I had a fantastic show! Here would be my recap:
The mix and meet was silly with all of the aisles, I was hoping the tables would be around the perimeter of the room so that one could walk the whole space logically. Fundamentally, participating (which we did) was a good deal because it was like getting 4 passes for $1050 instead of $1200.
I spent all of my time in the air conditioning with the exception of a few instances at the pool bar. This probably wouldn't have been the case if we weren't running datacenter tours during the daytime on Friday and Saturday... but it did rain quite a bit too.
I didn't stop by any cabanas but evidently some companies are still giving away swag as our attorney had a whole "swag bag" filled with shirts, hats, pens, mugs, lighters... that's so 2001 but oh well I simply am getting old and don't care for ad specialty. My kids will be able to read soon and then it's all over.
I found the attendees to be, by in large, extraordinarily focused on getting business done. Lots of meetings everywhere and from what I observed a good sense of humility about getting out of the box and learning so that everyone can grow and expand their business instead of shrivel away and die.
As always, the inside bar, lobby, smoking area out back and pool restaraunt were the places to be to see everyone, have meetings and socialize. This event is always a personal favorite, I truly enjoy and appreciate having a closed venue.
Brad