The expo at Etten-Leur was first thought of about 5 years ago. Sadly the ones who took the initiative never got it to work because the city council didn't like the idea. Now 5 years later the idea was introduced again by the husband of my mom's colleague. This happened in January 2011.
A bunch of people were invited and asked to come up with ideas. I was one of those people. Since K'NEX is a relatively "new" (not to us) modelling material, they really liked what we could offer after seeing the videos and photos of Looping Star, Moloch and Big Apple. They invited me to join the meeting to discuss certain things and brainstorm for ideas to promote the first expo in this town.
At the meeting we showed pictures of our models to one another, discussed the sizes of our stands and negotiated how many models everyone could take with them. My first idea was to have three models at the expo. However, when we measured the space for the expo, it occured to us that there was no way we could fit in three K'NEX models without becoming "overkill" towards the other builders. I had a hard time, but I managed to fit in two models, even though this was not the plan at first.
So after this I had to contact the second builder; Maarten was the first choice for this expo. He was chosen by comparing school holidays, distance to travel and the overall quality of his models. By the time the second builder was chosen it was already February.
In April we had a few of the builders go back to the expo to accurately measure the rooms and make a map of where everything would be placed. After this we had a lot of contact with one another, new additions to our stand, promotion ideas, etc.
Just to sum it up, I've been actively working on this expo for 6 months already. This combined with other expo's too like Geleen, Waalwijk, Roosendaal and Oosterhout (GWOH). It's hard work and takes up at least half a day every week.
Today we reached the day to actually bring over the first few parts. I decided to bring my stand first, promotional items and some electronic parts, so I can repair stuff if it decides to randomly stop working during the expo. I've constructed the table for Maarten, so he can bring the model, put it on the table, hook it up and let it run. The lucky boy doesn't really have to do anything.
Tomorrow we will bring in the models and put them together (Maarten will do that on Friday, though, as he can't make it tomorrow). After our models are put on display we have one day of rest before it kicks off at Friday.
My brother was playing with the camera resulting in my battery going dead after just one picture from the expo. However, I do have a few from when I was still home.
Crate full of electronics and stand material
Expo Table and the electronics from XenoX + trains (in the blue box)
All that fancy Dutch Details promotional stuff!
The cloth for the table
Some stuff from other people from the expo, that big round thing must be some kind of merry-go-round.
So that's it for today. Tomorrow the serious business starts, moving over the models and getting them to run! I will try to write a daily report together with Maarten every day so you guys can follow the progress of the expo and hopefully get a bit of the feel and understand the effort it costs to make a successful expo.
SSCoasters Moderator 
I hope you can be successful and help bring things into an upward promotion.
