Home Show Promotes Propane Appliances to Builders, Consumers

It’s not easy to talk with builders, contractors, and architects when they are busy at a jobsite, so vendors in the business of selling products and services to these professionals invite them to mix and mingle, learn, and view new products at a nearby trade show and education event.

Homeowners, too, present a challenge to vendors. Many homeowners are not aware of all the home improvement products that are available to them. So, the vendors invite members of the public, too, to attend the event and enjoy a day of viewing exhibits and product demonstrations.

Reaching those two audiences was the goal of the first South Georgia Home Showcase, which was held February 12-13 at the University of Georgia (UGA) Tifton Campus Conference Center in Tifton, Ga. The event promised attendees a chance to get product information direct from the manufacturers, and offered vendors a chance to spend two days talking with interested prospects.

The event was organized by presenting sponsors Conger LP Gas (Tifton, Ga.), a propane company serving 7000 customers from three offices in South Georgia, and Short & Paulk (Tifton, Ga.), a company that operates five lumberyards and home centers in South Georgia. They were helped by the Tifton Tourism Board and the UGA Conference Center.

“We had a good turnout of contractors and homeowners,” said Dan Richardson, chairman, president, and CEO of Conger LP Gas. “After the event, someone told me we’d hit a home run; I said, ‘No, we hit a grand slam!’”

The first day of the show, a Monday, was invitation only, and contractors solely were invited. Contractors and vendors could mingle on the show floor in the afternoon, and at a dinner in the evening. The dinner included a presentation by Jesse Marcus, director of residential and commercial business development at the Propane Education & Research Council (PERC). He talked about incentives that are available to builders. Three hundred people were at the dinner.

On the second day of the show, Tuesday, the show floor was open to both contractors and the general public from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. Between 85 and 100 displays were set up by vendors, and many of the exhibitors also offered product demonstrations inside and outside the convention center. An estimated 1800 people attended the show on the second day.

Admission to the show was free to those who preregistered. For those who didn’t, there was a $10 charge and the money raised at the door was contributed to Habitat for Humanity. The registration allowed the presenting sponsors to ask for contact information and pick up leads. The $10 charge for those who did not preregister enabled them to make sure that the people who attended were actually interested in what was being shown at the event.

“When you advertise a free event, some people just show up with a bag and walk around picking up free stuff,” Richardson said. “The $10 charge eliminated that.”

One of the offerings that helped draw contractors to the event was education. The South Georgia Home Showcase hosted about a dozen continuing education (CE) classes, including some that earned attendees CE credits from the American Institute of Architects (AIA) and the National Association of the Remodeling Industry (NARI).

“In the state of Georgia, home builders must have continuing education every year and they must have a certain number of hours of it per year,” Richardson said. “So, tying education in to our event filled a lot of classes. In one day, they could fulfill their requirements for the year.

“February is generally a slow month for contractors and home builders anyway,” he added. “We provided a boxed meal that they could pick up so that they would not have to leave campus to eat.”

“Reaching the home building community was the main emphasis for us and for Short & Paulk,” Richardson said. “Jay Short from Short & Paulk came to us a year earlier, wanting us to participate and help plan the event. We held two shows previously at our Vidalia location, and getting the builders together was very difficult. Teaming up with Short & Paulk for this event helped, because they are in contact with those guys every day.”

“When you try to talk to contractors on a job site, it’s difficult because they are busy,” he added. “This event provided a casual, relaxed atmosphere where we could just talk with them. Several contractors and home builders we had not done business with before, we are doing business with now.”

Among the homeowners who attended the South Georgia Home Showcase, tankless water heaters and whole-house generators were big hits. “Tankless water heaters by Rinnai were the star of the show,” Richardson said. “We had a lot of people at our booth, and I saw a lot of people at Rinnai’s booth, too. In this area, tankless water heaters are coming on strong. We installed 150 last year, and we hope to install 250 this year.

“In this area, there are not as many subfreezing days, so you can put a tankless water heater outside your home and save space inside. Many new homes are already equipped with them. People are he

aring about tankless water heaters and, once they have one, they like them. I’ve never heard anything bad about them.

“We also had several people who asked about whole-house generators,” Richardson added. “Only a few months before the show, we had Hurricane Irma. Many people lost power during the hurricane, and that was still fresh in their minds. So we sold a lot of generators.”

The show helped vendors promote these and other sorts of propane appliances. In addition to selling propane, Conger LP Gas sells, installs, and services all types of gas appliances.

“The main thing we heard from people who came in was, ‘We didn’t realize Conger LP Gas did all this stuff,’” Richardson said. “We are in the South and we don’t have as many degree days as people do in the North. Here, when people hear ‘propane,’ they think of 20-lb cylinders for their gas grill. At the show, these people saw all sorts of propane appliances.

“We all have to do a better job of educating the public,” he added. “Appliances like tankless water heaters give you year-round gallons.

“Marketers must think differently when they sell appliances,” Richardson explained. “We all need to quit trying to make so much on the appliances, and make money on the gas. We make more money in the propane industry by selling propane gas. We want to sell the appliance and the installation, but the big thing is the recurring income, several times a year, from gas.

“When people come in here and ask about gas logs, we ask them if they have heard about tankless water heaters. Ninety percent of them say they have and they have been thinking about getting one. We tell them that if they get both, we can give them a great deal.

“If you sell them only logs, you will deliver gas to them once and not go back for three years. But if you tie the logs in with a tankless water heater, you will see that customer three times a year. The customer will be ecstatic with the appliances and you will deliver more gas. Seeing the customer that many times a year will really help that relationship.”

Soon after the close of the first South Georgia Home Showcase, the presenting sponsors were already making plans for the second.

“Before the show, vendors told us that many events are not well attended, and they asked us if this was the best use of their time,” Richardson said. “After our event, they told us they had seen more attendees, answered more questions, and given out more brochures than they had at any other local event. They all said they would be back next year.”

For the second show, the presenting sponsors plan to start organizing the event earlier and to offer CE classes on the first day as well as the second.

“You always want to critique what you have done and improve it,” Richardson said.

“Contractors told us that they spent all day Tuesday in classes, and they would like to have walked around more,” he added. “Next time, we will start with the classes on Monday. We also will look to expand the classes and include plumbers.

“We started organizing this year’s event last October. At our first meeting, someone said, ‘You guys are already three months behind.’ We said, ‘Nah.’ By the end of the day, I apologized to the lady who said that. She was right; this was a bigger project than we expected.”

One thing that made the event a success was promotion. The presenting sponsors promoted the event on social media, local TV and radio stations, and mailed information to builders and contractors 100 miles out. Conger LP Gas and Short & Paulk each did mailings to their own customers and contributed to a general mailing.

“We pulled out all the stops,” Richardson said. “We worked hard and it cost a lot of money. We had help from the vendors and from PERC. PERC also helped by sending Jesse Marcus out to speak.

“You can’t just put out signs and banners,” he added. “It took a lot of work, but it was well, well worth it. If nothing else, we received a lot of brand recognition from all the advertising we did for the event.”

The South Georgia Home Showcase is to return to the UGA Tifton Campus Convention Center, Tifton, Ga., for its second-annual edition on February 11-12, 2019. For more information, visit www.gahomeshowcase.com.

—Steve Relyea