dana, how's it going?

0:00:19
 (Dana Esposito)
 Good.

0:00:20
 (Dana Esposito)
 How are you doing, Chris?

0:00:21
 (Chris Dunn)
 I'm good. Tell us a little bit about yourself, for folks who don't know you already.

0:00:26
 (Dana Esposito)
 I feel like people are sick of seeing me. But I've been in the industry 30 years. I've been at Blue Hive 3 years in exhibit design and creative leadership, corporate leadership. But the exciting part about today is that we're here with Finn Yonkers, who I've had the luxury of working with several times through my career, and I've learned a lot from him. So, Finn, could you tell us a little bit about yourself and your background?

0:00:50
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Absolutely. Great to be here, obviously. And so, yeah, I have 30 something, some unknown years in the industry. I'm a little different in that I started from the automotive industry. So there's a little tie in here that I'm going to be using throughout the day here. There's a lot of similarities. But I think the main difference is with car styling,

0:01:14
 (Finn Yonkers)
 you're within the envelope of a brand, right? And we do the same thing with exhibits and with ours, it's a whole nother kind of tech because every part of that vehicle is that brand language. So when we go to an exhibit, we have a lot of the same kind of things happening, same parameters, limitations, excessive stuff,

0:01:33
 (Finn Yonkers)
 and we're all in the same room. So I think we're gonna use that a lot to kind of relate to some things exhibit-wise. But like I said, I've been around for a long time, learned a lot of things, worked with some great people, been happy enough to see the advent of digital technology and trade shows. I'm old enough to see that transition. And in response to that, about 25 years ago, started my own company that just focused on media and how it integrates into architecture.

0:02:01
 (Finn Yonkers)
 So, again, lots of fun, lots of fun projects. And there really is no industry. I think you guys share that feeling. This industry is something else. It gives you everything you want and everything you don't want. But you know, there's a passion there that everybody shares. And I think that's probably the best part is, you know, you're on a larger team that all kind of are going for the same goal. So whether it's a polo team, football team or trade show exhibit builder, it's kind of there's an element there that is unlike other industries. So

0:02:35
 (Chris Dunn)
 I don't think I've ever heard of the exhibit industry compared to a polo team. So this is a yeah, yeah, absolutely.

0:02:42
 (Finn Yonkers)
 The losses are big, you know, you could step in a lot of horse dew. There's a lot of horse excrement being shoveled at that time, yes.

0:02:50
 (Chris Dunn)
 We're just talking about appropriate words for that. Awesome. Well, you know, one of the coolest things about the industry is, like Finn said, it's, you know, once it gets in your blood, either you hate it and you leave early, but more likely you probably stick around. So like Dana and Finn, I've been doing this since the mid 90s, 30 years, just this year as well. And I actually had the pleasure of working with Finn when we were both considerably younger.

0:03:23
 (Chris Dunn)
 Back in, I was started I got my start in Colorado, I moved to Massachusetts, I was with a small group there, and all of a sudden, Finn showed up as our creative designer. And although he didn't stay there very long, it made a huge impact.

0:03:37
 (Chris Dunn)
 So when we started teaming up, Finn, you were still freelancing, but working for Blue Hive, and then ultimately came on as the EVP of Creative back, you know, right after COVID, I think it was. So it's been, been awesome, obviously, you know, reconnecting and

0:03:54
 (Chris Dunn)
 working together. And then, you know, Dana brings just a great set of resources and skill sets to the to the group as well. So hey, we got a live show today. We do most days, but drop a note into the comments. Let us know where you're hanging out. I see you, Zadia.

0:04:14
 (Chris Dunn)
 How are you? She's a Jersey girl, I think. And yeah, drop some questions for us. So this is going to be a great conversation. Finn's really going to kind of peel back the onion on, on a lot of things surrounding exhibit design, but also a lot of things that you may not think of

0:04:31
 (Chris Dunn)
 as far as being related to exhibit design. So before we hit the meat and potatoes of the show, as it were, I want to talk a little bit about our sponsors. Without them, we wouldn't be doing this. So we're very fortunate, all three of us here actually, on this episode, number 34, happen to work for Blue Hive Exhibits. Blue Hive is a full creative agency exhibit house. We've got East Coast presence, we've

0:04:57
 (Chris Dunn)
 got West Coast presence. Both of our locations, we store, we build, and we do all of the things in those locations, which is a little unique. There's some agency profiles or business models out there that are creative groups, but they don't build anything. We do both. We like to think that we're in that kind of right size for a lot of groups, whether you're a well-funded startup up through a multi-billion dollar international organization enterprise. You know, we're about 100 people strong and that comes with more resources than kind of a boutique agency and yet at the same time there's a lot more personalization and customer service

0:05:38
 (Chris Dunn)
 than with some of the real big houses where you're kind of just a number unless you're a billion dollar exhibit program, as it were. And then in addition to Blue Hive, we're also sponsored by our friends from Fist Bump. And Fist Bump is the group that's actually hosting this podcast. I got involved with the founder, Brandon Lee, a guest for next week. A couple of years ago, he was helping me and Blue Hive with our LinkedIn presence in our game, and about a year ago started really seriously kicking around the idea of doing a podcast.

0:06:10
 (Chris Dunn)
 Here we are. We are 34 episodes in. We started right at the first of the year. And like everything, consistency is the name of the game. So we're trying to build a community of like-minded event people here, whether you're trade shows or corporate or

0:06:25
 (Chris Dunn)
 internal, on the exhibit side, festivals and just anybody connected with events in so many different ways. We're trying to kind of build this forum and format for honest conversations back and forth. And we really appreciate not only you either stopping by live here as well as Folks who are listening to this on a podcast after the fact But anyways, that's a lot of stuff

0:06:51
 (Chris Dunn)
 I'm gonna kick it over to Dana to start with our questions so we can get in and see what's in the The the mind of mr. Finn Yonkers sure

0:07:00
 (Dana Esposito)
 All right, so I have in the past Finn when, when people have asked me about you, we like describe you, I usually describe you as like a very, very high level creative. And one of your many strengths is designing for memorability and brand DNA. So could you tell us a little bit about creating experiences that leave a lasting impression through relevance and impact? Sure.

0:07:25
 (Finn Yonkers)
 So we all want impact. We all want that exhibit that screams and shouts at a very loud volume. But is it relevant volume? Is it something that tangibly will go into the mind map of that person and revisit them on the plane home

0:07:40
 (Finn Yonkers)
 and be worthy of explaining to their colleagues in the next cube and such? So I think for me, a big part of exhibit design is being able to dial in where you're where you're going to put your emphasis, where you're going to put your focus. And that all comes back to brand. And we'll go back to cars for a minute here.

