The events industry still isn’t up and running from being shut down in March. Nearly eight months of a shutdown is enough to put other companies out of business. Our industry still isn’t allowed to work, and nearly every significant trade show and conference scheduled for the rest of 2020 has been cancelled. While PPP has been a vital lifeline for the many small businesses in this industry, including T3, we still need a targeted, longer-term assistance program to help preserve 2.8 million jobs.
We were left no choice this year but to try and reinvent our company in order to survive. In the past, we have worked with such prestigious brands as Salesforce, Amazon, International Toy Fair and we set up their annual or semi-annual events. Event planning was the core-business for T3.
T3 was able to share our story with WCVB, Channel 5, the ABC Affiliate in Boston. As a local company in the Boston area, our story has impact on so many people. (check out the link!)
We discussed how T3 has had to pivot from an events planning company to now building personal protective equipment, including intubation tents, which have been deployed at Brockton Hospital. We also discussed how we are now building school desks and desk shields working on orders for a homeless shelter in Mattapan and Boston Public Schools.
“Because we build things for events, we are a light manufacturer in that aspect of our business, so it has been easy for us to pivot and reimagine what we build, using the same raw materials, but applying it in a different way," said Chris Valentine, CEO, T3 Expo. “Obviously, we've been devastated – our core business is down 90%. But we've been able to keep 50 people employed.”
T3 also built beds for the Javits Center in New York City in the spring for the makeshift hospital it created to serve COVID-19 patients and worked with the Army Corps of Engineers in Connecticut to build additional beds to support the state’s fight against the pandemic.
As T3 continues to stay relevant and keep the company alive, we are working still to secure more rounds of support and PPP funding that will help our organization stay in business. Telling our story is half the battle in our fight.
If you stand with the events industry, please contact your Congress representative to let them know that our industry is important and you won’t stand by and watch it collapse.
Please reach out to your state representatives now to let them know what you think.