From GE Trolleys to METRORail Trains, “Carfare” Is Still Required.

This will sound so last century but I do remember when Atlanta replaced its streetcars with trolley buses. The electric trolley supplier, which happened to be GE, advertised about it in magazines like The American City.

My granddaddy, Max Baron, took me on at least one remembered ride on the streetcar that ran down Piedmont Avenue near our house of the era. So there was a jolt of flashback after I climbed onto METRORAIL at a parking lot at Bell and Travis, headed to OTC 2011 at Reliant Center.
 
I started riding the cars again last year for events in the Medical Center and in Reliant Center. Taking the train down to the Offshore Technology Conference this year (as in 2010) was a doddle. (That’s an informal British phrase meaning easily accomplished, a piece of cake.) Drive downtown. Find an easy parking place. Walk half a block to the METRORail stop, get your ticket and climb aboard. Fifteen minutes or so later, get off just 100 yards from the door to OTC. To get back, simply reverse the process.

It’s a buck-and-a-quarter fare one way. And that’s where the flashback comes: I wrote the $2.50 total cost into my expense-tracker as “carfare.” Even when you Google this phrase, you won’t find much about it, or its forebear “streetcar fare.” And I have no idea what mental attic corner I pulled it out of.

I do know that streetcars and trolley cars are gone (mostly) with the wind. Richard Layman, whose blog also supplied the photo of the ad above, is a bit whiny about the subject of public transportation but enough of a good sport to say:

I wrote recently…about how GM, Standard Oil of New Jersey, and Firestone led a conspiracy to replace streetcars with buses. The fact is it’s way more complicated and nuanced than that – just how history most often is, nuanced and more complicated than at first glance.

Whatever all the reasons for America’s cities eliminating seemingly more efficient means of mass transit, advertising about it was a staple of certain trade magazines; 50 and more years after the GE ad appeared, I was still creating print campaigns for transit bus motor oils like Exxon’s…and running them in American City and County…the modern name for The American City.

Subways and trains are fun, flashbacks and all. I wish we had more of them. Because despite downtown Houston’s empty buildings, riding the train to and from the center of our city is exciting and easy too. Even a little sexy. Just remember to bring carfare.

R&B@OTC: Along with 78,000 Other People, We Came to See and Be Seen.

We forget. We all forget – and fast, too. When I wrote here about the 2008 Offshore Technology Conference, oil was $128/barrel. Today, after the close of this year’s OTC, the price is $97.30 – down from a high of $113 a month ago. In the middle, there have been ups and downs, spills and chills and drilling moratoria. Plus constant predictions of “the end of civilization as we know it” in terms of a bleaker, far more expensive energy future.

So why, in the face of so much negativism and angst, did more than 78,000 of us go to OTC 2011, generating another record-busting year? One reason is our recognition (at least as far as I can tell) that oil and gas aren’t the end of us; but rather, they’re Western civilization’s guarantor.

That’s a big word but no less true. Hydrocarbons not only fuel our present lives, they assure the quality and durability of what we have achieved financially and culturally.

This is not to say our industry doesn’t have its tin ears and big mouths. Transocean’s boneheaded safety bonus announcements a month ago are just one example of how to make an entire business segment look real bad.

OTC is energy – the thrilling buzz of making things happen, of participating. It only took me and Brian Bearden sitting together in the PSR Group booth for five minutes, getting this caricature drawn, to also draw a cheerful crowd of lookers…and sitting ducks for the PSR people working the booth. (Thanks and you’re welcome to the PSR gang!)

George Foster of Foster Marketing answered me this: “What’s the marketing value of exhibiting at the Offshore Technology Conference?”

Trade shows are the last bastion of building personal relationships in this digital age. The opportunity to reacquaint with clients and prospects from all over the world at OTC is  phenomenal. Not only the relationship-building, but to know that making one sale pays for the show makes OTC well worth the expense.

