When asked about the decision to re-launch an event on the west coast, Amy Allen, Show Director for JLC LIVE, Remodeling Show and DeckExpo explained “we came to the conclusion that the economy is moving in a better direction which offers our exhibitors the exposure they expect in return for their investment in time, effort and dollars spent. Conversely, bringing JLC LIVE to Portland provides attendees in the region enough top manufacturers and education making attending worth their time away from the jobsite,” stated Amy Allen, Show Director for JLC LIVE. 
“Although the show may have been on hold for the past few years, it was the right decision to preserve the show’s future,” continued Allen.  “We appreciate the patience of our sponsors, exhibitors, attendees and other partners during this hiatus.”
The event website is currently under construction and should be live in December 2010.  Booth space assignments for the 2011 Northwest event are scheduled for spring of 2011.  Manufacturers or distributors interested in participating should call 800.471.4204.  Incentives will be in place for those who wish to participate in both the 2011 Northwest event and the 2012 New England event.
For more information about JLC LIVE please visit www.JLCLIVE.com.

I’m pleased to announce that I’ll be returning to the Journal of Light Construction’s JLC Live Residential Construction show to be held this year in Long Beach CA on May 6th through the 8th.

JLC Live Residential Trade Show is designed for small construction and remodeling companies to come see, learn and try different tools, techniques and methods that will improve their crews and staffs abilities.

I’m not sure yet what the speaking schedule is going to be; watch for that at a later date to be announced once all speakers are tapped.

I’ll be doing a 75 minute seminar on “Waterproofing Decks Over Living Spaces-It’s A TEAM Effort”, where I’ll do a Powerpoint seminar that discusses various types of deck coatings, the installation of a typical decking system and how/why the contractor and the waterproofer must be a team together, to ensure a high quality job.

Do you have any suggestions on what you’d like to see discussed or addressed? Issues that have happened on your job? Send and requests you might have to me at Bill@deckexpert.com
and I’ll see if I can work it into the program.

Mobs where waiting at the door at 4:15 pm, eagerly waiting for the doors to open to the Art of Waterproofing Decks seminar, presented by deck expert Bill Leys…the Long Beach police had to be called in to restore order after the PowerPoint handouts ran out…
well the reality was they had to promise not to break into a keg and hold it back for all the folks who came to the 4:30 seminars, instead of going to the free happy hour that began at 5 pm.

I was pleased to see about 25 persons in the audience when I started up my seminar, including representatives from Mer-Kote-Parex LaHabra. The audience seemed engaged and asked me lots of questions, obviously because they had problems in the past.

I wound up around 530, with time for questions and answers…one guy who was from Nor Cal came up and said he was a deck coating installer, thought I did a pretty good job instilling the process of what deck coating installers need from their contractors.

My best feather that went in my cap so to speak though was editor Dave Frane of JLC Magazine who emailed me saying my presentation was interesting and most importantly, not boring, quite a feat for such a boring subject… 😉 and then invited me to write an article on deck coating!
So look for an article sometime down the road, not sure what the magazine’s turnaround is from receipt of article til publication, but I will be doing an article! Thanks JLC!

The just ended JLC Live Residential Construction Show in Long Beach seemed to be well attended by my estimation on Thursday, May 15th, the day I attended the show.
Getting in early to check in as a speaker, I wandered down stairs in the seminar area, where the office of JLC staff is and where the speakers lounge is too.

I met Sherri Daniels, a dynamo who was making decisions and introducing me to staff and telling me about my seminar and room assignment all at once and never seemed out of sorts the whole time. “Just another day” Sherri deadpanned.

Leaving me off, I met up with Dave Frane, a senior editor at JLC magazine. We struck up a conversation on waterproofing and enjoyed some banter before heading up to the show floor.

Tons of peole milled about on the floor, a mix of trade show booths with live demo’s of installations of windows, tiling, stair building and vendors selling tools and various software-estimating stuff mostly.

Wandering the floor, I met a number of vendors/manufacturer’s with interesting products and ideas..including Landon Innovations of Moorpark CA’s “Gorilla Gripper”, (www.gorillagripper.com )a handy tool that allows one with ease to handle sheets of plywood and drywall materials with an ingenious handle that grips the piece. Simple Man Products booth had some ingenious “why didn’t I think of that” products that makes life easier on many construction tasks; an electric box finder that one slips into the elec boxes, then puts up the drywall and you can easily find your placing to cut out the hole for the box. Check out their line of stuff at
www.simplemanproducts.com

Shower and bath waterproofing products were represented well, the market for easy to install and waterproof tile showers and baths is ripe for change, leaks in these areas contribute to a lot of construction defect issues like decks do. Nobel Company amongst others has a line of foam cast tile ready forms and pre-sloped floors along with their all in one waterproofing sheet membrane for tiling, which also integrates a crack isolation membrane in it as well. They claim it will work with exterior tiled balconies too. I’ll have to do some research…the material looks interesting.

Wandering further on the show floor, I came across the only actual deck coating manufacturer to smartly buy a booth and meet 100’s if not thousands of potential customers who may need deck coating on one of their projects (pretty dang likely they will!)and now are on Westcoat Specialty Coatings mailing and contact list. I met Curtis at the booth who had some of Westcoat’s cool water based stains and other flooring finishes, along with their deck coating lines and waterproofing.

I watched Michael Byrne do a live tiling demonstration for a while, then went in search of lunch at the speakers lounge.

Down at the speakers area, I met a local from Atascadero-Turko Semmes, of Semmes & Co Builders, who was giving a talk on green building. Then as I’m sitting across from a guy, Tim Faller, who sports a JLC Live badge that says “Westerly, RI” as his hometown…I find out that a couple of Rhode Islanders are out here for the show -stair guru Mike Kennedy is giving demo’s on the floor. Being from RI, it was funny to hear the other speakers, many of whom are on their 3rd or 4th show, ribbing us on “are akshents”. (our accents)It was nice to see that an accent on bringing in California based speakers was made with great success. I joined an esteemed group of caring craftsmen, including Dennis Allen of Allen Associates in Santa Barbara, Michael Byrne of Los Olivios, Jay Elbettar of Newport Beach, Gary Katz, Reva Kussmaul, Michael McCutcheon of Berkeley, Turko Semmes of Atascadero and Bill Robinson of Arroyo Grande.

I walked around the show again before heading over to my hotel, the Queen Mary, for a quick refresh before my seminar at 430.