0:07:55
 (Finn Yonkers)
 What makes a Ferrari, a Ferrari and a Corvette a Corvette? The difference between the two cars, fairly similar in terms of wheelbase, engine power, all that stuff engineering wise, aerodynamics, drag coefficients, and the actual bodies are only millimeters apart in terms of you know what the shape is, the volume, and the proportions depending on the model, but you can tell that Ferrari from 80 miles away. You don't need to look at the badge to know it's Ferrari, same with the Corvette. And that's kind of what we're talking about with exhibits. One of the things that we see happening right now

0:08:27
 (Finn Yonkers)
 due to the SEG principle of using aluminum skin frames and then skinning them with graphics is that becomes a methodology for just doing graphic design, to rely on only that to create that look and screen that impact. So is that really relevant to the brand?

0:08:45
 (Finn Yonkers)
 What we know from, and we'll talk about this a little later with neurological effects of some things, is spatial dimension gives you enhanced memory. It gives you a way to kind of relate to the space and it opens up a cognitive interpretation that you normally wouldn't get

0:09:02
 (Finn Yonkers)
 if you just kind of like walk by. So that dimensionality is also what makes a car different, right? The tail ends may be shaped differently, very subtle, but it's dimensional. And people like beautiful things. People like curves. They don't like square edges. So a big part of, I think, design is finding what that brand DNA is. What is that brand? They're all there at the same trade show. They're all doing the same thing. They're essentially selling very much the same thing. May have different tag lines, but what is the real difference? And to that you really have to explore and figure out what that value statement is. Sometimes the client will provide that for you,

0:09:39
 (Finn Yonkers)
 but sometimes you have to look at the competitive landscape. You really have to understand what is going to resonate before you even think about what it's going to look like, or what the message is. And that kind of planning and research, I think, gives you a really strong foundation. What I like to call it is like a criteria list of things

0:09:57
 (Finn Yonkers)
 that you must meet, goals you must meet in that parameter. I'll give you a couple examples of how to get there from a blank page. We often start with the system, right? We got to have a storage room, we got to have a reception desk. Those are all functional criteria.

0:10:16
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Everyone's going to have those, right? Going back to the car, everyone's going to have a steering wheel, four wheels, and a car seat. How do you go beyond that? What do you use? Where do you look towards?

0:10:25
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Are there just cool shapes, cool technologies, giant LED walls? Yes and no. You have to have a reason for it. You have to have the content for that video wall. You have to justify that technology through an engagement that is relevant and memorable.

0:10:41
 (Finn Yonkers)
 It has to do with the core issues that that person's there for, so it'll click on down the road and have some momentum rather than just be like a showpiece. So I think the only way to do that for me, and this kind of sounds weird, is not to start with panels or a floor plan, a scale or a price, but really start with fundamentally an abstract version or an abstract language that deals with what you're trying to say. So a good example

0:11:10
 (Finn Yonkers)
 is a company called Biotechni and they do a lot of life sciences. They do workflows, they do software, they do machines, instrumentation, and how those instruments work together. Bottom line is they have a lot of different brands that they buy and then other people Need to recognize those brands within that exhibit. They need that that brand loyalty to continue even though it's under a new umbrella that being said our solution started with the abstract and

0:11:40
 (Finn Yonkers)
 We came up with some shapes. I came up with a corkscrew shape that did two things. One, it related to the notion of innovation and always moving, moving forward and venting. But kind of the nature of the coil encapsulated all the brands inside it. So if you think about that from an abstract sense,

0:12:00
 (Finn Yonkers)
 it's not a trade show booth yet. It's just a visual metaphor for explaining exactly what's happening in that exhibit, so to speak. That visual metaphor then has to be cultivated, turned into what you really need it to do. And I think that important first step is to kind of think abstractly and really delineate what your goals are so

0:12:24
 (Finn Yonkers)
 you meet?

0:12:28
 (Dana Esposito)
 So you mentioned automotive a lot when you're talking and I know you have like you said a lot of background and you do some beautiful sketching and aerodynamic just amazing renderings even by hand Never mind what you can do in the computer, but are there any other lessons from automotive styling applied to brand-driven exhibit design? So just going back to the

0:12:49
 (Finn Yonkers)
 fundamentals of what a car is, right, all those things, technology is kind of equaled out engineering cars, right, depending on what category. So it's really all about the look, and the only thing that's holding back the look are two things. The physicality of the space the humanoid and how it relates to it It not being it but he sheer whatever point being is the end goal with it with an auto and it starts with just sketching for a reason because you're after a mood and

0:13:19
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Just like you would start to design a suit or a dress or anything else It's an image builder for the person wearing it. Cars, I don't know if you know, are very similar to suits and dresses in the sense that you identify with that look as a person, you fit into that segment. So the feeling of generating a vibe, a feeling that relates to passion rather than information or any type of like marketing speak, that's fundamental. I think the more that is generated

0:13:49
 (Finn Yonkers)
 organically, the better you have at hitting a home run because whether people realize it or not, they're internalizing those things even if they're just the client who's about to build that. They're gonna understand at that level more about why we're doing things, why there's certain things that are shaped or colored or integrated with technology.

0:14:09
 (Chris Dunn)
 So for those of you who are listening in, if you've never had a conversation with an exhibit designer that sounds like this, like you're probably talking to somebody on the junior level, who's talking first about storage volumes

0:14:23
 (Chris Dunn)
 and how many demo stations do you need and how many, you know, cabinets and so forth. So, you know, when you work with a professional like Finn, and certainly there's a number of great designers who are out there, you're digging really deep. You're really, you're, again,

0:14:36
 (Chris Dunn)
 you're starting not so much with the form and function. You're really diving into like, what are the, what is the brand ethos? What is the brand, you know, look, feel, flavor and DNA. And then trying to work backwards almost. So a couple of things. So Finn, I drive a Honda Civic.

0:14:57
 (Chris Dunn)
 It's a newer one. It's got the better body style. But you know, when I was a younger man, I would only, you know, like an SUV, I had to drive that. And I have a 60-mile each way commute. So eventually, I settled on a car that was economical.

0:15:15
 (Chris Dunn)
 And I think, I still think it looks relatively sporty, although I don't know that it's my true ethos.

0:15:20
 (Dana Esposito)
 No, it looks like your daughter's car. I keep going, did you drive your daughter's car today? No, this is mine.

