The same crate, the same two employees, and the same screwdriver produce different outcomes in Chicago, Las Vegas, and Orlando. Knowing which one you are in changes what your install actually costs.
Labor jurisdiction at US trade shows is negotiated venue by venue. The rules follow the building, not your company and not your home country. For an international exhibitor this is genuinely unfamiliar territory, because in most of the world the question does not arise in this form.
What right-to-work does and does not mean
Florida is a right-to-work state. In practical terms that makes Orlando more flexible than the strictest union markets, and it is one of the reasons the city hosts as many large shows as it does.
What it does not mean is that there are no rules. It is worth being precise about this, because the phrase gets oversold by people trying to make a booth sound cheaper than it will be.
Right-to-work means my own staff can do whatever they like inside my booth.
Exhibitor personnel can generally do more than in a strict union market, but the venue and show management still set what is permitted, and some work stays with the official contractor regardless.
It means I do not need paperwork.
It changes who may work, not whether they are authorised. The forms are the same forms.
It means labor is cheap.
It means labor is more flexible and commonly cited as less expensive than the strictest markets. It is still a real line in your budget.
The work that is never yours to assign
Some categories stay with the official general service contractor in almost every venue, whatever the state.
- Moving freight on the show floor. Material handling is the contractor’s work, everywhere.
- Rigging, and anything that goes overhead.
- The final electrical connection, in most halls.
- Anything involving the building itself, including the floor and the ceiling.
This is not a negotiating position. It is how the hall is run, and trying to work around it is how a booth gets stopped mid-install.
What an exhibitor appointed contractor actually is
An EAC is a company that is not the show’s official contractor but is authorised to work on the floor for you. An exhibit house installing the booth it built is the ordinary case, and it is the reason your builder can be your installer.
Authorisation is paperwork with a deadline: a notice of intent naming the EAC, and a certificate of insurance meeting show management’s requirements. Both are filed in advance, both have a date, and neither costs money.
What they cost is access. Filed late, your crew is not admitted, and the fact that they are standing outside a hall in Orlando holding the right tools does not help. This is the part people miss, and it is entirely avoidable. The general version is in EAC or general service contractor.
Why this shows up in your quote as crew hours
Labor is priced per person per hour, with different rates for straight time, overtime, and holidays, and different rates again for different crafts. Because of that, comparing two quotes on labor dollars alone tells you very little.
Ask for the install estimate in crew hours instead. Hours are comparable across quotes, they predict the bill in any city, and they are a direct readout of how complicated your booth is to build. A design that takes twelve crew hours in Orlando takes roughly twelve crew hours in Chicago. What changes is the rate and who is allowed to hold the screwdriver.
It is also a useful design signal. If your install estimate is climbing, the structure is getting more complicated, and complication is a cost you keep paying at every future show.
What to settle with your exhibit house, in writing
Labor is where a quote and an invoice diverge most often, and the divergence is almost always about who assumed what. Three things are worth pinning down before you sign, and none of them is awkward to ask.
- ✓Who is the EAC, and who files the paperworkName the company. Name the person filing the notice of intent and the certificate of insurance, and put the filing date in the schedule rather than leaving it as an intention.
- ✓How many crew hours, over how many shiftsAn install quoted as a lump sum tells you nothing. Hours over shifts tells you whether the plan depends on overtime, and overtime is where labor budgets break.
- ✓What your own staff are expected to doIf the plan assumes your people unpack, place product, or dress the booth, say so now. If it assumes they do not, that is crew hours you have not been quoted for.
The same three questions are worth asking about dismantle, which is the shift everybody under-plans. It is also the shift that decides whether your booth is in a condition to be used again, which matters a great deal if the plan is to store it in Orlando and bring it back.
What Orlando genuinely gives you
Set against Chicago or Las Vegas, Orlando offers more flexibility for your own personnel, a labor market commonly cited as less expensive than the strictest union cities, and a hall that is straightforward to move into. Our OCCC move-in guide covers the mechanics, and union labor rules city by city sets the comparison out properly.
For an international exhibitor at NPE, the useful version is this: the city is on your side, the paperwork is not automatic, and the deadline for the paperwork arrives well before you fly.
The flexibility is real. The forms are still due.