With the largest foodservice show in the world taking place this month, take it from a quick-service veteran—networking is worth your time.

 

Well, here it is: May. The season for trade shows is really starting to heat up as is the weather. It’s when travel becomes not just a question of if there will be airline delays, but how long they’ll be. So, the subject of this month’s diatribe is trade shows and their prime purpose: networking.

Let’s start with what I know best, which is how McDonald’s used to deal with the above, and then discuss how you should do it today.

In the really old days, this was known as talking with people for fun and profit. We didn’t have the term networking. We had local co-op meetings where the operators in a television market got together to trade war stories and decide how to spend their marketing money. As a part of this, they shared successes and failures. Operators who had been around for a while mentored newer operators, listening to their problems and suggesting solutions. The same situation occurred on a national level with a national co-op of elected operators who met several times a year for much the same purpose.