The Pumper and Cleaner Environmental Expo International is always a much-anticipated industry event. It’s well-attended by PROs looking for the latest in trucks, restroom units and trailers, and accessory equipment. But it’s also a tremendous opportunity to find many professionals gathered in one spot, and to learn from that vast pool of knowledge.
One of the best ways to do this is to attend the Education Day seminars offered during the show. There are many to choose from, covering everything from equipment and technology to management and training. And these sessions are just the beginning of the learning opportunities at the show. We asked these PROs what their favorite sessions were, and the answers were as varied as the people themselves.
“We liked all of the classes we took,” John Richardson says of his experience with Expo education offerings, “but I’d say (the most useful was the) profitability session, talking about how to run your business with more streamlined efficiency.” He also enjoyed a session on line-jetting because he’s considering getting into jetting. He says the knowledge he gained in Louisville will help him determine equipment to invest in when the time comes to make the move.
His wife and business partner, Melissa Richardson, enjoys the Ladies’ Sessions offered during the same time slots on Education Day. She says it’s nice to think about things other than just the business once in a while, and helps make the Expo pleasant as well as informative. “I enjoyed the wine tasting, and especially the three-hour workshop about how to re-energize yourself.” It helps with the business, and in fact helps with everything, she says.
Rajeev Kher traveled thousands of miles to attend the Expo, and made the most of his time at the Kentucky Exposition Center by taking a full schedule of classes on Education Day. When asked which was the most useful, he didn’t hesitate.
“I attended the one on employee training, which is very important to me. In India, we’re not really following any set background of concepts, so everything is new in business. For me to learn new techniques as to how the employees can be motivated, how they can be trained, what kind of systems you can follow; writing reports, how to drive safely and clean restrooms safely, hygiene. All these things matter a lot, and no one teaches us these things in India, so for me this was a great learning opportunity.”
He believes the course will help him run his own business better, but also become a business leader in his home country. “We do it a little differently, not just for events, but also provide sanitation for slums and rural areas, which are under-developed and not self-sufficient,” he says.
He explains that in India, 50 percent of the population still defecates in the open. This obviously leads to all kinds of health issues, so providing portable restrooms is far more than a convenience service. “In India,” he says, “good hygiene is still a luxury.”
Wilton Sanitation driver Kevin Megson says every course he’s attended at the Expo has been useful for developing his career. On Education Day in 2010, he attended about 10 sessions, and another two the first day of the show.
He was especially struck by the courses concerning the business side of portable sanitation. “It gives me a better understanding of what my boss has to go through to make things happen for us,” he says, “more of an appreciation for what he has to do to sell.”
He says he learns as much on the show floor as he does in the education seminars. “You look at what someone’s doing there and say, ‘Hey, we could maybe start doing something like that.’ And all the guys you talk with, you learn a lot from them.”