0:15:29
 (Speaker 14)
 Okay.

0:15:30
 (Chris Dunn)
 Okay. Yeah. So anyways, I'm comfortable with the fact that I'm almost done paying it off and eventually maybe it will be my daughter's car as well. And I can size up to something that's more of my, I know fit to my own personality. Finn, you touched upon an awful lot of stuff in there. One of which was, you know,

0:15:49
 (Chris Dunn)
 kind of that biotechnology project. Now that project has in fact won several awards and we've done a lot of posting about it. So hopefully folks who are listening in or seeing this, we have shared it a number of times in the past and we will, you we will do so again.

0:16:05
 (Chris Dunn)
 We can add it to the show notes, but it's strict. It's absolutely phenomenal. Every time you look at it, it's just one of the best booths I've ever seen. It's amazing.

0:16:15
 (Dana Esposito)
 And if you want to see a visual of it, you can go to the Blue Hive website and it is gorgeous. I mean, when you look at it, it it is definitely when you look at it, you're like, oh, this is the difference between a custom, really well thought out exhibit, right? This isn't just a bunch of panels, you know, with a really nice graphic, not that there's anything wrong with it. There are shows that that absolutely suits the, you know, the need. But this is definitely a gorgeous exhibit.

0:16:41
 (Dana Esposito)
 And it's a large exhibit. And it's a large exhibit, but when you work with someone like a high-end designer, they're going to be asking you about your whole program, which is what someone like Finn does. You know, it's not just that one and done. That large custom exhibit that you'll see on our website actually, although it's custom, breaks down. It's custom modular and works at many other different smaller sizes, so he still has beautiful impact in a big booth and a smaller booth. And it takes, you know, a special type of talent to really be able to make those type of things happen, happen

0:17:12
 (Dana Esposito)
 for you as well.

0:17:13
 (Chris Dunn)
 Jim Collison, COLESLUGF Fantastic. You know, I just, I want to bring up another one of your designs, which I think resonates. And again, we're going to ask the audience to kind of, you know, either draw upon some examples, which you can find on our website, or just, you know, kind of be open to, to Finn, maybe painting the picture. So you designed a booth for a diabetes company called Tandem. Kind of a really important to me, as my daughter is diabetic, probably the daughter who owns that car, right, that isn't her car. But she's a diabetic, so, and she wears a tandem pump. So when we actually landed tandem as a customer

0:17:51
 (Chris Dunn)
 several years ago, that was a huge win for us. It was a market that we weren't in. And you designed a booth and it's been out in the market. It's gone to dozens of shows. There's basically the same version of that that lives in the US and another version that lives in Europe. So the booth continues to just be timeless. And you mentioned earlier that a lot of companies and brands

0:18:18
 (Chris Dunn)
 are leaning heavy on systems. Systems are great. They're efficient. They're lighter weight. They pack efficient. They're lighter weight. They're, they, you know, they pack, they pack small, right? There's, there's benefits there from a cost standpoint, certainly. But when all you do is build flat walls and put graphics

0:18:33
 (Chris Dunn)
 on them, you're, you're really going to struggle to stand out. So what I kind of wanted to say about the, the tandem design, which not my accountants, you and Jack Halley have worked that account tremendously. And every time I see a picture of the booth, I'm just like, man, that's just beautiful. It's very much somewhat minimalist. It's less is more, but it's architecturally interesting and warm tones. And there's just all these things that make it different from a big boxy, you know, wall that's covered with graphics?

0:19:06
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Uh, yeah, I'm glad you picked that one. Um, a large shout out goes to the crew at Tandem because of the way they work, you know, and they really laid the foundation. Uh, when they came to us, they had just rebranded and they put a lot of emphasis on these, uh, to fast forward to the, the kind of motif of motif is all about lifestyle, right? This pump is so small it enables you to do activities

0:19:29
 (Finn Yonkers)
 you typically would never think you could do with diabetes. Right, you're limited, you're tied to a syringe, you're tied to, your whole life is on a script. This releases you from that. So obviously with all medical companies, lifestyle is everything, right?

0:19:43
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Happy patients, happy customers, happy everyone. So, but more than that, they came up with a graphic motif that was kind of like, almost like when you cartoon characters, like the road runner, they're running down the street and you see little wheel waves

0:19:59
 (Finn Yonkers)
 as they're moving through space. They created this dynamic called the radii and there's a series of lines with a slight radius in it. And they're actually born from their product, which is a small square with round corners. But as you tilt that through space,

0:20:12
 (Finn Yonkers)
 in that animated fashion, it creates these radii lines. So that movement became their symbolic metaphor for freedom and a whole new life for someone who has diabetes, or even the parent, like you, Chris. Even you're wrapped into the whole regiment, right? So how do you translate that?

0:20:30
 (Finn Yonkers)
 And this is a great example because their competition, you know, it's a very close-knit area of, you know, there's large diabetes shows, but then there's very small sections where pumps are delivered, delivery mechanisms are. So all those people have large

0:20:46
 (Finn Yonkers)
 programs and they all rely a lot on fabric and a lot of SEG. So much to the point where we were at a European show and we took pictures of all the competitors in the European space. And this is another issue is you create a great booth and win one market, and then you go to replicate it on another continent, shortcuts are taken and all that. We didn't do that with this booth. And here's why.

0:21:12
 (Finn Yonkers)
 We took a picture of the competitions booths and they essentially had so much SEG that I took the pictures and I swapped the logos on each booth. And in the end, you can't tell the difference you Really is befuddling that that that million-dollar booth can be upended with one quick Photoshop like okay

0:21:32
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Here's a different header. It's a competition and it all works together. There's no like oh my god, that doesn't look like it fits it fits Why because there's no dimensionality to it. There's no sense of space. There's no effect of like cognitive, you're in the booth, you're experiencing it. It's just surfaces and it's just pages of a magazine. So I have an advent towards that is to always try to get some type of dimensionality in there, right?

0:21:59
 (Finn Yonkers)
 And these radii turned out to be the perfect metaphor

0:22:04
 (Speaker 5)
 for we created a wooden alcove and used them And these radii turned out to be the perfect metaphor for,

0:22:05
 (Finn Yonkers)
 we created a wooden alcove and used them as like the basis for some architecture. And it really kind of like came together because of the visual language of their product as well. Everything in their branding campaign came from the product. So in the end, the product looked like the booth

0:22:23
 (Finn Yonkers)
 and it was all designed for it in one harmonious environment. And because you see that all at once, you look at the booth and you're like, wow, they really did a good job. And it's really just consistency and it's treating everything. You can't just have like this really sexy counter and then have a regular kiosk. It doesn't work that way. They all have to relate to one another Again going back to the car thing If you if you look at a car and this is going to be over the top here from a deep dive You look at a car. It is a volume

0:22:53
 (Finn Yonkers)
 compromised of surfaces Each surface relates to one another and how that volume changes in proportion It's all based on the surface relationship and the And the slightest movement in an accent or a millimeter of this, of adding mass or retracting mass, can make that volume be successful as an art piece, as a sculpture, as a car, or not.

