I know it’s customary to thank your customers first but we wouldn’t have met so many of them and mainly locksmiths, if it hadn`t been for the MLA putting on another very successful show.
As the years go by very few trade shows manage to stay the course, I can think of several which have started strongly then either shrunk in size or completely disappeared over the last decade or so. Okay the MLA is slightly different, they represent a very large part of the locksmith industry, but they are still to be commended because in an ever changing market place they have remained strong and as such continue to be well supported and hence we are already pencilling in for 2021.
I do now want to thanks all those customers who we met over the three days of the show, many who we already knew and already trade with, but also those new enquiries from both the UK, Europe and others from further overseas, South Africa and New Zealand, I think were the furthest away.
We have always tried to put some thought into the design of our physical displays, whether they be gates, doors or cabinets in order to encourage customers to touch and feel and this year the centre piece was the code change challenge. For those of you who didn`t see it, this featured our 5000 series ECP keypad mounted onto a full size door blank, and the test was to see who could change the code the quickest.
I am pleased to say the response was fantastic encouraging both the older and the younger generations to have a go. In one case a prominent MLA member had a go, only for later in the day his grandson to take on the challenge clearly intent on beating his Grandfathers time. And wow was that a close one, almost a tie.
Our new logo states the code can be changed on the door in under 10 seconds which in itself is remarkable, because this is done safely and securely but we had several customers who managed it in a smidgeon under 5 seconds with the winner Lee Palmer setting the record at 4.39. So, our congratulations go to Lee and he receives the winners certificate plus the £100 cash prize.