I have pushed the same query to other colleagues, veterans of working in or visiting clients at this year’s OTC. When I get more answers, I’ll post them and let you know. Meanwhile, newly headlined Barrett-Wehlmann-Proctor principal Jim Proctor splits being seen five ways:

From the optimist’s perspective, it’s keeping your brand relevant in the context of the global industry’s biggest event of the year.

From the pessimist’s point of view, it’s not being conspicuous by your absence.

For the salesperson: “I can see 40 customers in a day, not get on a plane and it only costs $1.7 million.”

For the marketer, it’s accumulating those pesky exhibitor points and improving location – year after year.

And from the CFO’s perspective: “What else are we going to do with all these profits?”

Thank you to Tuesday’s wingman Bearden, principal of web design consultancy Upstream Marketing. Thanks to Signalwrite clients here and abroad, and to everyone who made a great OTC 2011 possible…nothing cartoonish about any of ‘em but great colleagues all.

My OTC

This seems a good day to break cover and resume posting to the blog – especially since Susan Kirkland has written a post that a number of consultants will likely read and ponder. The energy industry does not come off well, though it’s really not the subject of Susan’s post.

As I mentioned in my response to it, though, I have devoted the past 30 days or more to maintaining connections with colleagues, clients and prospects at OTC.08 – this year’s Offshore Technology Conference here in Houston.

It’s the world's largest offshore energy event. This year’s attendance reached 75,092, the highest in 26 years and 11% more than in 2007: With more than one-half million square feet of exhibition area, the show included 2,500 companies from more than 35 countries in an area the size of 13 football fields.

With oil at $128/barrel, it’s not surprising that there is plenty to see (from gigantic hardware to advanced software) and do (visit clients on the show floor, shake and howdy with people from a dozen or more countries).

In no particular order, thanks to my colleagues – Rob Schoenbeck of area51, Philippe Holtzweiler of Hope Communications – who attended breakfasts, luncheons, cocktail events and the exhibition itself; handfuls of clients who welcomed me into their booths and their activities; hundreds of Englishmen, Scots, Germans, French and Belgians who opened up their hands and their hearts to meet one more Houstonian. And the thousands of OTC volunteers who, every year, make a trade exhibition like this possible.

Do you believe that doing better business depends on how effectively you can communicate benefits, advantages and features of your brand one-on-one?

OTC.08 was a massive example of how well you did your job. My clients did great, though I say so myself.

OTC Precog

Precognition – “precog” – is knowledge in advance of an event, especially by extrasensory perception.

I can’t see much further through a brick wall than the next fella. But last night, at the American Marketing Association Houston second annual pre-Offshore Technology Conference networker, I wondered if anyone could see lightning far off on the watery horizon.

Here’s the price of oil holding at US$115 a barrel and attendance at this Mixer was down compared to last year.

This is no fault of its excellent hosts and sponsors: It was a good time at a good venue. However, to justify this post, I ought to be able to find something reasonably profound to say about all this.

What I learned is that every person I spoke with has had a different business experience through the first quarter of this year. Some people have been struggling and this is in a market that feeds off the Energy Sector, which continues its growth. To be clear, no one I met last night had to testify about his or her “obscene profits” before the US Congress – obviously I am hanging with the wrong crowd.

Here’s the deal about OTC .08: One of the world’s largest trade shows, it opens at Reliant Center here on 5 May. It’s the Houston version of the Texas State Fair, Ringling Brothers Circus and a Bob-the-Builder Convention rolled into one huge event, with more than 70,000 “offshore E&P professionals” and more that 2,000 exhibiting companies.

That lightning you see on the horizon? I sense that’s the sparking of opportunity, precognition of fresh business for marketers. The truth is out there. Get your rear ends down to Reliant Center when the OTC doors open.

All the official OTC hotels are sold out, but if you’re serious, you can stay here with us. And thanks to the hosts and sponsors for last night’s get-together. (The AMA’s Sherri Scott caught me with my enthusiasm showing…again. I have got to be careful around that woman!) Have a great weekend.