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Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Leaving for Europe

Steve Cole: Big day today, getting on the plane for Europe and the Essen trade show. I have no fear of flying, but I really don't like not being able to get up and move around or go somewhere else. This will be my first real experience with jet lag, since there is six hours time difference and my body will have to get up and go to breakfast at a time that it thinks is 2am (and about time to go to bed). We'll land at dawn on Wednesday but my body will still think it's midnight on Tuesday. What fun!

Even so, I'm excited about the chance to meet new and old customers, new and old friends. The game industry is a small town and everybody knows everybody, but more importantly, everybody HELPS everybody. No other industry works like this. I had no clue what to do or plan or prepare or take with me or how to do things when I get there, but other game companies (supposedly in competition with mine) arranged my hotel reservations (well, the executive director of the trade association did that one), my trade show booth, back connections, shipping a pallet of stuff, and even storing what we don't sell for next year.

Can you imagine General Electric telling Westinghouse, "Oh yeah, here's all the information you will need. Let me set you up with the same hotel I'm in. Hey, we'll pick you guys up at the airport and drive you down to Essen since you don't know the place. Oh yeah, banks, there's one in the convention center and you just wire the money home. Oh, and we'll store you left over products in our warehouse for you until next year, no problem. And let's all go to dinner together at the end of each day."

But that is how it works here. One company (Mayfair) takes it on themselves to send a cargo container with everybody's merchandise in it. Just crazy. It would be impossible for us to go without all of out "competitors" doing half of our work for us and showing us the easy way to do the other half.

Even more fun, my neighbor at the show is Rick Loomis of Flying Buffalo, an old friend (I played his games when I was in college back during the war, and don't ask me which war). He's now the president of GAMA (the Game Trade Association) and he's sharing his rental car with me. I'm not sure I'm looking forward to his driving 100mph on the autobahn between the airport and the trade show (something over an hour) but he insists it will be fun.