CEA Really Treated Bloggers Well For CES 2009

I have to tip my hat to the folks at the Consumer Elecronics Association for their outstanding treatment towards bloggers during the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show. I was provided a free high-quality carrying bag that I used for most of the show to carry around laptops, a camcorder, business cards, bluetooth microphone and more. The bag has 13 seperate pockets ranging in all sizes and is high quality. Very nice touch. Also, we were provided coupons for free lunch during the course of the entire show – if you got there early enough, it was a boxed lunch that was actually pretty decent (choice of Italian, Club, and other sandwiches) that had a cookie, Apple, chips, etc. Vegetarians were also supported.

The bloggers lounge had high quality internet connections as well as Wifi, multiple couches, tables, and free coffee, soda, water, and more. They gave away free CES-labeled USB thumbdrives (512mb) like they were candy. However, what is truly strange is that CES is NOT blanketed with Wifi. It blows my mind that they don’t have some sort of free or pay-per-use all over the Las Vegas Convention Center for CES, which had 130,000 attendees this year – that is a serious cash magnet. So, the blogger’s lounge was really my retreat to put some of the content up from the last few days.

Everyone was super helpful and it was great to meet other bloggers. Networking is king at CES.

Here’s a shot from the press lounge, not the bloggers lounge, but gives you an idea of the setup. I was sitting in the middle of course, next to an Australian woman who worked for a Paper out in LA. Stan is on the right talking to his wife, I believe. I’ll have to find that Australian woman’s card and edit this post with her name accordingly. She was a cool chick. Before Stan sat there on the right, another beautiful woman sat in his place and I sat in the middle. It was a nice seat, that’s all I can say.