The following information is reprinted by permission from
SALES AND MARKETING STRATEGIES AND NEWS, October, 1994...

When Nabisco Foods Group set out to astonish attendees with state-of-the-art presentations at last year's Food Marketing Institute show it needed more than an audiovisual rental house. It needed a company that would help design an Electrosonic videowall game show from concept to completion. So it turned to Schiller Park, Illinois-based Rent Com Inc. which was ready for the challenge.

A full-service presentation rental systems integrator, Rent Com produces high-tech, yet easy to operate presentation systems that minimize the amount of technical labor needed.

With Rent Com's help Nabisco featured five different versions of "NabisQuiz" each day at the show, and gave away Olympic jackets to the winners. Contestants chose from categories displayed on a giant videowall, and when the category was completed a screen saver displaying Nabisco's corporate logo and products appeared.

"They wanted to be able to replace the game screens with something that would reinforcethe Nabisco brands," says Jim Anderson, media systems designer.

Complete with buzzers, LCD screen displays, podiums, sound effects and lights, the game show ran with the touch of a button, thanks to Rent Com's integrated laserdisc and videowall technologies.

"It was by far the most popular and creative exhibit of any we have undertaken," says Mike Falkowitz, Nabisco's manager of sales development and administration. The booth was my dream for three years, and Rent Com made it feasible and cost-effective," he says. "We couldn't have done it without them."

But there's more to a successful trade show presentation than high-tech components. To turn complex presentation ideas into simple operations, the company uses subtechnologies.

"Subtechnologies are the little things that make it all happen," says Dan Evans, rental manager/media systems design. "They can be software, hardware or a combination of both -- what we're really talking about is show control."

For example, during a live presentation, several things may be happening at once or may be prompted by timers, says Anderson. "All these things have to be coordinated so the presentation works automatically, and exactly the same way from one presentation to the next."

Founded in 1971, Rent Com has grown from renting sound systems and basic presentation equipment to designing, renting and selling unique applications. "I like to think of us as an AV boutique," says Anderson.

Customers usually don't tell the company what system they'd like to rent. Instead, they relay their ideas for a specific project. "We determine the technology and make it all fit together. We're very client driven," says Evans.

In addition to helping clients with trade show presentations, the company provides trained operators to help run the AV equipment and computer interfacing used at corporate meetings and special events.

In some cases, clients decide to purchase the equipment they previously rented. This led to the development of RC Communications, a division with its own sales force and technical experts who design, build and install custom AV systems.