0:23:15
 (Finn Yonkers)
 It can completely upend it. And I can cite several different cars that have been developed. And I hate to go back to this at this point. But what happens in the conceptual stage when the designer is drawing it, and then what happens in the manufacturing stage,

0:23:29
 (Finn Yonkers)
 they have to put a number to it. Same thing happens, it gets watered down. So in the end, I think the Tandem Booth kind of does all that, right? It takes into account, takes very seriously their position in the marketplace, to the point where we couldn't just rely on translating

0:23:45
 (Finn Yonkers)
 that to a European model without actually sending them the wooden fabricated pieces that we cultivated over these years. So what you have is an international trade show program where everything is synchronous and all the same people go there. So they understand and see the value of doing that and it's catching on. So it's a very good thing.

0:24:06
 (Dana Esposito)
 Maura Blair Yeah. The one thing I, Tandem's a great booth. And again, I think it might be on our website if someone wants to get a visual of it. But one of the things I love about it behind it and what it's solving for their end user. So if you were to take the logo out of the graphics for the tandem exhibit, it still feels like a tandem exhibit even without any graphics on it, right? That's how strong the brand feeling is, the environment, and also because they understood that and they also understood

0:24:43
 (Dana Esposito)
 brand consistency, how important that is. that is like Finn saying so we built a US version of that exhibit and an international version of that exhibit and that brand consistency is so powerful. I love that

0:24:58
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Yeah Really really good people to work with as well I mean you see the transition. When companies are small enough that the people that worked on the product also work on the branding and the campaign and the marketing and then the trade show,

0:25:10
 (Finn Yonkers)
 you get that consistency. It's not moving from department to department. And that I think is one of the great things we get to do is work with different size groups and different projects all the time. So kudos to them.

0:25:22
 (Dana Esposito)
 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you know what too, sorry Chris, Biotechny and Tandem, I know they're just two projects that we use in an example. Also something that I'm very proud of both of those clients and the teams who work there that, you know, Finn that you were dealing with and the rest of the Blue Eye team we're dealing with is they weren't afraid, right? They knew their booth

0:25:45
 (Dana Esposito)
 was going to look different and they took advantage of that. They were like, yes, we want to look like us. We want to be different. They weren't like, well, you know, that's not what our competitors do. Well, exactly. Your competitors aren't doing it. That's why you should do it. Like,

0:25:58
 (Finn Yonkers)
 I love the fearless and creativity. It's a great point, but I think it's also worth noting that promoting that bravery comes from us. That doesn't come from them. Typically, it's rare that they say, well, I want this award-winning booth and I don't care how much it costs

0:26:16
 (Finn Yonkers)
 or how long it takes, right?

0:26:18
 (Speaker 13)
 That's a dream.

0:26:20
 (Speaker 6)
 Right, right.

0:26:21
 (Finn Yonkers)
 But ultimately, we convinced them to go that direction. Biotechny was the hardest part was convincing them to take that on, because you did have a large group of decision makers. Half of them were totally afraid of it. And in the end, it's up to the responsibility of the designer to sell it, right? You have to say why it's going to work.

0:26:40
 (Finn Yonkers)
 And again, it's originality. You look at a sea of exhibits. Oh, there's a hanging sign and some B-matrix panels and a large LED theater. That's not going to knock the socks off anybody. That's just like, what are you going to do? You're going to change the logo to make it look like a different company's booth? So this is what you explain to the client.

0:27:04
 (Finn Yonkers)
 This is what you tell them to make them understand that you have an opportunity here to have a piece that is going to be growing in the same type of viral kind of magnitude that your company is. And that's really ultimately what made them switch.

0:27:19
 (Dana Esposito)
 It wasn't- Well, then I'm glad that you were able to verbalize it to them. And I'm proud of them for trusting you and us for going down that road, you know. And also, to your point, I think, you know, when a salesperson, an account executive, who are really their consultants, right, they're trying, they're always looking out for the best interest of their clients. If they say that, some of this stuff to a client, the client might be thinking, oh, you're just trying to get me to spend money or spend more money or something.

0:27:48
 (Dana Esposito)
 When a designer says it, I believe for some reason the client understands that designer is still going to try to be watch their budget, right? But they're looking at a much bigger picture. They're trying to serve for the client. It's not necessarily like we're just trying to waste money. No, we're trying to give you the best end result and carve

0:28:08
 (Finn Yonkers)
 a path to success for you. One of my most favorite professional experiences was with NEC and I did a whole bunch of trade show booths for them in the handheld wireless industry. And each one, you know, the very first one was like, they wanted something exciting, but didn't know and talked them into it.

0:28:30
 (Finn Yonkers)
 And by the third booth, they were like, well, they came, they actually came to our facility. And the guy, Jose, wonderful man, he looks right at me, he's like, we don't know what to do. We're asking you because of what you've done for us. We want to know exactly how to do this. And what would you do in this case

0:28:49
 (Finn Yonkers)
 if you had no handcuffs? So that kind of like customer relationship is what we're all about. I think that the client...

0:29:00
 (Speaker 12)
 Oh my God.

0:29:04
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Ah, so sorry. I'm so sorry. This is live and it's real. So you know, we're not robots, right?

0:29:10
 (Speaker 11)
 We're not AI.

0:29:11
 (Dana Esposito)
 Yeah, we're not AI. But you know what?

0:29:13
 (Speaker 11)
 That's beautiful, Finn.

0:29:14
 (Finn Yonkers)
 I don't have time for AI, but honestly, the client needs to be part of your team and you need to be part of their team. The only way we can succeed in this business. It's not selling a bunch of wood and laminate. It's selling a connection, a relationship. And we're skipping to the end of my speech here. But 100%, that that ability to translate your vision to them in a way that they can see it, feel it, also speaks to being able to simulate it. Now we have more tools than ever to be able to do that, but it also makes

0:29:52
 (Finn Yonkers)
 you want to rely on those tools more rather than actually use them to enhance your original thought. More on that later.

