PONDEMINIUM 2012 EVENT REVIEW

In the month of February there are not too many people thinking about ponds and water gardens. It is cold, weather is nasty, and the ground has not been seen for a month now. Pond and water garden professionals are huddled around their stoves with blankets draped across their backs impatiently waiting on Spring. Ponds and water gardens are the last thing that we have on our minds right?
Wrong! On February 1-3, 2012 in York, Pennsylvania about 60+ pond and water garden professionals came together for 3 days of networking and business building at an event held by Splash Supply Company of York, PA called Pondeminium! Mark and Rebecca Willoughby put together their second Pondeminium, which may be shaping up to become an annual event.
Much of the Pondeminium event was held indoors with presentation and seminars held in the comfort of a warm dry conference room. The event kicked of with a “State of the Pond Industry” address given by The Pond Guy himself, Greg Wittstock; who teleconferenced in to give Pondeminium a nice jump start. But all the while there was also an outdoor pondless waterfall build happening at the Splash Supply Company retail location; being led by Brian Helfrich from Aquascape Inc. Brian is one of the country’s, if not world’s, most highly regarded pond builders. Brian makes the hands ON building seminars as fun as they are informative, always giving even the most seasoned pond and waterfall builders something new to learn.
For the inside portion of the event industry professionals like Doug and Judy Harvey, BJ Linger, Rick Weidman, Mike Michoki, and several other respected pond and water garden pros shared their experience and know how on all sorts of topics. Pondeminium topics from sales, marketing, and social media; to project showcases and pond aeration. Smaller break out groups discussing pond tours, home shows, social media, selling technique, and other more intimate discussions also took place; giving the attendees numerous options to help them fine tune and grow their pond and water garden businesses while making contacts and friend within the industry. The last indoor session was held by Brian Helfrich and was an “any topic” discussion between Brian and all the event attendees; it was good stuff for any pond pro to be a part of.
The entire Pondeminium event was well organized and ran smoothly with very nice hotel accommodations offered with a group rate. Shuttles were available to go from the conference to the retail site, or it was an easy drive to everything. A very nice mixer style dinner at a local restaurant with panoramic views overlooking York was great too. Did I mention there were some killer chocolate chip cookies being passed around during the presentations?
The Pondeminium wrap up was again held at the Splash Supply retail location at 4464 Lincoln Highway in York, PA. The pondless waterfall and a couple of overflowing urns were officially turned on creating some beautiful eye candy for traffic passing by the retail center. Handshakes were made, business cards were passed out and the pond pros headed back home; with some coming from as far as Missouri!
If you want to learn more about the Pondemonium event or have an interest in attending an upcoming event visit the Splash Supply Company Facebook page at www.facebook.com/splashsupply. I am sure Mark, Rebecca, and Ryan from Splash Supply would be happy to hear from you.

All copyrights to this material is solely owned by Mike Gannon