If breakfast is the most important meal of the day, that’s doubly true at a dealer conference like last week’s Kyocera event at The Pallazzo in Las Vegas. At events like this you’re on the go from sun up to sun down and if you don’t get up early enough for breakfast, you miss out on a prime networking opportunity.
Indeed, for me breakfast is the most social event of the conference. It’s a terrific opportunity to visit with peers, socialize with dealers and learn more about what’s going on out in the real world apart from all the presentations and announcements taking place at the conference.
Some of my analyst friends and I have a running joke about bacon, and after a few years of dealer meetings without this breakfast staple, the past few years Kyocera has seen the light and not pulled pork from the morning menu. At least on the first day of the conference where there were mountains of bacon as far as the eye could see.
Although there was no bacon on Thursday morning, a huge disappointment for everyone at my breakfast table, the conversation among the analysts and dealers certainly made up for it. Between the two dealers from Alaska and the dealer from Northern California, the conversation was light, lively, and informative. It was fascinating to hear about the challenges of being an office technology dealer in the 49th state. It’s clearly a different world up there, and the challenges of servicing customers in Alaska are very different from what most dealers in the lower 48 experience.
I can’t imagine living and working in that environment, dealing with 40 below temperatures, delays caused by avalanches, navigating around moose and bear, and flying in two-seater airplanes for a service call, but it was fascinating to hear about it. I give these dealers who have been able to survive and thrive in this kind of sales and service environment a lot of credit. If it weren’t for breakfast (sans bacon), I might never have known. They’ve got a great story to tell and I hope to share one of those with you in a future issue of ENX.
And next week look for my recap of the Kyocera dealer meeting, delayed a week because of illness (I had the flu on Monday and Tuesday despite a flu shot last fall) and the two stories we’re running this week on GE Capital.
Thanks for reading.