0:29:58
 (Dana Esposito)
 I love so much that that client not only felt that way, but actually said that to you. Because to me, like that is, that is, I'm sorry, I'm gonna swear that's me. That's the shit right there. Like that is, that is frigging relationships built on trust. Right? And that is the impetus of what we're trying to do

0:30:19
 (Dana Esposito)
 with our clients is, you know, have them really understand we have their best interests at hand. that client understood that because they started working with you, us, and they got it. So that's beautiful. Love it.

0:30:31
 (Finn Yonkers)
 They brought us in all the way into their naming studies of all the handsets and all that stuff. It was quite a big deal. Go ahead, Chris. I know you're about to say something.

0:30:41
 (Chris Dunn)
 I just wanted to reinforce before we kind of get off this topic and just move on, as a client, as the owner of that exhibit, of that future exhibit that hasn't happened yet, the best results will come from exactly what Finn and Dana are saying. Work with your exhibit house,

0:31:01
 (Chris Dunn)
 understand your goals and your challenges and push them. The best exhibits, we've got one on the floor right now for a wonderful client of ours, VEJ, the Veterinary Emergency Group. They push us. We come to the table with what we think is a great design

0:31:20
 (Chris Dunn)
 and they're like, that's nice. How about this? How about that? And they continue to push us and the product that ends up on that trade show floor is that much better when we're not that we're trying to settle, but sometimes we don't know when we're done and the client just keeps pushing. Sometimes it can be challenging, but you end up with

0:31:43
 (Chris Dunn)
 a really great product. And obviously it's done in a way that's mutually respectful back and forth, right?

0:31:49
 (Dana Esposito)
 So when I say- And they're one of those clients that I would term as fearless. They're like, they know who they are, they know who their brand is, they know who they're trying to talk to

0:31:57
 (Dana Esposito)
 and what they're trying to say to them. They come to the table knowing this stuff and they're able to tell us and the designer and they're able to achieve a lot that way and their exhibits look so different than all their competitors and look so much like them. I love that they are fearless that way and that they're not afraid to be creative and their exhibit just recently won an award as well. Right and when you say they know who they are and what

0:32:22
 (Chris Dunn)
 they want, I will preface that by saying they don't know what the booth looks like, right? It's like Michelangelo chiseling a piece of granite, right? There's a form that lives inside there. I don't know what it is yet, but we're gonna expose it through the process.

0:32:38
 (Chris Dunn)
 So it's really cool. And as somebody who I think all of us have backgrounds in art and design. And one of the reasons that people like us end up in this industry is because the level of creativity, even though we're building things for, you know, capitalism and corporate entities, like we still get the juice, or as Dana said, the shit from the design process and working with people and just that level of love that you have for like, man, this was a cool project. I'm so happy I was part of that and got to see it come to fruition.

0:33:15
 (Chris Dunn)
 All right, Dana, we are at the 33 minute mark here. We're gonna try to bring this in at under an hour, although we got a lot of cool stuff to talk about. So what's next on the hit parade here?

0:33:28
 (Dana Esposito)
 Okay, so we have a bunch of questions and I'm poking around a little bit here. So Finky, talk to us about engagement and the neurological impact and different approaches to engagement for attendee perception on a neurological level.

0:33:44
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Yeah, so I'm to preface this to say that I'm not a doctor or neurologist.

0:33:50
 (Chris Dunn)
 You do play one on TV though.

0:33:51
 (Finn Yonkers)
 In fact, I rarely even go to the doctor. But you sleep in the holiday inn. Yeah. And this is really like, this is part of my own research in really for a project and enhancing kind of the notion of what engagements are, right? We have all these different engagements that we use, standards, if you will. You've got a touchscreen, you've got a multi, you've got a large LED screen, you've got holograms, you've got

0:34:19
 (Finn Yonkers)
 theaters, right? Big theaters, small theaters. And they all contribute, they're all kind of a staple, right? Do we want a theater? We have a big message, and this is, this is what kind of blew me away, is a lot of what we do as designers and producers, producers instinctively, we do because they work,

0:34:36
 (Finn Yonkers)
 but we don't understand the neuro, what's happening in the brain that makes it work, right? It actually, all this research for me has validated that what we're doing is right, but it's also opened up some other thoughts, right? I think I'll just touch on them because we don't want to be here all day. And yes, again, I'm going to have to look at some reference points for pronunciation. But one of the initial obvious ones is tactile discovery, right?

0:35:06
 (Finn Yonkers)
 So if you look at a touch screen, you're touching a touch screen as opposed to looking at a screen. That's a huge jump. Why is it more effective? Because you're involved, because you're engaged. But it actually, it releases dopamineric activity and episodic memory formation. How about that? That it basically is encoding what's happening to you and what

0:35:29
 (Finn Yonkers)
 your brain is doing instead of just watching an interactive as you're interacting. Not only do you own it, are you using your senses more than one right? But it's actually releasing stuff in your brain and it's making your brain more susceptible to understanding stuff. So a couple tips on using a touchscreen, make the discovery process progressive.

0:35:51
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Don't give them everything at once, make them dig for it, layers, layers, layers. That way you ensure that they're only, I call it the informational pyramid. They want to know the tip or they want to know something down there, let them do the work, right? The more they do it, the more they understand, the more they gain ownership of it. Human context, pair everything with

0:36:09
 (Finn Yonkers)
 patient stories relative to the people that are there. You have an end goal to relate it to the human condition, whether it's a healthcare exhibit or anything else. 3D interaction. You've got this touchscreen, it's showing you a spin around of a blender or something a car

0:36:27
 (Finn Yonkers)
 If you can make the person be able to interact and control that spinning around rather than just viewing it Again that that registers that makes them learn it more So that that even on a touchscreen if you use something called haptics, right? So when you touch a touchscreen something else happens on that and maybe even bounces your finger back a little, that's another next level. So we're kind of starting at the base level here. Just anything that stimulates that on a autonomic nervous

0:36:57
 (Finn Yonkers)
 system beyond just sitting there. Take it to the next step. We've got multi surface view. So now we're dealing with space. We're not just looking at, and one of my pet peeves is you put a monitor on a wall, maybe a graphic behind it, it's a postage stamp. It doesn't relate to the graphic environment, it's just, it's yet another TV. It's so kind of 1982-ish, right? So that was that was exciting in 1982 Now it's a little more about video walls But also video floors and and I think whenever you add more than one surface

0:37:32
 (Finn Yonkers)
 You create space and you create a spatial dynamic then again something happens in your brain that spatial context Gives you an episodic memory it It registers that memory in your head differently than if you were just watching past a flat panel. So it's a proven scientific context that that extra video wall, if everyone's listening, is worth it, you know?

