Asheville Wedding Festival

Hey-lo.

It is about 4:31 and I am just about winding down now from this weekend's Wedding Festival at the Asheville Civic Center. Since you are reading this, you already know that I like to help with the Wedding Festival crew with setup and take down.
What most vendors don't realize is the thought, the work, the sweat, the blood, that goes into each show. Oh and the pranks...but we will get into that later.
The staff that was here tonight was...in no particular order, Marc and Colleen (show producers) Logan(road manager), Garyn, Virgil, Ben, Lana, Coleman, Sarah (The Machine...this is the girl that just will not stop for a break all weekend) and of course Kennedy.
Their weekend started on Thursday when some of the crew traveled with all the gear to start assembling it on Friday morning at 7:30. I arrived at 4:30pm right in the middle of vendor load in. At this point the crew has already been working all day, and now they are assisting the vendors. I cannot even begin to tell you how physically demanding this is. And everyone that I observed during this time was smiling and glad to be here.
When I got here I jumped right into vendor load in. That is a workout and a half. By the end of load in, around 8:00pm, I was spent. I know I tried lifting something that I should not have and now I am paying for it...dearly. And I only got there at 4:30, not all day like everyone else. Sometimes, I kinda feel bad about not being able to keep up with the crew but in my defense they are all at least 10 years younger and in much better shape than I am...or ever will be.
After vendor load in came time to stuff the Wedding Festival Planning Bags. Now...while I and the guys were loading in, some of the girls were already getting the vendors' information that each participating vendor supplied ready to be stuffed into the bags. The funny thing about the bag promo is that with me being a vendor, I know the value of participating in this because each bride will already have my DVD, post card, or whatever I want placed into the bag and each time that I am helping the crew, I see all the vendors that did take advantage of the promotion I have to think to myself...what am I waiting for here. Because each bride will already have my information, my exposure will surely go up.
What I mean is at this show there was about 450-475 brides walking around. That is by my estimate, those were not official numbers. I have met with brides who attended a Wedding Festival that I did not get to meet because there were so many brides there, it would be impossible to meet every single bride that walked through that door. So now you can see why this is a great idea for the vendors.
I will fast forward a little bit here...we are now done, and it is about 8:30 and Marc and Colleen are taking the crew out to Fuddruckers for some dinner. Joining tonight are James and Jenny from Visio Photography. If you are a photographer or aspiring to be one, then you would definitely be a fan of theirs. They have such an artistic eye for capturing the bride or any subject for that matter...it is just mind numbing. So it is always a pleasure to sit and talk with them...pick their minds, etc... Now, if I could just sit down with Visio and Kismet at the same time, that would be cool.
After dinner I got settled into my room at the Crowne Plaza Hotel...very nice indeed. Garyn and Coleman came to my room and we played Guitar Hero for a while and soon after, my day was finally....finally done. I could go to bed now....if I was not aching all over that is.
The next morning, I got up...barely, and ventured to the breakfast buffet and started my day with a fantastic breakfast. Soon after I started Marc, Colleen, and Kennedy joined me. And about the same time Virgil and Ben finished off the breakfast club.
Right after we ate, which is about 7:20am we were all ready to head back to the civic center for yet another day hard work and fun...