Here is a little potpourri for your Monday morning: according to an article at DMN, hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of equipment was stolen during NAB 2006 in Las Vegas. Despite spending $350,000 on security measures and employing 1,100 guards, 17 thefts were reported this year.
Worst off was Abel Cinetech, who had a $72,000 Panasonic Varicam camcorder, another Panasonic camcorder worth $27,000, and finally a $4,000 Panasonic camcorder stolen from their booth in the days leading up to the opening of the show.
Ikegami was hit with the theft of a $55,000 HD camcorder and a $34,000 Canon lens. A $50,000 Sony camcorder was stolen from Shotoku, and the president of NL Technology gave chase to a man who stole a $100,000 Ikegami camcorder. Thankfully the man put the camcorder down (gently, fortunately) after he saw he was being chased and ran off.
We have displayed at NAB before and had equipment stolen. Companies who display at he show are forced to wrap their entire display in plastic, use locks and chains and hire private guards. I can site five other vendors who lost something at the show. We were lucky - we only lost a few thousand dollars in gear. The reality is that the NAB show is a work-for-profit. The less they spend on guards the more they keep. Who are the theives? Other vendors? The Union? The guards? Clearly its someone. We will never display again, after the marshalling fees, 50 cents per pound, $200 for a phone line (not including useage), $300 for power and $50 per square foot plus carpet!! $35 to rent a $6.00 trash can? What if all those who had losses banded together and approached NAB. NAB pockets millions for the show (and who knows how may missing Plasmas). Together we could compel better security. My insurance agent won’t write a trade show binder for NAB citing “too may mysterious dissapearences”. Only NAB can be heald responcible for this monster of grand larcey. More security? Better security? The casinos have cameras that can tell them if a single chip is dropped in a bathroom. How do they carry off a Schook Hummer???