0:37:54
 (Finn Yonkers)
 You need more than one video wall to get that extra context. So using dynamic environments-

0:38:01
 (Chris Dunn)
 Can I cut you off for just one second? So thinking again, just painting a picture for everybody. We did a great project for LogMeIn back in the day. It became, they turned into GoTo, but they had a giant video wall and we actually pitched them on doing a video floor. And at the end of the day, it was a big number, right? So what you did as a value engineered piece is we went with a high gloss black laminate on the floor

0:38:26
 (Chris Dunn)
 and that became such a reflective piece that all of a sudden they had two video walls when they only paid for one.

0:38:35
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Yeah, and also the propping, right? So it was a beach scene when we actually put beach furniture on there. So you created more than just a diorama, if you will, but a space that you can delve into. And that's why we're at Tray Chose. It's a spatial thing. It's a tactile thing. It's a human connection thing has has

0:38:54
 (Finn Yonkers)
 very little to do with how you deliver it. It's more of what it is and, and, and on and on. So, you know,

0:39:00
 (Chris Dunn)
 thanks for all the comments here. We're speaking her love language right now. She's one of our super listeners and a video professional as well. So she's loving this for sure.

0:39:13
 (Finn Yonkers)
 So a couple of tips with the multi-surface view is to create spatial zones. So if you're highlighting a product, right, you then can embellish the environment around it to support it in such a way that makes it 10 million

0:39:25
 (Finn Yonkers)
 times more exciting than just the product. You can control how much ambient entertainment is supporting that element.

0:39:32
 (Chris Dunn)
 Is that like creating a vignette around that?

0:39:35
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Creating a vignette. Or if you say you're showing an MRI machine, showing the operating room behind it, and the operating room comes to life. It starts changing and giving you an extra level. Controlling the sensory load.

0:39:49
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Too much brightness, too much overwhelming. The neurodiverse people are basically us, right? We all have different sensitivities to everything. So you have to be able to kind of generalize the effect to everybody's interest level, but also their sensitivity to impact and give them a way out.

0:40:07
 (Finn Yonkers)
 I'm going to go right on to the theater, right? Theater to me was you have a big message and you want to tell it to as many people, right? So you have zones of impact, you have a traditional detail station or demo station, software demo. That's the one-on-one with some onlookers. You get a detail, but to get them to the demo station, a large theater that announces the project and product and gives you like a 15-minute, you know, intense, like supercharged kind of message. You can walk away from that and you've reached a lot of people. One client, Adobe, I worked with a lot. they relied on that gigantic theater.

0:40:47
 (Finn Yonkers)
 That was their wheelhouse, right? They had everybody in there. And because it was a theater, you get a lot of quick dialogue, you get a lot of information and on and on. And I thought that was the only reason.

0:41:01
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Well, it's not the only reason. Turns out, because we're humans, we enjoy being around humans and sharing things. So when you're next to someone and in a crowd of people, and you see something gigantic happening on the screen, there's a shared relationship that you have.

0:41:17
 (Finn Yonkers)
 And it happens in your brain at a neurological level, whether you know it or not, you're now partners with those people. So that sharing gives you all these other factors, right? They call it neural synchrony, where everyone's kind of like on the same page.

0:41:32
 (Finn Yonkers)
 It triggers the actual limbic system, which again, it's just releasing a chemical in your brain. And that gives you a stronger consolidation of information. It actually tells your brain, hey, this is really important. I'm going to place it here in

0:41:47
 (Finn Yonkers)
 this storage closet to get it later, instead of like, wow, that was great, I don't remember it. The overall effect I think is that you get a whole bunch of people in one area sharing that feeling, and that's reinforcing that feeling, whether it's a vibe or a sound or anything.

0:42:05
 (Finn Yonkers)
 The storytelling activation really gets everybody to synchronize and then the diverse, I think the diversity of people watching it is critical to kind of think about because you don't have like, you might have a different expectation of a large theater experience than everybody else. And that really has to be taken into account. And you have to have that. And the last one kind of relates to this

0:42:31
 (Finn Yonkers)
 in the sense that whenever you have a theater experience or an acute demo or an immersive experience, decompression, you know, if you have a lounge in your booth, you're doing a very smart thing. It's not just for the, for people to take a break. You need your brain to kind of have that quiet time to register everything you need, everything

0:42:54
 (Finn Yonkers)
 you just learned, everything you just saw. So, if you have a place like that in your booth, it's tremendous in terms of enhancing the memorability of the information that you're trying to give to people. Because they sit there and process it, right? So it involves the parasympathetic nervous system and lowers the heart rate, increases blood pressure,

0:43:18
 (Finn Yonkers)
 or lowers blood pressure, cortisol levels, and physiologically supports your brain in terms of being able to process stuff. So if you're walking, your brain's focusing on, I got to move this leg here, this, that, and the other thing. I'm going to focus on the heart beating.

0:43:32
 (Speaker 10)
 Take that all out of the equation.

0:43:33
 (Finn Yonkers)
 What are you focusing on? You're focusing on the movie you just watched. And because your brain is kind of like in that mode, that is going to reach you better, right? So decompression space is very important. Soft sensory input in these spaces, very important. Natural lighting, lighting that moves with you maybe.

0:43:52
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Guided reflection prompts, okay? So this is like, maybe you have a screen in there that reviews what you just saw and prompts you to kind of reflect in a certain way. Different ways to kind of express yourself, whether you want to take notes, draw or move or kind of deal with a monitor. And then an accessibility

0:44:15
 (Finn Yonkers)
 area in terms of, yeah, no, never mind. I'm going to leave that one out. It's too complex. I think we've had enough of the neuro. You guys had enough of the neuro?

0:44:27
 (Dana Esposito)
 Well, no, that's awesome, because people understand that this legitimate reason why we suggest and do a lot of things that we do as designers, it's not just to make something look pretty. There's so much involved in strategy, communication, education, because we want people to,

0:44:44
 (Dana Esposito)
 we want that content to become something they've learned, right, so it was worth it. So can you talk to us a little bit about, because I'm trying to be sensitive as time, can you talk to us a little bit about like future trends and technology?

