I work closely with a lot of entrepreneurs and I’m often asked my opinion of the various venture fairs in the area. The question is urgently important when they need capital to keep their company growing and alive. They are reluctant to invest time and money into an event that doesn’t give them a good chance to connect with serious investors. They hear rumors that some are great, worth every penny, and some suck, stay away.
I’ve been to lots of venture fairs, I help plan and run a few, and I have my opinions and biases. But my purview is limited. I’m sure it would be much more useful to the entrepreneur community to collect opinions and reports from a statistically significant number of people who have experienced a range of venture fairs.
That’s what this post is about. I’m hoping that you will add comments about individual venture fairs, and venture fairs in general. As we get a certain critical mass of comments, I’ll break it up into separate event-specific posts.
I’m inviting comments from entrepreneurs, investors, event sponsors, service providers, and event organizers.
So have at it. Share anything you want. I only ask that your comments be objective and fair. What’s good, what’s bad? What works, what doesn’t? What is it about venture fairs you would like to see ridiculed and banned, and what should be praised and imitated?