Turning away sponsors and exhibitors “sounds like a pretty stupid thing” for show organizers to do, Bob Hughes admitted, given how the trade-show industry is primed to leverage every partnership opportunity for maximum revenue.

But in “The Profitability of Restraint: Why Leaving Money Behind Pays Off” — Hughes’ ECEF (Exhibition and Convention Executives Forum) session on May 27 — the vice president, supplier relations, expositions and meetings, for NACS (National Association of Convenience Stores) will share how taking this approach makes good business sense. Convene recently spoke with Hughes to learn why it works for NACS and why he thinks other trade-show organizers might want to take a page from his book.

What sets the NACS conference and expo, which represents the global convenience and fuel retailing industry, apart from other trade shows?
I think the little bit of the difference that I have more than most is that my industry is not for manufacturers, it’s for the retailers.

The retailers definitely show up at the show and it’s for the greater good of the suppliers — all the money goes back into the industry to make it better [in terms] of where they sell their goods and services. There’s a little bit of a symbiotic-ness there. We’ve seen too many people have a philosophy where they will sell anything they possibly can, whether there’s an ROI to it or not. You might get money one year, but those dissatisfied folks will never come back again. When I talk to a supplier company, I can safely say without any hesitation … that we’re going to maintain a show density, and we know we’re not going to water down our membership level.

We don’t do sponsorships. A lot of people do sponsorships, and we have this thing where we, in essence, call this higher-level membership your year-round sponsorship. They get recognition year-round in the Hunter Club [an exclusive, top-tier supplier membership category that is capped].

Sometimes when you can’t get into a club, you want it even more. The show and the membership levels are super high-demand. We don’t necessarily want somebody who is going to think of NACS only for the four days of the show. We want to know that you engaged all year round so that you can build relationships.

The Hunter Club members come to our other events that are more niche. We have a State of the Industry in Chicago, about 800 people. We just did our Leadership Forum a couple weeks ago, about 300 people. We have our Day on the Hill.

Our retailers understand that this Hunter Club relationship is a higher-level spend in the industry to make it better — 86 percent of our revenue comes through the supplier channel. I have roughly 200 Hunter Club companies, and they represent a third of that 86 percent, so they are huge spend.

Our main annual event is a trade show, that depending on the year, can be in the top 35 trade shows [at] 140,000 net square feet. We typically have a waiting list of 200 companies wanting to exhibit. We have many companies on the show floor that have wanted to have a huge increase in their booth size.

Ninety percent of [most organizers] would let [a supplier have any] size booth they want. It’s hard to walk away from 200 companies on a waitlist. Conservatively, it’s probably [worth] a couple million dollars. We could get that, and we’d have an amazing year — I just don’t think we would have an amazing year next year.

We have dedicated show hours, and I’ve not seen [other shows do that] for three days. We open at 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. the first two days — that’s not a whole lot of time, but there’s nothing else conflicting with it. Our education is all in the morning. On that last day, we’re open 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. They’re really full, non-conflicted, full-density hours, and there’s a great vibe and energy. Even a strong show that is open 10 or 12 hours — either at the very beginning or the very end, or lunchtime — it’s just dead, a low-energy vibe.

What helps contribute to the energy on the NACS show floor?
The samples — it’s a whole different thing. People stand in line for a crispy crunchy chicken or a pizza or a hot dog. There are tons of options for food. You really have to pace yourself.

Even the beer companies, they check IDs and set up full bars — if it was in your neighborhood, it would be there for three years. It’s got that kind of detail to it. You go in there, and you sit in a bar, and you can’t get a 12-ounce beer, but you can get a 5-ounce sample size. It’s a big draw. Just food, drinks, and then seeing what’s new. At least 5 percent on the show floor is new.

Where is the show held?
We rotate between three cities — Chicago, Atlanta, and Las Vegas. Our preferred [rotation] is Vegas every other year — Vegas, Chicago, Vegas, Atlanta, Vegas, Chicago.

Each of our last three events has been our record breaker for that city. [In 2025], we broke our largest attendance record ever for Chicago. Vegas is always our biggest show, attendance-wise, and we broke our all-time record [in 2024]. In Atlanta, we had broken that record the year before. We’ll see if we can keep that trend. That’s pretty hard to do three straight years.

Do you attract international attendees?
They come from around the world but are mostly U.S.-based. Some of the folks that come don’t necessarily come for the buying opportunity. It’s more of “a back to the future machine.” When you look at retail, we’re all on different cycles. Some are ahead of us. Europe is blacked out in tobacco. If you want to see what retail is going to look like without tobacco, you can check that out. Then mobile and last-minute delivery stuff over in Asia. Then here, they love our loyalty and our food service.

Everybody’s coming to just learn without having to recreate everything. [They go to our] ed sessions and they’ll walk the show floor and look at stuff. When you get into the global, you’re looking at equipment like a car wash or a coffee machine or something.

You told me that other organizers assume you are in a unique position — and you’re “a bit arrogant” about your approach to turning away suppliers. How do you respond?
We need money as much as anybody. Our industry is [challenged by the fact that oftentimes] people don’t necessarily want a convenience store in their backyard. When you think of a convenience store, some might think of crime or people hanging out and that it sells tobacco and alcohol.

When you work here, you realize that it’s a food oasis for many — a [supermarket] is not going to go into a low-income area and we are their grocery store. It’s also a safe haven for people. It’s open all night. If you’re in distress, a well-lit area with a trained person in there could really be helpful. Then it’s our place where people who are frontline workers — nurses or doctors or firefighters or police — can go and get that gallon of milk the next morning for breakfast for their kid because they can’t get it at [a supermarket] when they get off their shift.

What else do you do differently?
The notion of doing on-site space selection — I hate it. Could I sell it and save a lot of time and money? Yes. I feel that two things are fundamental to that. One, I’m making them pay a lot of money to be there, and then I’m taking them away from the customer. I just don’t feel that that’s the right thing to do, at least for me and for NACS.

The other thing is we do space selection two months later on calls with them. We have the floor plan. We’ve taken into account the surveys and what we saw at the previous show. You can fix things that [happened] the time before. If I’m selling at the show, I can’t do anything. I’ve already sold the show for the following year.
It feels like exhibitors appreciate it. I do hear them get frustrated when they’re [forced] into making a decision in 10 minutes — “I need you to tell me you’re moving here right now or you’re going into the back of the hall.” That is not how you would treat your top customers. We all do it, I think. At other places where I’ve worked, we’ve done it before.

First, we tweak it however we need to tweak it. There’s a 20-minute call. I have two people that know what the heck they’re doing, that talk all about the entry points in — “Oh, you don’t want to go there because that’s a high ceiling, or there’s a high ceiling right in front of you, so you’re not going to have a sign.”

We have mystery-shopped our big booths already from the year before, so we have photos, so we actually pull them up. We make it very easy for them, but you couldn’t do that on site. It’s a very collaborative thing, and I think it builds a lot of trust.

What do you hope the ECEF audience will get out of your presentation?
I’m going to challenge them at the end, at least, to try to walk away from just one thing. I don’t know if they’ll be able to do it, but that’s going to be the challenge. What one thing can you say no to?

Michelle Russell is editor in chief of Convene.