0:44:59
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Yeah, I'm just gonna start with a kind of a generalized rant on AI. It gives you access to all the information in the world and all these tools have come out to help you in your job Make you better as long as it's you being original and you're not using it to Write or come up with ideas or anything else, right? So that's where we are now, whether it's a good place or not,

0:45:30
 (Finn Yonkers)
 there's something happening in terms of tools that help you, right? There's a lot of car industry, there's drawing programs because cars are designed with drawing, right? Like fashion sketches. So there's programs that use AI,

0:45:44
 (Finn Yonkers)
 they'll take that sketch and turn it into a realistic photo. And it's really quite amazing what they've done. And it's because they have the horsepower behind the automotive industry to get there. Our industry is not there, but there's several tools that you can use to enhance what you're doing in terms of being more productive on any level, on any position within our paradigm. I think what's gonna be interesting when AI gets to the next level, general AI,

0:46:11
 (Finn Yonkers)
 and that's where it develops cognitive thought. And that's the scary one that everyone's afraid of. And you talk about this with an AI engineer, they're like, it's gonna happen next week. And right after it gets to that point, it's gonna be able to develop itself into the Terminator.

0:46:29
 (Finn Yonkers)
 I had an old friend who works at the Harvard Business Review. She basically said that among scholars in AI, they think this is probably 10 years off. And there's a lot of fanfare that this is where we're going to have robots do all this stuff for us. They're just tools right now.

0:46:48
 (Finn Yonkers)
 They're just research tools. And if you rely too much on those tools, they become kind of a generic person, a generic version of you, because it's really just searching for the entire planet and making everybody else like you

0:47:03
 (Finn Yonkers)
 and you like everybody else. So going back to the car analogy, there's your Honda, there's your Jeep, a Camry is the same way. You take the label off a Camry, you're going to have a hard time finding that in the airport parking lot, right? So that's the result of AI. It's just homogenous, like solving a problem. And I think we have to, as a culture, be kind of sensitive to that.

0:47:27
 (Finn Yonkers)
 And I think it came out yesterday on various news agencies that 95% of the AI enterprise solution apps that have come across in the past year have doomed, failed, and are going out of business. So, you know, let's be careful about AI.

0:47:44
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Let's use it in the right ways. There's nothing worse than a designer using prompts to create a design because then you're really not thinking, you're just prompting. You're not sketching, you're not doing the deep thought necessary to get there. So, yeah, that's one of trends. I think I just wanted to have a personal

0:48:13
 (Speaker 5)
 this is something that happened with biotechnics we created a

0:48:18
 (Speaker 9)
 Virtual lab that if you did it right with the large screen and interacted with it

0:48:21
 (Finn Yonkers)
 You can simulate being in that space So now you have a 40 by 20 booth with another, you know, large facility that you can walk into and deal with. So I think you're going to see more of that. There's no question as all the all the technologies increase, processors get faster and LEDs get more advanced. The hyper personalization, right, and making the customers needs and wants align with what you're trying to show them as a customer provider. So I'm on Bose or on NEC. What that person walking up to that trade show from the aisle, how do we identify what they want to see and how to talk to them, we're going to be able to do that, have that conversation before they even get to the booth. And when they get to the booth,

0:49:09
 (Finn Yonkers)
 we're going to have a greater understanding of what they might want to see on that screen. And maybe the screen will call up something specific to their personal experience or needs and wants based on all the energy being put into people's data. Sustainable and circular design, we know

0:49:25
 (Finn Yonkers)
 that's gonna dominate, that has to happen and I think it has to go beyond just the zero waste goal and using and reusing aluminum panels for example. We need to look at different materials and different ways of getting stuff to places. I think that's one of the biggest kind of opportunities is the transportation effect. Hybrid and they call them phygital. This is physical and digital mediums.

0:49:53
 (Finn Yonkers)
 And so this is really an idea that is not new. During COVID, we had a lot of virtual trade shows. Another thing that kind of relates to this is the virtual twin where where companies will create a digital Persona that mimics you in every way in order to teach and verify. Thanks to you that Along with this notion of having this virtual entity so you can visit a trade show and we did this years ago with amgen where we'd have a kiosk and

0:50:23
 (Finn Yonkers)
 You could actually as an attendee of the show contact a nurse and invite them to the show and celebrate their presence in it. And more of that I think is gonna happen where you don't, you may be remote but you're there a little more in detail through the holographic technology and everything else that we have going on and coming. The holograms are gonna be big big, drones are going to be big.

0:50:47
 (Finn Yonkers)
 This is my own personal thing is right now the drones themselves are limited by noise in their application, right? There's a lot of rules and laws and I actually did a project years ago for Mouser Electronics. I designed the interior of this car. It was based, it was an autonomous car and it was based on having a drone

0:51:10
 (Finn Yonkers)
 that would kind of fly in conjunction with you and spy on you and they kind of give you the opportunity to like look at the surroundings instead of just driving the car. That whole theory was kibosh. We got a lot of people like,

0:51:22
 (Finn Yonkers)
 oh, the regulations, you can never do that. Within a year, there were five production cars that had that as an offering. So the regulation thing, I can't take that seriously. You go to a trade show now, you still see drones during setup, but they're loud.

0:51:38
 (Finn Yonkers)
 They're annoying. The technology and how you can use a propeller and different types of propeller technologies. Once they get quiet, you're going to see a lot more. I think there's no question about that. 10 years ago, MIT, they took a bunch of tiny little drones and they added string feeders to them. And they programmed them to be able to solve a problem and create a bridge between two points.

0:52:06
 (Finn Yonkers)
 So the drones had to literally on their own, autonomously talk to each other, analyze these two surfaces, figure out how to build a bridge. And they would fly and weave and build that bridge all on their own. So not the size of the drone, but the intelligence behind it.

0:52:25
 (Dana Esposito)
 That's bananas.

0:52:26
 (Finn Yonkers)
 It tells you. Yeah. And so think about like waking up in the morning and just opening your mouth, swarm of drones comes in and cleans your teeth and flies anywhere else. That's probably not going to happen, but think about in an exhibit, you have stuff that moves right. We, I was at CES one year and LG had a, they had a display that involved moving plasma screens. That's how long ago this was. It would move and grow and build. That movement is everything. Your eye sees it and you want to look at it and it draws you in. It's a big, important factor, whether it's video or an actual element that's moving.

0:53:06
 (Finn Yonkers)
 So when we see like a kiosk panel that may slightly rotate to face you, right? To follow you or say something and recognize who you are and why you're there. Those are all things that I see coming. I mean, imagine a little screen.

0:53:21
 (Finn Yonkers)
 We already have these drone screens. Imagine one in your booth that kind of like has your face on it because you're remote and you're flying through the booth, like just like you're there and you're interacting with people just like you're there.

0:53:34
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Like the office episode where Michael Scott was on a Roomba with a iPad. That may end up, you know. That I think is where we have room to really innovate. I think, you know, everything's usually static and we go by the norms.

0:53:51
 (Finn Yonkers)
 I think when you start to see more robotics, more autonomy and more of these power devices that have the ability to connect and relate, then you're gonna have someone behind that that's relating. So you might be at a trade show but not be looking at a screen. You might actually be able to like pick up a pamphlet. Who knows? Those are the kind of things that I'm excited for.

0:54:17
 (Finn Yonkers)
 What I'm not excited for is just what AI does. It takes that human condition and it kind of waters down what makes you original, what your thinking is, and also your execution is. So it's kind of careful what you wish for a situation, but it's very exciting. These next few years are going to be very, very exciting.

0:54:37
 (Speaker 8)
 Agreed.

0:54:38
 (Chris Dunn)
 Awesome. Well, I can honestly say episode 34 was a little bit more of a glimpse of the future than I think we've had. We talk with a lot of different folks who are experts in their own areas, but Finn, you've really pulled back the curtain a little bit

0:54:56
 (Chris Dunn)
 and shown us when you have a designer of your ilk, you're just thinking about things that so many others aren't with regards to the neurological effects and like, what does the future of exhibiting really look like? So very cool stuff.

0:55:14
 (Chris Dunn)
 So we're gonna start to put a bow on it here. We're at 55 minutes. This has been a great chat. One of the things that we like to do here on the toolbox is to basically kind of try to put a little bit of a bow on it.

0:55:26
 (Chris Dunn)
 Can you leave us with a couple, two, three insights for designers, marketers, event professionals, whether it's something you've already talked about and you want to wrap it up or maybe something new?

0:55:39
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Yeah. I've got three. One is avoiding systems and predictive processes. We all have processes in our workplaces. We all follow step A, step B, and do this, that. Avoid that.

0:55:52
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Avoid starting with a B-matrix panel when you're doing your layout. Think about really what the goal is. If you really want a wow idea, you have to get rid of all that. You need to start from scratch and look at the brand and look at like where the brand is and where they're going and why they're doing everything they do visually. And but also culturally, it's a reflection of their their their whole corporate corporate culture.

0:56:17
 (Finn Yonkers)
 So there's plenty when people say various designers I've heard in the past, they will. We just don't have enough info. The info is out there. And now with AI, the info is out there even more. You can really get into the nuts and see why certain decisions were made.

0:56:33
 (Finn Yonkers)
 And it's a huge tool to help you do that. But tossing out preconceptions is an absolute must before you get anywhere. The guy that invented the Cuisinart didn't think, I got to figure a different way of shredding cabbage and so on and so forth. And you didn't look at other ways. You just had a wow idea, right? And I think that's a big part of it.

0:56:57
 (Finn Yonkers)
 The AI tools will make a more efficient you, but you don't want them to change you. You don't want to water that down. Avoid using it for any type of creative thinking, whether it's writing, drawing or anything else, and remember who you are and why you are who you are, because that's going to be your biggest commodity as we go into the future. And all the social media and everything else. There's a true cultural genericism that's happening.

0:57:24
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Everyone has their own little camps, but you have to figure out who you are in order to really be different. And being different in this business is number one, right? And then keeping sight of the goal. The overriding principle of why we're doing this

0:57:39
 (Finn Yonkers)
 is creating relationships. It's connecting, it's finding ways to connect. And it's not with machines, it's not with computers, it's not with SEG walls, it's with people. So that never lose that sight. The best tool is your reputation and your individual capacity for connecting and empowering connection. Those that's what

0:57:58
 (Finn Yonkers)
 you bring to the table. I don't care what job you have, you're cutting wood, same thing. In the end, it facilitates that connection, that networking. And those are my insights. And I would say my final insight is a culmination of all those. And that's the really stayed ahead of the trend cycle.

0:58:18
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Once you see a trend, like, well, that's a claw machine. We gotta use a claw machine. It's already over. Don't use a claw machine. It's already over. Don't use the claw machine. Come up with something else. Right? You need to be memorable, but in a relevant way.

0:58:31
 (Finn Yonkers)
 You don't want to be memorable, oh wow, we're at a healthcare show and they had a bulldozer in there. I won't forget that ever, but it doesn't really help you. It doesn't help the brand. So be cognizant of why they're remembering you and create that impact no matter what.

0:58:47
 (Speaker 4)
 Awesome, awesome.

0:58:49
 (Chris Dunn)
 That's a great, really great recap there on some ideas to leave people with. So I guess the last thing that I will ask you, Finn, is how can people reach out and connect with you? What's the best way?

0:59:00
 (Speaker 7)
 LinkedIn.

0:59:01
 (Finn Yonkers)
 LinkedIn is by far the best way.

0:59:03
 (Speaker 6)
 All right.

0:59:04
 (Finn Yonkers)
 Please look me up. I look forward to speaking about anything.

0:59:07
 (Chris Dunn)
 There you go. He's got a he's got a pretty wide repertoire of knowledge base. So you can talk to Finn about an awful lot of things, especially, obviously cars. So hey, thanks so much for coming on the on the toolbox today. This was super fun. Dana, thanks for joining. We're wrapping it up here. And I guess the closing message is, you know, this event community that exists, and hopefully we're helping build, you know, just can kind of keep contributing to it. I

0:59:36
 (Chris Dunn)
 think, you know, the idea of a rising tide is raising all ships, right? The more that we help our clients exhibit better, the better results that they have, the more customers that they reach, the more revenue that's generated, the more they can continue to do it. So it's a cyclical situation.

0:59:54
 (Chris Dunn)
 You know, partners, vendors, you know, people were able to, you know, kind of work together with, in order to kind of help everybody best understand what possibilities there are and to help execute those pieces. So Zadia was our number one contributor today.

1:00:10
 (Chris Dunn)
 So thank you so much. She's a Jersey girl on the video and AV side. So thanks so much for weighing in, appreciate that. And until next time, thank you very much for joining us here in the toolbox. We are back next week, same time, same bat channel.

1:00:26
 (Chris Dunn)
 We'll have the founder of Fist Bump, Brandon Lee, joining us to talk about the connection between, you know, kind of that world and events and how you can kind of relate at the crossroads of those pieces. So thanks very much guys.

1:00:41
 (Chris Dunn)
 Take care and have a great week. Cheers.

1:00:44
 (Speaker 5)
 Cheers, bye-bye. Cheers, bye-bye.

1:00:46
 (Speaker 4)
 Bye-bye.